When we see people like Grant Cardone, Mark Zuckerberg, or Steve jobs, we see their expensive cars, mansions, and extravagant lifestyle. We get so drawn into what they have we forget what it took to get there. As much as we want to believe that these ultra-successful businessmen are just average Joes with a great idea, it couldn't be further from the truth. Entrepreneurs like these are not everyday people. They're different not because of their wealth or idea, but because of their grit, determination, and love of adventure. They're serial risk takers who won't "learn their lesson" and by virtue of that occasionally find great success. 

 

The magnitude of risk it takes for an entrepreneur to achieve this success is often underestimated and can feel like "dancing on a razors edge". Of course, to a true entrepreneur, there's no feeling better than the adrenaline that accompanies such risk. Why else would famed entrepreneur Richard Branson continue to take life-threatening risks like flying a hot-air balloon across the Pacific, which he attempted three times before yielding to his wife's pleas for his safety.  And he's been taking risks of equal magnitude his entire life, in slightly less flashy ways, like the launch of his company Virgin Records in 1972. 

 

It's not just Richard though. Every entrepreneur who's ever lived has taken risks others were unwilling to take--the larger the risk, the larger the reward. Of course, more times than not, "dancing on a razor's edge" leads to some pretty catastrophic falls. The best entrepreneurs--the true, die hard, adventure-addict entrepreneurs--emerge unshaken, tenacious enough to get back up and try again, no matter how disastrous the failure. It may be insanity or it may be genius, but it's precisely this persistence that separates the entrepreneur from the everyday man. After all, the only way to know your limits is to go beyond them now and then. 

 

At the end of the day, being an entrepreneur is about getting up every time you’re knocked down, not for your pride, not for the money, but because there's something inside of you that refuses to settle, something so frightened by mediocrity, that it would rather "dance on a razors edge."

 

Mandy Arthur is Editor in Chief at Success Fastlane. Follow her on twitter @Molly_Dagger