179: Founder Mental Health Pitfalls

The Bootstrapped Founder

This week I chatted with Patrick Campbell about his exit of ProfitWell to Paddle for $200 million. One of the most mind-blowing things that I experienced during that conversation was hearing Patrick tell me that he feels he needs to build something else to prove that his exit -$200 million- was not just a fluke.

I did not expect that, but I should have because I feel the same way all the time. And the more founders I talk to, whatever stage of their journey they might be on, I hear them tell me the same story too. Whether they just started out or sold their business for millions a few years ago, they still struggle with who they are, what they should be doing, and proving themselves and their worth to others.

00:00:00 Intro
00:00:29 Sponsor
00:01:44 Introduction
00:02:50 Balancing Parenting & Business
00:04:58 Overthinking
00:06:22 Addictions
00:08:03 Dealing with Failure
00:09:45 Not delegating can lead to anxiety
00:11:13 Burnout & Dreading Loss
00:12:49 Navigating imposter syndrome when others appear successful
00:14:44 Second-guessing decisions and dealing with incomplete data
00:16:29 Underestimating and Judging Yourself
00:18:14 Debilitating Shiny Object Syndrome
00:19:54 Feeling guilty for taking a break
00:21:09 Underwhelming Sales
00:24:03 Outro

- Founder Mental Health Pitfalls
- Find your Following, my Twitter course — now with Find your Following Essentials, the 7-day Twitter crash course
- Zero to Sold & The Embedded Entrepreneur, my books on entrepreneurship

This episode is sponsored by Senja.

You can also watch this episode as a video on YouTube.