Day 43: My 5-year wedding anniversary
One of my favorite startup bloggers is Brad Feld. I started following his blog 3 years ago after meeting him at a Foundry event at the CES conference in Vegas (his Venture Capital firm is Foundry Group). He was a big inspiration for me starting to blog my own startup journey and remains an inspiration with his candid and authentic views on everything from his professional life to his personal life.
One of the things Brad blogs a lot about is the emotional process of starting and running a company. He offers great advice on how to deal with the many ups and downs using examples from his own experiences as a founder — including his various bouts of depression over the years — and the countless interactions he has with other founders. He always brings a very open and genuine tone in his writing. Perhaps the most important thing he has done with his writing, or at least the thing that resonates most with me, is raised awareness within the startup community around mental health issues and the importance of having a strong support system.
The reason I bring all this up is twofold. In my own life I’ve had many moments of feeling very up and feeling very down. I’m an emotional person who puts all my passion into whatever I do, both in my personal life and professional life. I often times exhaust myself with this approach and have learned to be more tempered which has helped me. As I start my own company for the first time, reading Brad’s thoughts and experiences helps me further approach things in a better way and it’s important to have resources like that.
The other reason I bring this up is because this weekend is my 5-year wedding anniversary to my wonderful wife. Perhaps the most important thing in life is having a partner who supports you unconditionally in everything you do. It’s sounds like an easy thing to do in a relationship, but it’s often times more challenging in reality. I certainly need to learn to be more unconditionally supportive of my wife. My wife, Sharlene, on the other hand has always been very unconditionally supportive of me (and others in her life for that matter) no matter what I choose to do. It’s one of her best qualities and something I learn from her. I certainly couldn’t take the leap to leave a great job to start my own company without her love and support. I am very lucky to have her in my life and on our 5-year anniversary of being married I’m reminded of how grateful I am she said “I do”.
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