In business, that instinct is treated almost like a moral virtue. Growth is celebrated, while saying no can feel like failure. I believe that mindset becomes dangerous when applied to service businesses built on trust, expertise, and long-term relationships.
There is a point where pursuing more clients and more revenue starts taking away the very things that made the business valuable in the first place. I learned to think about entrepreneurship through three questions: Who am I? Those questions matter because a business eventually reflects the choices of the person who runs it.
Every entrepreneur wants financial success. Money can provide a better home, better health care, memorable experiences, and greater freedom for ourselves and the people we love. But money cannot purchase additional hours in a day.
It cannot create memories with our families after those moments have passed. Research has highlighted the importance of that distinction. A 2022 study of 32,087 working adults in Abu Dhabi, published in the International Journal of Environmental Research and Public Health, found that job satisfaction, mental health, satisfaction with personal relationships, and the size of a person’s social support network were directly associated with happiness and life satisfaction.
For entrepreneurs, the danger is easy to recognize. Say yes to every client, every opportunity, and every demand, and eventually there is too little time and energy left to serve anyone properly. A 2026 cross-sectional study of 250 entrepreneurs in Thailand found that entrepreneurial addiction was associated with both burnout and a greater intention to exit their businesses.
The researchers’ statistical model indicated that burnout partly mediated that association. There are two forces that make this trap particularly powerful: greed and comparison. By greed, I mean the belief that no amount is ever enough.
Extract — continue reading at the source.
