balloon deflating, a little
Rooted MKE has been open just a little over 2 months and I’m writing this blog in tears.
Emotionally I am tired, drained, and on a mini wooden rollercoaster-like the antique one at Six Flags that sort of shakes your body from side to side despite accelerating forward. There are days when I feel so grateful, blessed, and enthusiastic to continue the work of uplifting BIPOC voices and literacy. Sprinkled on top and between these layers are days of discouragement, confusion, anxiety, and uncertainty. Running a business is nuanced and complex. While I think I understood that every day would be different and that I’d wear many hats; I dismissed that there were pieces of me that still need development and nurturing. Those pieces of me are showing up daily and becoming mini speed bumps that I can’t speed over.
I am an introvert. Let’s double back and be honest about that. As a teen and young adult, I presented myself as highly social to mask my insecurities. After years of pretending to be social to pacify the desire to people-please, I’m now on the opposite end of a wide spectrum. I am quiet in social settings because I don’t feel like I am enough and often compare myself to others (self-projecting). In this comparison, I conclude that I have nothing to offer in a room of what I’ve deemed “accomplished” adults and can’t compete with what they contribute to the world. I also am uncomfortable in moments of conflict and avoid tough conversations because it makes me feel uneasy and afraid to use my voice because of how the other person will respond.
Crazy enough, every news story and article shared about the store makes me uncomfortable and fearful. While I am so fortunate to be able to spread awareness about Rooted MKE and widen the lens of who sees what we’re offering; I am anxious because I want to appear polished, poised, and capable. In business, this manifests as me overextending myself and my tiny team. I live comfortably in a space of ideas. The implementation of these ideas with clear processes and procedures is a muscle I am building, reluctantly. While I knew Rooted MKE as a bookstore, academic support center, AND exploration space (a space for kids and parents to come to collaboratively make things and explore creatively) was a lofty goal; The day-to-day ability to execute effectively in all of these areas is exhausting and unsustainable at the current level. As many of you know, I am a wife and mother of two children, a curious and expressive three-year-old and a fearless and busy, exclusively breastfed, soon-to-be one-year-old. My house looks like a mini-tornado came through, my personal life is non-existent and 24/7 I am thinking about the business. When I consider where I am on a scale of ground and wholeness, I am at the point of water boiling into evaporating particles. And yet, I think about how to make the business go.
I don’t share much about the behind of the scenes of the business. My obsession with wanting to be polished and capable leaves no room for unveiling the curtain to showcase the overflowing closet behind the room that appears neat and organized. I’m growing a team while working on my ability to effectively communicate what I need and delegate without micromanaging. I also don’t always know what I need, and how to articulate what I need to others if I don’t know what I need. In this current phase of business ownership, the need waves “hello” after things don’t go as planned, or I teeter an overflow to tasks on my plate and something is spilling on the floor around me. In those moments I have no choice but to acknowledge that I’ve made a mess and need help cleaning it up because it’s clear and visible. I cloud my brain with messages of needing to be perfect and can’t currently let the wall down so that my team can actually support me. Rooted MKE is also my baby, so I struggle with letting others hold her, even if for a moment. While I’m ready to share it with my community in ways that I see are aligned with what’s in my heart, I’m not ready to release it from the swaddle I’ve wrapped tightly around my midsection to be nurtured by anyone else. I fear that my baby will change and morph into something I don’t recognize.
My desire to truly run by business with the mission in the forefront leads me to make decisions based on the impact on the lives we reach, rather than from a financial perspective. I have yet to pay myself and place myself at the back of the line to ensure the team is compensating and high-quality, low-cost services are offered. This too is unsustainable so my shift and reevaluation of business structure and capability are vital to the survival of Rooted and the ability to be a long-standing community business.
Rooted MKE is too big to do alone, and I know this. There are too many moving pieces to keep it going sustainably with me working 7 days a week and still not being able to complete the ever-growing task list that my anxiety and busy baby won’t let me tackle as a pace that will yield the likely unrealistic results I want for a team of one. These past few weeks of business ownership have been rough for me. The fresh helium injected into the balloon of bringing a dream to fruition is stale and mama’s balloon is lingering in the middle of the room. I know that as I grow and become more knowledgeable about running the business this feeling will wean. But today, I’m struggling.