Keep that spark lighting, commander!

It’s Sunday night. I needed fresh air and went on a short walk around the block. Surrounded by large and tall buildings everywhere around me. Lights are mostly off already, with a few blinking televisions here and there.

But suddenly I notice a window on the other side of the street, one lighted-up room with just a few people inside. They were moving computers, desks and furniture around the room, having a lot of fun along the way. Probably arranging and designing their own office or studio space, since they haven’t been there before. And it was Sunday night, remember?

A brief look at them and it reminded me of how exciting it is when you’re starting something new. To build and create something out of nothing. To get a few thinkalikes on board and try something that’s still just an idea. To go into the unknown and, for you personally, a new and unexplored area. That’s something I’m glad I got the chance to experience and be able to connect to, since it made my heart beat just by looking how someone else is enjoying in that spark of the moment.

After some time, when your company grows up, you suddenly find yourself surrounded by a lot of different people and it gets harder to maintain the culture and keep people inspired and motivated. And by motivation I don’t mean money. Rather, something that connects and keeps all of you together — often a passion about what you are creating.

At that moment, I somehow made a connection with Voyager.

“We may lose a little weight, gentlemen. But we won’t lose who we are.” — Kathryn Janeway

I recently started rewatching Star Trek, and noticed some similarities between turbulence within small companies and what they were experiencing on the ship.

When Voyager’s crew, after already a year in unknown space, started feeling confused and not motivated, caused by their Heimweh — Captain Janeway found a way to get them back on track by giving them the most challenging and interesting things to handle.

By exploring the new quadrant, she showed them (no matter how far away from home) why they started the journey in the first place, and what’s their mission out there in the wild — to explore the excitement of strange new worlds and to give their best to the ship and the whole crew.

Luckily, she made it. She kept that spark lighting. And not just once. She did it every time the crew needed her to show them the right course.

If you got the chance to run your own company or create a team on your own, there is a huge probability that you look at the early days as the most challenging and hardest times to date.

But you had that spark that made you rollin’ during the first months. The spark which is often forgotten along the way. No matter whether you were a lone ranger or surrounded with thinkalikes in the beginning, you had it. You were pursuing something, giving your best to achieve it.

And to be honest, you probably made a lot of great things in that period of time. Sometimes, even the biggest or boldest achievements were made right there, at the beginning of the journey. However, it’s not easy to maintain the course in the unknown.

If you caught yourself lost in space, recall your mission objectives and align with them. Remember the spark and think of that passion and enthusiasm now and then. It’s something that should still drive you further and be something that inspires you and the rest of the crew. Like it’s making those Sunday all-nighters across the street happy.

Keep that spark going. And keep it lighting, you’ll need it later.

Engage.