This week I caught up with a friend who started a company last year. The company has customers and is growing slowly. She recently realized that the market dynamics being what they are, the company likely won’t be the grand slam she originally envisioned. So now she’s considering what to do next: push along with the company even though the odds aren’t great, or begin looking for another problem to solve.

During our conversation, she said something that caught my attention: Building the current company was fun and gave her something exciting to work on after leaving her nine-to-five job every day. The idea of not having another idea to work on immediately is unsettling. She wants to stay in building mode.

The entrepreneurial bug has bitten my friend. She tried it and she loves it. The idea of working only her corporate job isn’t appealing because she feels like she’s just going through the motions there.

When people who are wired to be entrepreneurs get a taste of it, they don’t want anything else. The idea of not working on a company becomes foreign to them. It’s why many entrepreneurs say they’re unemployable. Being an entrepreneur and constantly racking your brain to solve problems makes entrepreneurs feel alive. Seeing how your hard work and cognitive effort turn into a product or service that others use is rewarding on a level that only entrepreneurs can understand.

And that’s why I’ve always felt that entrepreneurship is addictive. When people get a taste of it, there’s often no going back.