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The idea of becoming an entrepreneur is one that has occurred to everyone at some point or another. Most often at six in the morning when you have to get up to go to work for someone who you don't really care for for less money than you are worth. Yet only a small number of people ever truly make the attempt to create their own business and of those who do only a handful succeed, so what are the characteristics of someone who creates a business and succeeds. There are many of them but the most important are passion, drive, and courage because without these the others matter very little and with them the others can be learned.

Passion is the first of these necessary traits. No matter what type of business you plan to begin if there isn't something about it that excites you it is unlikely to be successful. This does not mean that you have to love the type of business and it certainly doesn't mean there can't be things about it you dislike. Some of the most successful people are those who change things they don't like. It only means that you have to care passionately about your business. This passion could be a desire to leave something for your children, a desire to create something useful, a desire to change the world or any other desire that you want, but it has to be the first thing you think about in the morning and the last thing you think about at night.

This is where drive comes in. Many of us have things that we are passionate about but it takes more than simply that. Anyone who has ever worked for themselves understands that it is not easier than working for someone else. If you want to be successful working for yourself you must be the most difficult boss you have ever had. Drive means that you are willing to work 100 hours a week and miss it when you aren't there. It is the need to improve and grow in your business because you know you can be the best.

All of this leads to the understanding that working for someone else is actually far easier. This leads into the third necessary trait of a successful entrepreneur that of courage. If you have ever wondered where you are going to have enough money to pay your rent you know a fraction of the worries that trouble the entrepreneur. If you are successful this may eventually become less of an issue, but even then there is the knowledge that most of the aspects of your business are not fully in your control. The economy could change, someone else could come up with a new way of doing your business, you could have an employee get injured and sue you or a law passed that changes everything you do. As an employee all of these and more are something that the boss has to deal with, as the boss there is simply no one else to pass this on to.

These three are by no means the only traits needed to become successful. Running a business requires knowledge, wisdom, flexibility and many more important traits but with courage, drive and passion you have everything you need to learn the others.

Learn more about this author, Elton Gahr.
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