I have a confession to make. I am not totally confident that I want to make this confession public, but that’s the whole point of the blog right? Documenting our start-up journey? So here it is. I’m a bad wife. Yes. It’s true. I am. And here’s why. You know how some women day dream about flying off to a secluded spa for 3 days with no cell service and hourly massages and wine and dinner that has no calories, or screaming children? Well here is what I daydream about. Boring. Sometimes I just daydream about life being boring. That my husband would get up at a normal hour (not 4am), we’d sit and have coffee together, get the kids off to school and then he would head off in his car to his predictable day that begins at 8:30am. He would work diligently for the next 8 hours and clock out at 5pm and be home for dinner at 5:30. We would all play, device free, until bed. And every two weeks, a very predictable paycheck would be deposited into our account. Ahhh. I just want to hang out in this monotonous bliss for a second.

Isn’t it awful? I’m awful. Go ahead and think it. I know I am. Don’t get me wrong, I am totally supportive of his career choice and I know first hand how GREAT of a leader he is, and I love watching him be passionate about his work. But some days, some days I just wish he went to work, collected his check, and came home. It seems like life would be easy that way. I know that if there is no risk, there is no reward. And I saw how that played out at Snagajob and I am so grateful that he is an entrepreneur, but that was a different time. The risk was small. There were no kids, no tuitions to worry about, no concerns about what stress does to your health, no mortgage. Yes there were investors we didn’t want to disappoint or lose their money. Yes there were employees counting on a paycheck, but those individuals all assumed their own risk when they invested their money or career into a start-up. (You can see I am not the founder when I talk like that! I’d be surprised if Shawn even approves that statement into this post!) But if I am being honest, that is how I feel. Is there a support group for wives of entrepreneurs? I should start one if there isn’t.

The ironic thing is that he isn’t the absent dad, or distracted dad, or stressed out dad. He is totally present in the moment and easy going. Yes, he takes everything seriously (type A would be an understatement), but he has something that not all entrepreneurs possess. Faith.

You see, Shawn grew up in a Christian household. Shawn’s dad was a pastor and Shawn wasn’t the typical pastor’s kid who rebelled against the faith. He has been a believer for as long as he can remember, and not just someone who says he believes and goes to church because it’s good for your kids or for optics. He gets up every single morning and reads his bible, writes in his journal and prays. Before he even looks at his phone. This intense faith and belief that if it’s God’s will, it will happen, well, that is what enables him to be an in-the-moment dad and husband, despite the startup stress.

I, too, am now a Christian thanks to Shawn. My journey was different than his, and still is, but I also have that faith. It is just that I have to CONSTANTLY remind myself of it. It doesn’t come as naturally to me as it does to him. But it is at the center of our lives and our house, and certainly in our business world. With some grit, brains, hard work and God’s will, we will eventually live that predictable life, because goHappy will work. Or it won’t work. And either way, we will be at peace with it.

I often tease Shawn and say, “Hey, at least life isn’t boring!” I truly don’t know what we will be doing this time next year. Part of me loves it, and part of me wants boring. At the end of the day, it really doesn’t matter what I want. We will just have to wait and see what the big man upstairs has in store for us.