This week on Clarity Compressed I sat down with someone who’s the embodiment of a career entrepreneur. Jim Fitzpatrick has been in the automotive world for over 20 years, owning and managing a dealership, then starting an advertising agency with his son, founding the CBT Automotive Network, and most recently the Atlanta Small Business Network.

Jim found a lot of great solutions for problems he saw, first in automotive and now into the universe of small businesses (98% of the ENTIRE business economy is made of businesses between 1 and 500 employees) in Atlanta and the world. As someone who founded a company with his son and works everyday with his wife, he is also a real example of how family business can work. He gives us some pointers on that very topic. If you want to hear more about true entrepreneurship, tune in to the podcast.

Entrepreneurship has been a common theme throughout Jim’s career. I’m not talking about it in the sense of valuing your time like money or constantly trying to make business connections.

I’m talking about entrepreneurship in the sense of seeing a problem, looking at your resources and passions, and then addressing it.

Time and time again, this has been how I’ve proceeded in my life.

Take Congruent, an agency that’s my main focus right now. Congruent started over five years ago, not as a business but as a solution for a problem we had at Image Auto. We needed to keep everybody aligned with the mission, vision, and values of the company even though they were spread out all across the northeast region. I saw a growing problem in the company, and dug in to find a solution to address it. This resulted, years down the line, in a successful marketing agency.

This approach to entrepreneurship -- actually making changes to solve problems instead of just complaining or throwing your voice into the ‘conversation -- ties back to last week’s episode. You get to choose how you feel and act. You might not have control over the outcomes, but your personal choice lets you control you. Your response to challenges.

GRATITUDE is like a universal topic this time of year. I personally have much to be grateful for: my wife, kids, and family. A strong business. And this great community. A community built on sharing best practices and a "rising tides raise all ships" mentality.

People in the entrepreneurial and business worlds often speak about the same things when they talk about their path. We’ll say we want to 10x our business or hack our growth. We’ll talk about grinding every day and leveling up. The thing we sometimes don’t talk about is the pain of it; the transaction costs.

On the latest episode of Dealers Compressed, I wanted to continue a thought from last week. When we have difficult conversations, it’s obviously a point of pain, but a lot of constructive things come from them. This pain is part of something I call the TRANSACTION OF GROWTH.

There are costs to growing. There’s pain. Think about how your body gets stronger. You work out and physically push your limits so that your body adapts. To build muscle and gain strength, your existing muscle has to tear and regrow.

That’s an analogy for transaction of growth.

In this week’s episode of Dealers Compressed, I touch on the concept of transaction of growth and how it fuels my gratitude this season and all through the year. It’s something important to keep in mind. I’ve never looked back after a hard day’s work and regretted it, even if it cost me something. And that’s something I’m grateful for.