The Way to myself

Of course, the first thing that happened to our business was an expansion of our staff. While, de facto, we had almost no managers beforehand, and everything swam with the flow, now there was a huge interlayer between me and the business: marketing and management, many specialists in “this” and experts in “that”…

My personal time and attention span were too little to manage everything established yet. The administrative pie grew wider and higher, bringing nothing new to our business. On one hand, there was a feeling that a company with management is “right”, and everything was going as it should go. On the other hand, I understood that the company was dying down in front of my eyes. I was losing my influence. I was losing the feeling of the company – and drowning in the flow of bureaucracy! There was a fog of paperwork, separating me from real people and my own feelings of a developing business.

I continued supporting the “system” as a habit, but I didn’t understand why we need these plans, coordination chains, multilayer departments, and tons of reports. I didn’t even look through them!

Multiple instructions, internal orders and regulations, made a group of adherents turn into a bunch of obedient doers. Releasing the staff from their responsibilities regarding “what” and “how” they should do their jobs, I fully put all of them on myself.

At the same time, the flywheel of bureaucracy was moving faster, and the net expanded. 30, 40, and later 60 companies in 10 regions of the country. I stopped visiting the restaurants’ openings and started living my own life, while the business lived its own. I didn’t see our clients and guests, but only my managers’ reports. I became a little part of a huge managerial machine, and I didn’t own the business any more – it owned me. Moreover, the service quality and profitability were decreasing.

Once I went into one of our restaurants as a common visitor and sat at a table counting on a waiter to come. By the way, he was close by, but he didn’t hurry at all. Then I came to him asking: “Why don’t you serve me?” The answer was brief: “That’s not my table”.

At that very moment I understood, what my business had turned into. Our employees, who used to be part of a close-knit highly qualified team before, didn’t care anymore about whether or not our clients were served well. That young man didn’t see me as a guest, but just as a part of the interior, which he categorized as “my table – not my table”.

THAT WAS THE MOMENT WHEN I FIRST THOUGHT THAT AFTER BECOMING A SLAVE OF THE MACHINE I HAD MADE MYSELF, I STOPPED LOVING – PEOPLE, BUSINESS, AND THE WORLD.

That’s when I felt that I was losing myself. Just like a hamster, which eternally spins its wheel and can never get off. If at one time I saw the business as a source of joy, inspiration and energy, now it was just making me desolate.

Why?

The huge effort put into the business, brought nothing but exhaustion. Everything I did lost its liveliness, leaving pure mechanics.

Year by year, my life looked wealthier, and I had more opportunities to enjoy it. However, I felt worse and worse emotionally. Meeting friends and experiencing some lighter emotions, which can be bought for money, helped me avoid depression.

However, the tiredness was accumulated, while joy and love gradually went away. One day I understood that I’d lost the easygoing spirit which was natural to me. The deal I had didn’t cheer me up. The weariness of life reached the peak, and I wanted nothing: no business, no money, no love, no new ideas or projects…

Nothing I possessed encouraged me to feel the passion and the taste for life. I had to always seek for – and come up with some new sources of joy, inspiration, and reasons to live.

I STARTED ASKING MYSELF: WHO AM I AT ALL? WHY DOES THE WORLD NEED ME? DOES IT ACTUALLY NEED ME, AND DO I NEED IT? WHY WAS I BORN AND WHAT SHOULD I DO? I DIDN’T HAVE ANY ANSWERS, BUT I HAD A FEELING THAT I COULDN’T LIVE THE WAY I DID ANYMORE.

So, I found a way to change everything. “I guess, I should get married! I’ll get married and everything will improve. A family will fill my life with new meaning, and change its quality. I will settle down, calm down, and I will feel better”.

By the way, I noticed that as soon as I set an inner goal for myself, everything seems to happen without much effort. For example, that’s the way important people come into my life: we meet and get to know each other by chance, I don’t go out of my way to make this happen. And the opposite is true: usually, nothing goes well with the people I look for.

And in the same way, by chance, I met my future wife Marina. We became friends, and we had a wonderful relationship which developed easily and naturally. I liked giving my attention to her, flirting, taking care of her. So, I was absolutely sure that: first, I must get married; second, it must be with Marina.

After half a year since our meeting, I made a proposal. And three months later we got married. I got a new role: I became a husband. We found some new activities to do together, some mutual rights and duties. Our leisure time became totally different.

Once I was travelling by bus, when my phone rang. Marina told me we were going to have a baby. My first child! It’s really difficult to describe my feelings at that time: joy, surprise, perplexity, responsibility, tenderness… Something new was about to come into my life.

By the way, that was the moment when I decided to quit smoking. And I’ve never smoked since then. Because I was going to have a baby. What would she think of her father? What example would I be giving her?

As soon as Marina appeared in my life, we built a family and gave birth to our baby, a new period in my life had started. A new kind of energy came into it. Many things changed in my mind as well: I started living not only concerned with myself, but others as well. I became responsible for my family. Gradually, my interests changed too.

Many things were changing. But not my habit of having a free, independent life style, or taste for bachelor parties with friends and entertainment. I couldn’t leave that behind, neither did I want to do so.

That way a year passed and another one did… I was an adult married man. I worked on my family and my business, which was growing rapidly and required a lot of my attention. I thought of my business as my child, which I fed and helped grow for many years. And everything that happened to it affected me a lot.

More frequently the same dreadful thoughts came to my mind. “I devoted myself to my business till the very end. I established lots of successful projects. And where is my joy, calmness, satisfaction for everything I’ve done? When will this rat race finish? Why don’t I control my business, instead of it controlling me?”

There were no answers so far. I still didn’t understand, who I was and what I was here for. I felt as if I was driving staring at the gauges, without seeing the road, moving almost as a blind man.

