Inaction breeds doubt and fear. Action breeds confidence and courage.
If you want to conquer fear, do not sit home and think about it.
Go out and get busy.
-Dale Carnegie-

This quotes reminds me of a phone conversation I had with a colleague the other day. She talked about how having a home based business is lonely. (Lonely? I thought to myself. How is that?) She went onto explain that when you are working at home that it is nice to have other people to interact with, but since she is a home based business that she does not get that interaction. She said it would be nice to have someone to call. (I thought, well, you’re calling me right now.) And she went on telling me that other homebased business owners feel the same. (Really? I don’t feel that way, but then again I can be odd.)

My personal feeling is that you own that feeling and you can change it. Don’t sit at home “working” if you really don’t have much to work on. Get out, network. There are lots of people to meet. Pick up the phone, not for an hour conversation with someone you know, but to go out and met someone new. Get to know them on a more personal level and more about their business. Hmmmm, sounds like networking. Decide what networking events you will go to in week and follow up with people you don’t know. That should keep you from feeling lonely and possibly bring you more business in the long run.

On another train of thought, that loops us back to the quote at the top. If you are just “working” at home, that is really inactivity. If you are not out there networking, meeting people or doing whatever it is you have to do to grow your business. You get fearful of meeting with new people. Maybe it’s because you’re shy, you feel you network and don’t get anywhere (one reason might be that you’re not explaining yourself well), it’s too early in the morning (that’s me, I am a night owl), you don’t have transportation. They are all excuses. Excuses will always be there. My best advice is to just get out there. Start with one or two a week and work your way up. Stay consistent, you will see improvement, and I bet you won’t be lonely.

Side note: I am curious, do you feel lonely in your homebased business? (Yes, I want to know if I am the minority.) And what do you do combat that?