Although the life of the entrepreneur can be difficult, it can also be extremely rewarding. It just depends on what you consider to be a reward. You see, people have a tendency to disagree about a lot of things. Some people would say that success is measured financially, while others may rate success as recognition, popularity or in many other ways.

Going into business for yourself requires that you determine your personal meaning of success first. If you do not define this word in your own terms, you have no way of measuring your successes or failures. You literally can achieve a form of success that does not fit into your definition. Would you know when you achieved it? Would you actually look at a success as a failure?

I have learned that success comes in many forms. It can be as simple as someone remembering the name of your company, and as complex as landing your first ten thousand dollar deal. However you measure success is entirely up to you. No one can judge this for you, and often is is simply a perspective or a personal opinion.

The path to success is the one less traveled. Others before you have walked it. Others before you have fallen by the wayside. Depending on your business and your plan, success will often be an elusive animal, hard to find and swift to elude you just when you think it is around the corner. It is because of this that I have made up an alphabet or in other words , the "ABC's of the Entrepreneur".

You may agree or disagree with these. These are some personal opinions of mine.

1. A is for Attitude. You must keep a good one. Without a good attitude you will self destruct.

2. B is for Boldness. You must be bold to face the challenges of the entrepreneur.

3. C is for Cashflow. In order for the business to survive you must generate some source of cashflow.

4. D is for Determination. You cannot be beaten unless you give up.

5. E is for Energy. Energy combined with a clear vision can bring you success.

6. F is for Fortitude. There will be times when you feel like giving up, don't!

7. G is for Giving. Give to others and you will make a difference that will be rewarded.

8. H is for Help. Know when to ask for it and don't be afraid to.

9. I is for Interest. Generate interest from others in your business for greater success.

10. J is for Journal. Keep track of your successes so you have something to refer to in times of doubt or fear.

11. K is for Knowing. Know what others have done to be successful. Read, study and implement.

12. L is for Living. You must maintain balance. All work and no play will wear on you.

13. M is for Making a difference. The smallest things can make the greatest difference. Move forward one step at a time.

14. N is for Never quit. Winners never quit.

15. O is for Order. Try to maintain an order in your life that balances your needs, both emotional and physical.

16. P is for Paying Back. Always make every effort to return favors and make referrals.

17. Q is for Questioning the status quo. Always ask why, do not accept things the way that they are if they are not favorable to your situation. Look for a better way.

18. R is for Rest. Be sure to rest when you need it to avoid burnout.

19. S is for Success. Success is the prize, know what it looks like and keep your eye on it. Emulate others success whenever possible.

20. T is for Time Management. I know it is difficult. Try starting with small points and work your way up.

21. U is for Unbeatable. Unbeatable is a state of mind, not a physical characteristic.

22. V is for Victory. Celebrate every one no matter how large or small.

23. W is for Work. You will really know what this word means.

24. X is for Xtremes. Sometimes success requires breaking rules. Sometimes it requires getting attention. Read my e-book!

25. Y is for You. Without you, would your company still exist? Empower others to help you.

26. Z is for Zone. When you find the success zone, stay in it. Remember what you did to get there.

Being an Entrepreneur has it's challenges, but without challenge, there can be no reward. Face your challenges and realize your success!

In business, we sometimes find ourselves playing the game. We know what needs to be done and because of our upbringing and being taught an employee mentality since we were children, we go to work in our business as employees rather than entrepreneurs. We are in essence playing the game.

Business however requires a strategy to win. Much like playing Scrabble, it is not the number of hours that we work that makes us successful. It is the strategy in the way that we work that makes the difference. We can be employees in our business or we can create jobs for employees in our business. The choice is ours.

When we are looking at our business from day to day it is easy to get lost in the details of our daily tasks. We become overwhelmed with the minute details, trying to play all of the roles that are required to keep the business going along the path of our vision of what it is supposed to be. We find it difficult to see how we can trust others to fulfill those roles and do the job as good as we might. It is hard to let go.

The truth is that as we continue to hold on to our task load, we defeat the purpose of having a business in the first place. To work less and earn more. Thus we find ourselves burnt out, depressed and just plain tired of all of the crap that goes into running the business.

Many people at the point of frustration simply give up and go back to the world of being an employee. Rather that take the steps that could ultimately make the business work, we break down and give up, thinking that it is hopeless and that we can never change.

I recently read a book called "The E Myth Revisited". It talks about business and how to shift the thinking from being an employee to being an entrepreneur. It is a very easy read and it has a lot of really good ideas in it. I highly recommend it.

So what does this have to do with Scrabble? Nothing really except that without the strategy I usually lose. In fact in the more than 30 times I have played Susan I have only won one time. Is it because I am stupid? Maybe. however I believe that that is not the reason. I believe that Susan wins because she has a strategy to win.

One day my strategy will be as good as hers. One day I will win many games in a row. Until then, I will continue to work on my strategy. I will develop my strategy based on what she does to win. I will observe, copy, emulate and downright mimic what she does and then modify it to my own style.

Isn't that how we win in business too?

An admission of failure is a very personal thing and it should be done with those whom we have a special relationship. Often we can find it difficult to admit to those we love that we have failed. It is especially difficult to admit failure to those who had expected it from the beginning.

