Some notes from the lab over the past two years

[Slact]

I think it's been about two years since I posted on this forum. My absence from the forum was part of my greater effort to avoid time sinks on the internet. That's not a criticism of the community, just acknowledgement of my personal flaw. I was spending too much time reading posts and not enough time getting things done.

Anyway, I feel it could be valuable to check in and share some of my experiences over the past couple years in the hope that my experience in trying to move into the fast lane can help guide those in the process of doing the same.

First attempt, somewhere around Summer 2018:
When I first decided I needed to make a change in my life, I spent several months brainstorming, reading books, and trying to form an idea for a new product or business. This was an extremely exciting time for me. It was the first time in my adult life when I felt like I was in complete control, and not a victim of circumstance. However it quickly became apparent to me that I could spend an entire lifetime learning from books, audio courses, etc. without actually doing anything. This is when I started to feel a little anxious. A lot of creeping doubts kept coming back to me. I was concerned that I wasn't clever enough to learn new skills to develop a business outside my previously established 9-5 career. I was worried that if I developed a product or service, it was doomed to failure and that I would be ashamed and embarrassed at my mere attempt. This is where I made my first monumental mistake.

I was so obsessed with my fear of failure that my first venture completely ignored the need for scalability. I went for the low-hanging fruit.

I launched into a service which was more or less a variation of what I do for my day job. I advertised the business to get my name out there, and within a couple weeks, I got a few jobs. I'm very good at what I do, so lo and behold, I was pretty damned good at doing the same exact thing outside of work hours. I managed to get a few clients, and they all raved at what good work I was doing. I started to make a few hundred extra dollars a month, and at first I was thrilled. Over time, I realized that I was getting burned out working 80+ hours per week and that my results would always be limited to the time I was able to put in. I always had assumed that I would just put the issue of scale on the back-burner and "deal with it later", but I finally had to face the fact that this new venture would only net me a few thousand extra dollars a year.

Second attempt, Fall 2018-Fall 2019
Feeling discouraged (but at least glad I learned a lesson) I decided it was time to make a real effort. I finished up the few jobs I had left and closed up my little side-business. I decided to develop a product for the industry I work in. I came up with what I thought was an incredible idea for a product, but I had no idea how to even begin to go about producing it. I resolved to do whatever I needed to do to bring that product into existence. I spent basically the entire year reading and taking online courses at night. As I started to learn the bare minimum needed to create a prototype, I started fumbling though the process of putting the product together. Without any knowledge or experience, building a prototype was a incredibly frustrated. Even though the logical part of my brain understood that I was learning valuable skills, I couldn't help but feel like there were some nights where I would spend hours accomplishing zero progress (or worse, screwing up and losing progress) and that my efforts were completely pointless. Eventually though, I finally pulled through and made a working prototype of the product. I was enormously proud of myself and extremely excited. I genuinely thought there was a very good chance that this one product would launch me into massive success. I made some phone calls and managed to get a meeting with a few higher-up, potential investors. I showed them my idea, and demonstrated via the prototype that it could work. After I finished my presentation, they stared at me in awkward silence.

As it turns out, most companies in my industry have produced a proprietary product very similar to what I had developed -- I only had no idea this was the case because 1.) I work at a much lower level than the "powers that be" and was not privy to this information, and 2.) I was so completely obsessed with keeping my idea a secret from everyone so that it couldn't be stolen, that I failed to do my due diligence beyond some extensive Google searches to check whether the product already existed.

I was completely devastated. Just typing out the story brought back some bitterness and sorrow that I thought I had already dealt with. I felt as though I had lost an entire year of my life, and that it was all for nothing. All the late nights, all the effort, all the sacrifice. It felt like it was all a waste. At this point I just completely gave up for several months.

Third attempt, Spring 2020-present:

After months of feeling sorry for myself, I took some time to try to get some perspective. As I thought about it, I realized that despite all my efforts, I really hadn't made more than two attempts at reaching my ultimate goal. I realized that even if a significant amount of time has gone by, it was pretty silly to think that just a couple of attempts would lead me to instant success. I did my best to let go of the past, come up with a new plan, and dust off the work bench. Back in April, I began work on a new product and thus, a new prototype. I was finishing up work on the first prototype when a sudden thought hit me like a ton of bricks...I realized I did not once need to halt production or development because I didn't understand something, or because any part of the process was beyond my grasp. I had developed the skills to be so proficient at what I was doing that the amount of time required to produce my prototype was cut by a factor of 10. I was done by mid-May. I completed the groundwork on an additional two products just a couple weeks ago.

This time around, I've decided to start my own business selling my own products instead of relying on someone else for investment or management. I've spent the past couple months really digging into literature on the basics of marketing, business development, etc. I know it's perfectly possible that this new venture could go nowhere, and I might have to start all over yet again.

Ultimately, I feel like my experiences over the past couple years have caused me to grow as a person, and to really instill the notion that failure (even soul-crushing, heart-breaking failure) is a critical component of ultimate success. I haven't gotten to where I'm going yet, but I won't stop trying to get there. I'd rather keep trying without success and die someday knowing that I did everything I could than give up and wonder what could have been.

I wish you all the best, and I hope my experience can help you avoid my mistakes and reach your goals.

 

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[LHXS]

Tuapft moli e jiemvjz futi ug timg-exesipitt. liip vu jies jux ov huit epf xjisi ov velit zua. MNL og o dep jimq (O'f ci opvisitvif vu lpux vji pix qsufadv, iwip cz QN). Citv ug madl