The most important life lesson that I have learned that I like to share with fellow entrepreneurs who have failed in startups or friends and family members who have lost a job is the old Chinese saying that, “Grass survives the heaviest of rock.” The emphasis here is “grass”. If you put a rock on a flower, flower will die. If you put a rock on grass, grass will find a way to survive. As entrepreneurs, we are not entitled to anything. We must not think of ourselves as flowers that deserve sunshine and nutrients. We must accept that we are the lowest form of beings, or we won't find the courage and the clarity to survive. As I learned to say in America, as entrepreneurs, your ass is grass and the world is your lawnmower. So don't go looking for “love” in the wrong places. Good luck, everyone.
Way too many people read Techcrunch and think that's the standard operating procedure for startups. The reality is that it can take you a year before you even hit 1,000 visitors a week...let alone a month.
I think there's something to be said about the value of impatience as well. Wanting to pick up a golf stick today and be Tiger Woods is what makes you walk in the store and pick up that stick - then go to the driving range. Otherwise surfing around mindlessly and watching TV is going to always more convenient than actually doing some kind of work for some vision that you want to some day fulfill.
I'd say impatience is important. If you're going after the market, well you have to swim fast to catch the wave, for it won't wait for you.
I think the lesson here is to be impatient, but don't give up in case of failure - so the lesson is one of persistence.
A story that comes to mind is Evan William's Blogger.com days
Well that's a bit out of context and a bit summarized and so I can see is misleading. The concept of Y Combinator means people need to travel to where Y Combinator is. So us founders had to pack up bags and move to the valley to participate in this program. We all had pretty established lives here in Chicago.
One requirement was we had to find a place where we could have a dog, since a founder already had a dog and we couldn't get rid of the dog! :)
So the best place we could find was a house for the three of us in San Jose. We definitely ate cheap food and used cheap hosting and had cheap everything. We even used 3 imacs that were donated to us by someone from Apple.
But rent in California is a tough one, but something we needed to get through for our participation in Y Combinator. Which was totally worth the experience.
We think of the money we invest as more like financial aid in college: it's so people who do need the money can pay their living expenses while Y Combinator is happening.
It should be a requirement for entrepreneurs to read one story of persistence every week. It's hard to remember how ridiculously important it is...especially during the times you need it most.
I wrote a review on Amazon for this book, http://www.amazon.com/Technique-Getting-Things-Done-Directin... , published in 1947, "This is a very useful book on getting things done. If you need hand-holding and specific techniques you can apply without thinking too much it's not for you. It gives few specific techniques, instead it focuses on general methods applicable to almost anything and on many inspirational anecdotes. Very readable." Most of the anecdotes involve the need for persistence and consistent effort.
This reminds me a lot of the book Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. It seemed that, at least with respect to successful people, a large part of his thesis was that they were only successful because of their circumstance. However, the only unifying theme between all the successful individuals was that they put forth an extraordinary effort to master their fields for an extended period of time.
Gates sneaking out of the house in the middle of the night and taking a bus to work on an unused computer at a local college is a bad example of someone that was lucky with circumstance. It's an example of someone willing to do whatever it takes to create circumstances for himself. The same could be said for this chef.
Something about falling down completely and picking yourself up always makes for a compelling story. Also nice to hear you can get back that kind of passion.
Sprout is right around the corner from me - I'm definitely checking it out now. I'm a fan of Top Chef and had no idea he was involved; I would have been there the day they opened.
