Dancing With an Invisible Woman

# Dancing With an Invisible Woman

A few years ago, if you had asked me whether I was in a serious relationship, I probably would have laughed and said no. Technically, I would have been telling the truth.

Technically.

But the reality is a little more complicated. Because for the last six years, I've been dancing with an invisible woman.

She doesn't have a phone number. She doesn't have a birthday. She doesn't post cryptic Instagram stories when she's upset. She doesn't ask where this relationship is going.

In fact, she's the perfect partner. She never complains when I stay up until 3 a.m. She never questions why I spend weekends working. She never asks why I canceled plans. She just quietly sits beside me and says, "You should probably finish that proposal first."

And like an idiot, I always listen.

Her name is entrepreneurship.

Sometimes she goes by Loline. Sometimes she introduces herself as a startup idea. Sometimes she's disguised as a client request that was supposed to take thirty minutes but somehow consumes an entire week of my life. Regardless of the name, she's always there. Always waiting. Always wanting more.

The funny thing is that entrepreneurs are terrible people to date. Not bad people. Just terrible people to date.

We answer messages faster from clients than from people we supposedly care about. We remember campaign deadlines but forget anniversaries. We can explain a five year business strategy but somehow struggle to reply to a simple "How was your day?"

We tell ourselves we're building a future. Everyone else just sees us missing the present.

I've been guilty of all of it. There have been moments when someone was sitting right in front of me, talking about their day, while I was mentally calculating budgets, content calendars, project timelines, and whether a client would finally pay an overdue invoice. I would nod at the right moments. Smile occasionally. Throw in a strategic "Wow, that's crazy." Meanwhile, my brain was in an entirely different meeting.

If mind reading existed, I would have been arrested for emotional absenteeism.

The problem isn't that entrepreneurs don't care. The problem is that we care about too many things at the same time. Every opportunity feels important. Every project feels urgent. Every dream feels one step away from becoming real.

So we keep choosing tomorrow. We'll make more time tomorrow. We'll be more present tomorrow. We'll take a break tomorrow. We'll fix the relationship tomorrow.

Tomorrow becomes next week. Next week becomes next month. And before you know it, someone who genuinely cared about you is gone. Not because of one big fight. Not because they stopped loving you. But because they got tired of competing with something they couldn't see.

How do you compete with a dream? How do you compete with a company that doesn't exist yet? How do you compete with a future someone is constantly chasing?

You don't.

Eventually, you just stop running.

I think that's the saddest part. Most entrepreneurial heartbreak doesn't happen dramatically. There are no movie scenes. No screaming matches. No doors slamming shut.

It's usually much quieter. A little less conversation. A little more distance. A few unanswered messages. Longer gaps between calls. Then one day you realize someone who used to know everything about your life now knows almost nothing.

And somehow that's worse. Because there isn't a villain. There's nobody to blame. Just two people slowly drifting apart while life quietly takes over.

The invisible woman never intended to hurt anyone. Neither did I. But intentions don't change outcomes.

One of the strangest moments in entrepreneurship happens when you finally achieve something you've wanted for years. A major client. A successful launch. An award. A milestone.

You stare at the screen. You smile. Maybe you even celebrate for a few minutes. Then your hand instinctively reaches for your phone. Not to post it. Not to share it publicly. But to tell someone.

And suddenly you remember that the person you would have called isn't there anymore.

Success feels different when there's nobody waiting to hear about it. Nobody talks about that part. Nobody talks about how lonely achievement can be.

The world imagines entrepreneurship as a crowded room. Meetings. Networking. Events. Podcasts. Clients. Followers. Messages.

What it often feels like is sitting alone in an office after everyone has gone home, staring at a screen that keeps asking for more from you. More effort. More sacrifice. More patience. More years. Just a little more.

The invisible woman is never satisfied. That's why she's dangerous. Because she always makes a convincing argument. Miss this dinner and you'll finish the proposal. Skip this weekend and you'll launch faster. Ignore this problem and you'll regret it later.

For six years I've listened to those arguments. And to be fair, some of them worked. Loline exists because of them. Projects were completed because of them. Dreams became reality because of them.

But I've started to wonder about the bill that arrives later. The opportunities missed aren't always business opportunities. Sometimes they're human opportunities. Conversations you never had. Moments you never noticed. People you assumed would always be there.

The truth is, nobody tells entrepreneurs that one day they'll have to negotiate with themselves. Not investors. Not clients. Not partners.

Themselves.

One side asks, "How much more can we build?" The other asks, "How much more are we willing to lose while building it?"

I'm still figuring out the answer. Maybe I always will.

But these days I'm trying to remember something important. The business is not my entire life. It is part of my life. A meaningful part. A beautiful part. A part I'm incredibly proud of.

But it shouldn't be the only thing I dance with. Because one day, when the emails stop, the projects end, the campaigns are forgotten, and the numbers no longer matter, I don't want to discover that the only partner left on the dance floor was the invisible woman.

I want there to be real people there too.