Four Ways Frustration Leads To Failure

Ambition can fuel behavior that can actually set you back

Joe Procopio
5 min readJan 16, 2023
image by yanalya

One of the most difficult things for me to come to grips with is that the success I’m constantly striving for always takes longer than I want it to.

If it happens at all.

In my last post, I wrote about how quickly entrepreneurs need to run with their startup idea. There’s only a small window of time in which to act before even the most innovative ideas become obsolete. But it’s like running with scissors. You have to move fast, but if you trip over your own feet, you can hurt yourself pretty badly.

After a couple decades of success, failure, and a ton of time spent living in between the two, I’ve learned that the fire of ambition that fuels your success can burn you pretty badly when the frustration it causes prompts you to do things that might not be in the best interest of your business.

So you wake up most days wondering why you’re not further along, and asking yourself what it’s going to take to get there. Frustration over lack of customers, lack of revenue, lack of traction — however it may present itself today — can put tomorrow’s opportunities at risk.

If you can anticipate the bad behavior that frustration can surface, you can avoid most of the…

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Joe Procopio

I'm a multi-exit, multi-failure entrepreneur. NLG pioneer. Building TeachingStartup.com & GROWERS. Write at Inc.com and BuiltIn.com. More at joeprocopio.com