Do you enjoy what you love?

Read that again, slowly...

Do you enjoy what you love?

It is a strange question. And the fact that it needs asking at all says something important about the experience of running your own business.

The 'hats' problem

I was chatting with someone last week who is building a successful agency around the very thing they love. Creativity. The magical, slightly inexplicable process of taking an idea and turning it into something that did not previously exist in the world. Capturing an audience's attention, imagination and heart (I love those three marketing values by the way)

It should be a wonderful experience for them... except they are not enjoying it.

Because in order to build the agency, they have to keep putting down the 'creative hat' and picking up lots of different ones:

• The 'manager hat'

• The 'payroll hat '

• The 'HR hat'

• The 'business development hat'

• The "why has this invoice still not been paid" hat

None of those hats feel as good as the creative one. They do not fit the same way. They do not produce the same feeling of flow, of rightness, of doing the thing you were built to do.

And that's when the Mind Monkeys move in.

• "Maybe you are not cut out for this."

• "Maybe the business side is beyond you."

• "Maybe you should stop building. Put down some of that responsibility. Go back to just making beautiful things."

It is a temping point of view. And it is completely wrong.

The story you are telling yourself

Running (but not enjoying) your own creative business has little to do with the hats themselves. It is about how they fit – more specifically the story you are telling your self about that 'fit'.

It says, "The creative hat is yours. The others belong to someone else – someone more organised, more business-minded, more naturally suited to the administrative, managerial, financial reality of building something".

"Someone who is not you".

But that story was written by an earlier version of you, at a time when the hats were genuinely new and unfamiliar. When the weight of responsibility felt disproportionate to your experience of carrying it.

When every invoice, every difficult conversation, every operational decision felt like proof you were out of your depth. And, more importantly, when the vision you had for building something you truly loved, was small enough to only wear one hat.

But that vision is bigger now. YOU are bigger now.

That previous version of you did not yet have the evidence that the current version has accumulated.

The hats look better on you than you think. They suit the business you are building.

The story just has not caught up yet.

Where The Four Fears® come in

In my work with independent business owners, I have found that the 'hats' problem almost always traces back to one (or more) of The Four Fears®:

• "I'm not ready" (perfectionism) shows up as the belief that you need more experience, more knowledge, more time before you can legitimately wear the non-creative hats with any authority

• "I'm not good enough" (comparisonitis) shows up as the suspicion that other business owners –the ones who seem to manage it all effortlessly – have something you do not. A natural aptitude for the business side that bypassed you entirely

• "What if I don't have time?" (procrastination) shows up as either the endless prioritisation of the creative work over the operational work (because it feels safer) or a complete roadblock around the non-creative tasks which, in turn drains you of the magic you usually bring to your work

• "What if I get it wrong?" (fear of failure) shows up as the paralysis around decisions (hiring, pricing, pitching, positioning, investment) that feel too significant to risk getting wrong and therefore never quite get made
  

In truth, each of these are evidence that the job is stretching you. Which is exactly what building something worthwhile tends to do.

What the better story looks like

Here is the reframe I come back to again and again with the people I work with.

The hats are part of who you are becoming.

Every time you stretch yourself into a conversation about scope or budget, you are building a skill. Every time you make a hiring decision, or set a price, or choose not to take on a piece of work that does not serve your direction, you are developing a capability that your earlier self did not have.

You are, whether it feels like it or not, becoming the business owner your business needs.

Your 'better story' does not pretend the hats fit perfectly. It acknowledges that some of them are still a little stiff, a little unfamiliar, still being broken in. And it holds alongside that the evidence (real, factual, accumulating evidence) that you are wearing them better than you were six months ago. Better than you were a year ago.

That evidence exists. Your story just needs updating to include it.

How we update the story

Think of one hat you have been wearing recently that felt uncomfortable. And ask yourself: what is the story I am telling about how this fits?

Write down the specific words your Mind Monkeys have been telling you:

• "I am not a natural manager"

• "I am not good with money"

• "I am not the right person who can have that kind of conversation"

Now look at what you have written and ask, "When did I decide this was true?"

Almost always, the answer takes you back to an earlier chapter. A moment when the hat was genuinely new, the situation was genuinely unfamiliar, and the evidence for the story was at least partially real. The problem is that the story stuck around long after the evidence (after you) moved on.

The next question is the useful one, "What has changed since then, that this old story has been ignoring?"

Because something has.

It always has.

Every difficult conversation you navigated, every decision you made, every operational challenge you worked through... all of it is evidence that the current version of you is more capable than the story suggests. That evidence does not disappear because the Mind Monkeys are loud. It just gets overlooked.

Writing it down changes that. The act of putting the counter-evidence on paper starts to give your brain something more accurate to work with. And a brain working with accurate data tells a better story.

That is where the better story begins – with a more honest account of what you have actually already done.

Give this next question some time and thought

Think about the last time you felt the desire to put down the 'business hats' and go back to just creating.

What was the story underneath that pull? What was it suggesting to you about your capability, your fit, your right to be doing the thing you are doing?

Write it down. Then ask: is that opinion based on current evidence? Or is it a holdover from an earlier chapter – one that predates the business you have actually built?

The chances are it is the latter. And that the current evidence tells a considerably more capable story than the Mind Monkeys have been letting you believe.

Your turn...

The hats do not have to fit perfectly

And the version of you that keeps wearing them, keeps showing up, keeps building the thing... that version is writing a much better story than the one currently running in your head.

If you want to explore what that better story looks like for your business specifically, the Business Bravery Quiz is a good starting point. Four minutes, a personalised score, and a clear picture of whether it is clarity (what to do next) or bravery (making it happen) you need most right now.

Or, if you would rather have that conversation directly – a free 30-minute call is always an option.

Mark Franklin is The Four Fears® Guy: a transformational mindset coach and speaker working with people who are building something of their own.

Which hat fits least comfortably right now? Drop it in the comments. You might be surprised how many people are nodding along.