Something I’m Thinking About
The early years of a business or idea are often romanticized and looked back on as challenging, yet rewarding times.
We fondly recollect the struggles we faced and the people who were at our side during these crucial moments.
We recount with a slight smile the 16 hour work days and late night conversations over drinks with our partners on how we’re about to change the world.
We muse over all the times things almost blew up but somehow we managed to survive.
These early moments become the “glory days” of our business and the traumas and wins become core memories.
As time goes by, our grandiose dreams might turn into everyday routines.
Ideas evolve, priorities shift and the people we surround ourselves with change.
If we’re fortunate, we’ll stumble into some degree of stability and peace in both our personal and professional lives.
Challenges will always exist but our current ones seem a little easier to tame because we’re much more calculated in our decisions and actions.
Life is far from boring, but still, we find ourselves increasingly bored with its monotony.
We crave more.
Every so often, we like to reconnect with our buddies from “back in the day” and retell some of these old stories.
With each telling the stakes rise and the rewards multiply. Certain stories continue to be retold (and exaggerated) while others fade out of memory.
Years removed, and with a certain degree of survivorship bias, our actual experiences and the stories we tell may begin to diverge.
These subtle revisions to history are usually harmless — they help us tell better tales as well as validate our struggles to others.
Yet, they can also leave us longing for a past that never existed — at least in our present recollection.
There is nothing wrong with romanticizing our past but be careful you are not look at it through a clouded lens.
Some Things I Like To Ask Myself
When looking back at the past, it’s important to remember there will be a difference between what we feel now, versus the actual truth.
When we are able to clearly separate the two it affords us the insight to change our current decisions for the better.
Here are some questions I like to ask myself to help me think clearer. Feel free to download a worksheet and try it yourself.
I’ve answered them to help get your wheels turning as well.
1) What were some of the choices that helped me survive but also might have held me back? Is there something I could have changed?
Hedging my bets has always served me well but at times spread me too thin to really execute well. While it has forced me to build better processes and surround myself with people better than myself, it’s something I am hyper vigilant of.
2) What were some of the negative thoughts, feelings and things that I experienced at the time?
Insecurities around personal finances, fear of failure and the persistent insomnia that tends to follow are the main things that tend to surface for me.
Having ‘survived’ 20+ years as a full time entrepreneur, I’ve learned to trust in myself and my ability to always keep my head above water.
3) Where am I currently struggling and do any of these reasons “rhyme” with my struggles from the past?
I still worry too much about finances and probably overcommit to the future versus existing in the now. This is often sound financial advice but all too often I forego current wins for future bets. I could probably stand to take more chips off the table.
4) When I look back on today in 10 years, what stories will I be embellishing and what ones will I have left behind? Where will I be thriving and where will I be struggling?
The past several years have been high growth years for most of my endeavors. I’m starting to see multiple years of hard work start to snowball and I’m hoping to really continue that momentum.
We’ve done it all organically and I think that sets up for some pretty embellished stories of what went on during these “early years”.
As far as struggles, I’d like to say I’ve moved past the entrepreneurial ADHD but I suspect it’s too ingrained in my DNA. Given this realization, I’ve been learning to focus more strategically but I imagine it will always be something I need to be cognizant of.
5) Where will my future rhyme with my present?
Stable businesses are great but the early days of taking an idea and bringing it into reality is where I really like to be. I suspect this may start to shift away from my projects to other people’s ideas as well as some non-financially motivated social initiatives.
Some Things I’ve Been Reading
I’ll chalk it up to the vicious onset of winter, but i read quite a bit in January.
The Great Mental Models Volume 1: General Thinking Concepts: by Shane Parrish
This entire series is beautifully laid out and provides a well-structured exploration of core thinking frameworks. I read this book in a few short days and have found it useful for effectively naming patterns I often find in my own thought processes.
The Great Mental Models Volume 2: Physics, Chemistry & Biology by Shane Parrish
While I haven’t enjoyed Volume 2 as much as it’s predecessor, I still think it’s a worthwhile follow up to it. My biggest critique is that it often seems to stretch to find a business application to support a scientific principal or law. The whole series is an interesting concept but something was missing from this volume when stacked up to the first.
Historian Will Durant wrote this in this in his 90s as a memoir on what he had learned over his rich and often chaotic life. It was lost and remained unpublished for almost 3 decades until after his death. I found his perspective particularly compelling being that he was a historian who had written an 11 part series on the History of Western Civilization.
It’s interesting that in the chaos of modern life, many of our struggles not only rhyme with recent generations but transcend cultures, civilizations and millennia.
Aside from the content, Will Durant is a true wordsmith and this is a beautiful read.