Meanwhile the number of restaurants increased. One moment, I felt bored with replicating my restaurants, and working in public catering business altogether. And the competition became too tough, because I prefer working on the underserved markets, creating my own new niches.

That way, step by step, I was coming closer to the next important twist in my life. I was done working in the business I had built up from nothing. The business I put so much effort, attention, and energy into.

Together with my partner, we reached an agreement about the conditions for me leaving the company pretty fast. I thanked him for the cooperation and, as soon as we accomplished our mutual commitments, we parted.

As an entrepreneur, I find some pleasure in imagining and creating something that has never been thought of before. After finishing one project, I started thinking about a new one immediately. I started trying to find a fresh idea, a new sphere where I can establish something original.

In those days there was nothing like a shopping mall, gathering many manufacturers and sellers of a narrow niche together in Novosibirsk, – and in Siberia at all. For example, if you decided to do some home repairs, you would have to wander around the city. You’d buy some wallpaper in one place, electrics – in another one, furniture and interior decor – in the third, and plumbing – somewhere else… That was extremely inconvenient for both: buyers and manufacturers. I understood: there it was – a wonderful brand-new field for business!

WHILE OTHERS THINK ABOUT SEPARATION, I WILL MERGE.

That occurred to be the key point to achieving the future success of “Bolshaya Medveditsa” trade and exhibition center: give your customers an opportunity to choose, compare and buy all the things they need for their construction or repair work in one and the same place.

I was also inspired by the idea of building “Bolshaya Medveditsa” center, I was creating not only a certain kind of service or products, but also the space itself. A kind of environment for other people and companies to establish and develop. Stores, cafes, restaurants, service companies created a natural synergy effect all together. A huge number of goods, services, and other offers, attracted a significant number of people – potential buyers. On the other hand, a high quantity of buyers stimulated sellers to provide more services, goods and products.

My goal was, in other words, to build a suitable space for the manufacturers and to assist them. The idea proved to be effective: “Bolshaya Medveditsa” lives, develops and prospers to this day.

For about two or three years, I worked on the new business with my natural passion and inspiration. The project pleased me with new opportunities and unexpected solutions. I was able to create and imagine. I had total freedom to design something brand-new. However, later on, the situation repeated again. I ran into the same wall again. I got that feeling of being disappointed and following it – a sense of the emptiness and meaninglessness of everything I had been doing.

Business and daily rush seized me so much that there was no escape from my depression. I exchanged my expensive cars with the ones which cost a fortune, spent more money on clothes, chose absolutely unbelievable (regarding the price as well) destinations for my trips… Nothing I could imagine made my life more cheerful or better.

More often I started feeling I was a character of a famous joke about an owner of a luxurious yacht, who felt happy twice in his life only: when he bought it first, and when he managed to finally sell it.

That was the way I used to live those days: I felt a short flash of a desire to possess something new. I got it and, almost immediately, that feeling of inner emptiness came. To feel more alive, I always had to find some new reasons to get an emotional rush. More and more, I felt that I was not living, but just riding the same carousel in a circle.

Those days, I travelled all over the world looking for something (I didn’t actually know, what). That was a situation we call: go there – I don’t know where, get that – I don’t know what. There was hardly anything I hadn’t tried! I attended different workshops, studied everything that could catch my attention or give me a hint of a hope to find the answers to the most important questions. I tried everything I had met in my way. Everything the consumer’s world could offer – expensive or cheap, extreme or safe, classic or exotic…

All those things were done for one and only one reason: to feel happy, to find a new source of joy and inspiration. Nevertheless, days went by, – and the feeling of boredom came. Everything I’d used to love – skiing, yachts, parties – sooner or later stopped grasping any of my interest.

WHERE HAS MY HAPPINESS GONE? WHERE IS THE LOVE AND JOY WHICH USED TO BE WITH ME SINCE CHILDHOOD? WHO AM I? WHAT WAS I BORN FOR? WHAT SHOULD I DO IN THIS WORLD?

These questions didn’t let go of me. I was struggling, but I couldn’t find any answers yet. Also, I understood that I’d lost my freedom. Me, a person who values his freedom more than anything else, gave it up to his own business and entertainment. I lost myself in the lifestyle I used to live those days.

My feeling of disappointment worsened, taking me down to a new personal crisis. Some would ask: “What else do you need?! You’ve got a stable business, a nice family, a wife and a child… Everything seems to be great!” That was what my life seemed to be like from an observer’s point of view, but there was emptiness inside.

Needless to say, my disappointment affected all and each sphere in my life, demolishing them. The first line to be hit were my relationships with my closest ones, as I brought that annoyance and disappointment home. Though, my family which I wished could become my new support, didn’t save me from my inner pain.

In all honesty, one day I just stopped feeling what was going on in my own home. I started fighting with my wife more often. Once I had a huge fight with Marina right after coming back home from a yacht trip with my friends. So huge, that we decided to break up.

We lived apart for about a week. I had enough time to think about what my life had turned into. Those days the thought I could lose my family came to my mind for the first time. Meanwhile, it was absolutely clear that Marina didn’t want that and she was dreaming about our happy family life together. It was me and no one else, as if I were trapped in a dark labyrinth, trying to escape from it without knowing where the exit was.

MY WILL TO DO THINGS HAD ALL BUT LEFT. I HAD NEITHER POWER, NOR WISH TO DO ANYTHING AT ALL. THAT WAS THE DEAD END.

I COULDN’T LIVE THAT WAY ANYMORE. THERE WAS A NEED TO CHANGE MY LIFE, TO LIVE SOME DIFFERENT WAY… BUT WHAT DID THAT “DIFFERENT” MEAN?

That’s when there was a huge change in my mind. Maybe, the most important one. I started getting that if you want to escape from a dead end, you need to totally change your life.