Sowing the Seeds: Week 4 – The Road Less Traveled, by Tatiana – In The Mix #36

October 22, 2009 Tatiana EL-Khouri 12 Comments

This week I feel like I’ve made many strives along my quest to entrepreneurship. I recapped all my movement to MOTU yesterday, to which he gave me a really nice compliment. He said when he set up his businesses over the years, his lawyers have taken care of the paperwork and all the necessary filings but he was impressed that I took the process into my own hands and one by one made it happen. My business filings have been registered to the city, I have my federal EIN number, and procured membership with the appropriate vendors and associations. Most recently, I got my Seller’s Permit for the State of California.

Just looking at the list of things I’ve done is starting to make me feel like I’m making some real headway. Which has made it a natural fit for me to accomplish a lot of the movement on my own. I utilized the services of LegalZoom to assist with my DBA filings. Initially I thought leveraging their services would free up my time to handle other aspects of my business preparation and launch party coordination. However my love for research and over achieving can-do attitude lead me to feeling antsy.

As an impulse buy, I added on an EIN application and Seller’s Permit prep. I regretted my last minute purchase once I talked to my business tax specialist. She informed me of the ease to obtain an EIN number and I found out that getting the Seller’s Permit is free and can be picked up immediately at the Board of Equalization office that is across the street from my local mall. Equipped with this knowledge, I decided to take matters into my own hands.

Yesterday while I was at the Board of Equalization, I couldn’t help but feel the complacency and halfhearted aura in the air. I was placed in a waiting room to fill out my application while I waited to be called in. Upon being called I had not completed my application but was whisked away into a maze of cubicles that were reminiscent of Dilbert. At one point the stack of papers fell from my hands. As I attempted to pick them up, I lost sight of BOE worker. Once I found my apathetic guide, he stood anxiously staring waiting for me to catch up. When I entered his cubicle, before I could sit down and place my application on the desk, he gave me instructions to complete the form as his voice trailed off leaving me alone.

Confused by the disinterest, I had plenty of time to finish my application, review it several times, and read most of the “inspirational” signs on his cubicle wall. Aside from having 3 different signs that proclaimed he was off to lunch, one sign in particular caught my eye. It was bullet points from a sermon by the famed T.D. Jakes entitled, “The Ten Commandments of Working in a Hostile Environment.”

The second commandment on the list stuck out to me the most:

“Don’t expect to be appreciated. Your only expectation should be to get a paycheck. Don’t come to work to have personal relationships. Don’t allow what you do to affect who you are.”

As I read that commandment, waiting for my Seller’s Permit to be approved, I couldn’t help but think of the juxtaposition of my visit compared to the complacent attitude of the BOE worker. Here I am an entrepreneur, carving my own destination and embracing my talents and passions to do something rewarding and fiscally beneficial. At that moment, any doubt I’ve had in the past few weeks about starting this journey quickly subsided.

I began my work career at the tender age of 12 and have personally experienced a variety of workplace dynamics. I’ve tried to make the best of most situations and dealt swiftly when my workplace became toxic. I know many people are not fortunate enough to have their source of contentment and work be one in the same, but I am very happy that I have pushed through my doubt and uncertainty to at least give it a shot.