The first few years in business were hard af.
I didn’t know how to run a business, but I was also conflicted about what work was supposed to feel like.
For most of my life, work meant coming home dirty. My back hurt. My hands ached. Even in management, I was a dirty manager. I threw boxes, climbed into back rooms, handled deliveries – whatever was needed to support my team. Shirt and tie or not, I still came home with a dirty white shirt.
Then suddenly, I was working for myself.
No one telling me what to do. No checklist waiting for me at the beginning of my shift. No customers walking through the door. At the stores, people just showed up. I never questioned how or why. It wasn’t my job to care.
Now it was.
People from my old life would ask what I did for work, and that only made things odd. The world wasn’t sure what “working online” meant. Neither was I. It didn’t feel like work… at least not the kind we were taught to recognize as real.
I had to manage myself and convince strangers I was worth paying to grow their businesses. I wasn’t just learning how to run a business. I was questioning the definition of work.
Is this even work? Do I have value if I’m not sore, dusty, or exhausted? If my body isn’t paying the price, does it count?
Around year five, something snapped.
It was like finally finding the edge pieces of a puzzle. Not the full picture, just enough structure to stop guessing. The work stopped feeling random.
I used to get paid to stock shelves, keep stores safe, and create a customer experience that supported the bottom line. That work was visible. You could point to it. You could feel it on your body at the end of the day.
Now my work was defined by the quality of my decisions and the design of my strategies, decisions that determined whether my clients’ businesses grew or stalled.
The labor didn’t disappear. It compressed. My decision-making carried the weight. If pain is your proof of work, this kind leaves no evidence.
So yes, I stay clean now. But I’ve never carried more weight.
