There’s a group in my area for caregivers of children aged 0-5 that meets once a week. It’s called “Baby Steps” and last night the discussion was around separation anxiety.

Through our chatting, we struck on a very interesting point. Separation anxiety happens to parents just as much or more than to children. I, for example, started my business to allow me to be at home with my children, and it took my little girl’s own prompting to make me register her for preschool (today was her first day). I had big-time separation anxiety and had to get out of my comfort zone to do what will certainly be best for my daughter.

I only have to think back to the day I moved away from home to know that my mother experienced some major separation anxiety when her eldest child was leaving the nest.

Separation anxiety is basically what happens when you’re forced out of your comfort zone.

I learned last night that separation anxiety is most common with babies aged 10-18 months when they gain the ability to recognize people. They know when someone holding them is not their mother, and most children that age make their anxiety known. But I don’t feel like that anxiety ever really goes away. It just changes depending on our situation in life.

I was thinking about comfort zones when I was brainstorming topics for this blog post, and I thought about my friend Sally Kuhlman’s newest endeavor. Sally has been a virtual assistant for years, that’s how I know her, but she recently launched a new blog “Sally Around the Bay” where she blogs about her adventures around San Francisco Bay. She says that one of the reasons she decided to do this was to force her outside of her comfort zone to try new things.

I think all entrepreneurs can take a cue from Sally.

When’s the last time you separated yourself from yourself? What’s keeping you in your comfort zone? What will it take to force yourself out of it?

Are you afraid to start a blog because you’re afraid of how your thoughts will be viewed by the world? Do it anyway. You know, in this day and age you can hire someone to write your blog posts

Have you been meaning to launch an info product but keep getting in your own way?

Is there a brilliant tele-seminar sitting in your brain waiting for you to get the guts to go ahead and do it?

I was terrified before I first spoke to a group about writing better copy. The first time I got a booth for my business at a trade event I was scared. When I released my second ebook I was no less nervous than I was with my first one. It’s hard to put yourself out there, but you just have to go for it if you want to grow your business and if you want to grow as a person.

Ever since I was a little girl, I wanted to be a writer and to me, having someone value my work enough to publish me is the ultimate marker of my success. I’ve gone way outside of my comfort zone and have started pitching magazines on article ideas. Guess what? An editor has responded to me. They loved my query and it looks like I will be published in a magazine this fall.

Sometimes you’re not getting what you want most because you simply aren’t stepping outside your comfort zone and asking for it.

What would you do if you stopped listening to that voice in your head telling you you’re not good enough, or that everyone will laugh at you?

What if the only thing stopping you from being a brilliant success is you?

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I never knew how much I really loved trees until I moved to a home surrounded by them. Tall, healthy and beautiful hardwood trees are everywhere. A birdfeeder hangs from the Maple in my front yard and in return for feeding them, sparrows and chickadees serenade me throughout the day. A stand of birch in the back will make the perfect spot for a hammock one day and the mighty oaks next door have thrown their acorns into our yard in previous years and tiny oaks are springing up in my flower gardens.

Where I grew up, there weren’t trees. There was an ocean…the beach was my backyard playground…but no trees. I always thought the notion of collecting acorns off the ground and raking leaves in the fall was so poetic. Now my four year old asks every day if it’s fall because of the leaves changing and her and her little sister were thrilled when they saw little green acorns on the grass in our neighbor’s yard.

A couple of evenings ago, we were at our neighbor’s house chatting about the acorns and how the girls would sit out there all day and pick them up. The neighbors loved that idea because the more nuts my girls picked up, the less there would be for the squirrels. She said if she had any idea how many squirrels would show up to enjoy those acorns that she never would have planted oaks all those years ago.

Squirrels are destructive and they actually ate the neighbor’s outbuilding a couple of times. So I understand the frustration.But I can’t help but think, the pleasure she and her neighbors have gotten from that tree over the years must make up for the squirrels.

Trees do a lot for us. Besides the sciency things like cleansing the air, those oaks have provided shade on hot days and a a break from the wind on cold ones. Oaks are gorgeous to look at and I’m sure they must have been climbed by children at one point or another and I know my children will enjoy making crafts out of the fallen acorns over the next few weeks. Squirrels can be a big pain, but they only last while the nuts are on the ground…for a couple of months. Is the joy you get from an oak tree for the rest of the year, for decades, worth more than that?

Do you love your business as much as the day you planted the idea seed? Have you watched it flourish and grow over the years only to discover the squirrels? Of course it’s probably not going to be actual squirrels for you…I’m trying to use a metaphor here…but it might be the headache of bookkeeping or the pain of dealing with crabby customers.

Have you ever caught yourself thinking that if you knew how much hassle it would be, you’d never have started your business in the first place?

I don’t know about you, but I think there’s something awfully sad about that.

As I look out my window and watch a pair of blue jays enjoying the view atop a branch of one of those oak trees, I for one am very glad that my neighbor planted those trees.I actually suggested she get a cat to naturally take care of the squirrel problem.

What I would suggest to you for your squirrel is more complicated than a cat. Maybe you need to rebrand yourself or renovate your marketing message to start attracting different kinds of customers.

And maybe you’re just tired like most solo-preneurs and you just need a break. Maybe your clients and customers whose lives you impact in a positive way feel just as passionately about the product or service you sell as I do about the neighbor’s oaks. And here you are wondering if it was ever worth starting the business in the first place.

No matter how many bad days I have as a business owner, no matter how much I hate my squirrels (taxes and filing and stuff) I would never wish it away. And I’m pretty confident that if I went to my clients and said I wish I never became a writer, at least a couple of them would tell me I’m crazy.

After all, for every pain in the butt squirrel, there’s a beautiful, sweet sparrow.

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