To be wildly successful at anything requires us to go into a venture with a narrow definition of what success looks like. if we have not defined success before we attempt something, how do we know when it is time to give up on it and try something else?

Most people define success as having a dollar amount attached to it, but it is always not a financial reward that comes with success, often success is totally unrelated to finance.

Therefore as we work in a business we must be prepared to make a determination as to what success in that business looks like. If our success depends on a financial reward, we need to know what we must do to achieve that reward, otherwise we are at risk of failure. If on the other hand success is determined by the impact that we have on the lives of others, we can not always expect that this success will have financial reward.

So is it possible then to actually fail and succeed at the same time? This is the point that I would like you to ponder. As you go through your life, ask yourself what the impact is that you have had on the lives of others. Then weigh that impact on the result that you have achieved. It may not be a situation where you can claim a financial victory immediately, but it may also be a situation where you are primed to go forward and accomplish something that will reap a great financial reward.

It is with this thought that I would like to close this article. I know you have read the books that used this phrase and I believe that to achieve success we must all be prepared to live by these words. Whether we are successful now or have been in the past, we are all involved in a process of "Failing Forward" and it is in this common condition that we should all remember to be supportive of others when we see their need for support.

On the other hand, there are predators that travel in packs because they instinctively know that in the search for prey, some potential meals have the ability to defend themselves, and a group attack is usually more effective. This too ensures the survival of the species because, without the pack, some predators would literally starve to death.

In the large corporate world, herds and packs are replaced by boards of directors, employee teams, shareholders, and subsidiaries. These are groups of people who come together to pool their abilities in support of the agenda or goals of the corporation. In essence this ensures the future success of the business. In the large corporate world, failing companies are often absorbed by successful ones in mergers and through acquisitions. Rarely does a large company just "go out of business" or become extinct. They are usually simply bought by another large company.

In the small business world, the entrepreneur is the animal who has wandered away from the herd. Sometimes it happens because of unemployment, but often it is because they have a desire to be independent from the politics of the corporation, or simply to be self-sufficient. Fortunately for the small business owner, a community exists where they can count on others to help them to be successful. It is the community of business-to-business networking.

Not all small business owners are aware of the opportunities of success involved in business networking. In fact, if I were to make a guess at how many businesses are involved in networking, I would guess the number to be around less than 10 percent of all businesses. This is unfortunate because not only is there a great deal of opportunity for acquiring more new business in the networking environment, there are also methods of learning to be more successful and to be a bit safer in the business community.

Why would I link safety in numbers, animals and small business? Because in the business world at large, predators exist. Corporations have learned that a part of doing business is putting measures of security in place through patents, copyrights, server firewalls, policies, and a myriad of other functions that occur on a daily basis often with employees dedicated to these. In the environment of small business, we often are not even aware of the threats and if we are, rarely do we have the means within our budget to protect ourselves against them.

Let me ask you a question. Have you ever done work for someone who refused to or simply never paid you? If you have never had this experience, I applaud your extreme streak of good luck. On the other hand, maybe you have not been in business for very long so this painful experience may be looming on the horizon.

In any case, when this does happen to you, what will you do? Contact the lawyer? File suit? Complain to a friend? Accept it and move on? Most people tend to simply accept it and move on. Some cases may involve inventory that you can write it off as a loss on your taxes, but some cases involve intellectual property where there is no monetary resolution. The sad reality is that often there is no justice for you, no satisfaction, and ultimately no payment.

When one opens the figurative doors of their small business, they do so with a lot of enthusiasm. To maintain the daily pressures of meeting expenses requires a great deal of positive mental attitude. It means that even when things are tough, you have to be upbeat, and forge ahead in order to survive. This world of positive attitude dictates that we eliminate negative thoughts so that we can remain focused on our goals. In fact as communities of small business owners develop, it is almost an unspoken rule that negativity be eliminated from conversation on every level. After all you would not want to admit to a prospective client that things are not going well and you are going to have to file bankruptcy if you don't close this deal.

In the same vein, as the predator attacks the small business owner and feeds upon them, the entrepreneur is reluctant to talk about this negative experience. In some cases, the predator is working within the peer group of the victim. As the predator continues to feed, several members of the group may have fallen victim, but because of the fear of reprisal among the group for saying negative things about another "nice" member of the group, they remain silent. They are afraid that if they say anything negative about the predator, that they themselves will be viewed in a negative way.

People are afraid of being accused of slandering another. They are afraid that no one will believe that this person has really done what they are accused of and that it will further damage their own reputation if they become vocal. Have you ever felt this way? Has this happened to you? I am willing to bet that there are those reading this who feel the same way.

The truth is in my opinion, and this is simply my opinion, that as long as the predator is allowed to continue to function in a group, they will continue to do harm to individuals within the group. After they have victimized a good portion of the group, they simply move on. So how can we change this, how can we stop it? Is it just a question of taking responsibility to protect the others? Does it have to be a matter of risking our own reputation to try to protect others?

Until we change the paradigm of responsibility and belief, the predator will continue on, business as usual. Until we can find it acceptable to hear the honest truth about someone who appears to be a "nice" person, the predator will continue to thrive in our midst. There is safety in numbers unless we have blinders on. Without the ability to voice the experiences we have without tainting our own reputation, we will continue to suffer our losses.