Entrepreneurs Are Stupid & Selfish
“Building a business”. That seems like a strange term to me when the reality is more like “Build, Break, Rebuild, Break, Rebuild, Question Your Sanity, Build”. It’s also an incredibly lonely job.
You have your very small, tight knit circle of people that you can talk about the *real* business challenges with. Those things that you don’t ever talk about in public because the public is where you put on your smiling, ‘everything is groovy’, face. Whether you’re on top of the world, or have two weeks worth of money left, that face stays the same.
I get it, I don’t have to like it, but I get it. No one buys failure, and no one wants to take on risk. If I was hiring someone I wouldn’t buy from them either if I was worried about their solvency. It is what it is. The only people you’ll hear talking about their failures are those who have exited, or those who don’t understand the psychology of buyers.
So I won’t make this a “Here’s what I learned” post, or talk about the trials and tribulations because frankly the only thing I’ve learned is that every situation is different. If you want to ride a rollercoaster of stress and fear and exhaustion I’m happy to give you my advice, but you’ll do that with or without my advice. Maybe that’s what building a business really is. I’ve built four now, and that seems to be the only common denominator between them. Or maybe I’m just really bad at building businesses.
I can’t think of a single instance in which it wasn’t sheer, dumb luck that led me to some piece of insight or to a connection that made a difference to my survival.
All those books and posts and advice columns about “The 10 things successful people do” or “How I dominated” or “Learning to fail” are pretty much useless as far as I’m concerned. I can’t think of a single instance in which it wasn’t sheer, dumb luck that led me to some piece of insight or to a connection that made a difference to my survival. I certainly know plenty of people who are smarter, work harder, have better ideas, or *something* that is deserving of recognition…and yet never get it. Never discount luck.
“You make your own luck”. No. No you don’t. And F you for saying so.
“You make your own luck”. No. No you don’t. And F you for saying so. You make your own *potential* for opportunities. But again, I know a lot of people who do that better than I do and they never find traction. So on behalf of those people I find it offensive to just suggest that if they worked a little harder, networked a little better, followed the right process, read the right book, etc. that ‘luck’ would find them.
You know what I’ve done to deserve more than most people? Nothing. Not a damned thing. Nor have I done anything to deserve less. There are a lot of things about Silicon Valley that I don’t miss, but to its credit it is the one place on earth in which that concept is fully understood. Failure is expected, failure is an asset, failure is experience that can be leveraged.
My company was just acquired, after having rebuilt it twice (not that the public ever knew that, remember to keep your smiley face on). And the emails have come pouring in, from wealth management advisors, to friends joking about my impending retirement. I want to laugh when I read them. If they only knew. Is my life changed? Sure. New company, great group of people, great work to grind on and keep my mind engaged, all the things I look for. But retire? Please. That’s never in my future, even if it was financially possible, it’s not part of my future. I can’t even comprehend the notion of not working to build something.
Maybe that’s what an entrepreneur is. A really stupid person who would risk everything to be able to do what they feel they have to do.
Maybe that’s the point of this long rambling post at 2am. I would do what I do for free. Maybe that’s what an entrepreneur is. A really stupid person who would risk everything to be able to do what they feel they have to do. And let’s face it, it is pretty stupid and selfish.
Sometimes you’re going to step up to the plate and whiff, sometimes you’re going to knock the cover off the ball. But I think it’s the stepping up to the plate part that we should be honoring, because there sure seems to be a lot of luck involved in whether you hit the ball or not…regardless of your skill level.
Or maybe it’s just the Ambien talking.
