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> “We’re all just big, complicated bags of emotion walking around.” This has been the most important discovery from my startup journey, and the topic on which

> “We’re all just big, complicated bags of emotion walking around.” This has been the most important discovery from my startup journey, and the topic on which I now place the greatest focus. I was in the YC batch of winter 2009 – the one that included Airbnb. It was a small batch, so we all got to know each other pretty well. There was something that really made the Airbnb founders stand out from the rest in that batch. It wasn't that they seemed to have the best business idea; as has been widely written about before, PG and the other YC partners thought their "eBay for space" concept was stupid and would soon fail, then they would hopefully move onto something more promising. But for some reason, everyone just assumed that these guys were on a sure path to huge success, and in the batch voting on the most promising startup just before demo day, they won by a huge margin. I didn't grasp this at the time, but over my own startup journey I realised that the factor that made them seem so promising, and the one that held me back and all the other companies that didn't make it, was emotional strength and stability [1]. The Airbnb guys just really seemed to have their shit together emotionally. Not in any bulletproof, infallible way; they had their weaknesses, and made mistakes like everyone else, but they had a unique ability to cop the hits, learn the key lessons and bounce back better from every challenge and setback, and thus they kept growing and progressing at an astonishingly rapid rate. I, on the other hand, whose business concept was considered by some others to be at least as solid, was far more sensitive and emotionally fragile, and I would become increasingly scarred by setbacks and criticisms, and paralysed by fear of further torment. Though we battled on for five years, I became physically and mentally exhausted, and ultimately had to step away to let my co-founder and a new CEO to take over. In the six-plus years since then, it's been my primary focus to overcome all my deeply held traumas and unhealthy emotional/behavioural patterns, and to become as grounded and rounded a person as possible. And as my healing journey has progressed, any ambitions I held to achieve business success on par with the Airbnb founders has faded, and been eclipsed by the realisation that in order to do _anything_ well – from running businesses and leading social/political movements, to simply having successful friendships/relationships, a healthy family life and a physiologically healthy body – a healthy emotional foundation is of prime importance. And as I methodically work though my emotional baggage, all those key aspects of my life - career, family/friendships, and physical health - have steadily improved, but my ambitions and visions of a desirable future have also significantly changed from what they were when I entered YC. Exactly what that means for my ultimate career/life outcome is still very unclear, and to me, these days, not especially important. But one thing is for sure; whereas I'd initially hoped that getting into YC would put me on a path to building a "unicorn" tech company, the way it ended up changing my life has turned out to be far more profound. [1] The other thing that made them stand out was that they were by far the most nice and supportive to everyone else in the batch, which I've also since learned is a sign of emotional roundedness and wholeness; when you really have it together yourself, you have plenty of positive energy to share with others.

0xcraft 7y ago
Thank you for sharing so openly! My career and business life has been at best mediocre by most common measures. The inner journey though has been immensely rich.
LeonW 7y ago
I'm touched by your vulnerability and openness. It reminds me of a client who had built a billion dollar company and wanted my help building his next one. My immediate sense was that that was not really why we were talking or why he was here. We kept going and eventually I challenged him asking whether he had really built a billion dollar fortress to never need to be vulnerable. He broke down and we went deep, uncovering some of the deepest trauma I'd seen someone go through when they were 4 years old. From there, everything shifted and things took a very different direction. It's those kinds of insights, when as you say "as my healing journey has progressed, any ambitions I held to achieve business success on par with the Airbnb founders has faded, and been eclipsed by the realisation in order to anything really well – from running businesses and leading social/political movements, to simply having successful friendships/relationships, a healthy family life and a physiologically healthy body – a healthy emotional foundation is of prime importance.", once we really get in touch with our inner world, things shift dramatically and what has meaning to us changes. That doesn't mean that we don't want to to continue having a meaningful contribution to the world, but the sense of ego-striving that is often just a mask for our wounds can gently fall away and allow us to walk through life a little more freely. My learning has been whether you get to the billion dollar level or not, the untouched wounding eventually comes through and takes its toll if it stays unaddressed. It's stories like yours and the one I've described that make coaching the most meaningful thing I've done in my life to date.
- iliketosleep 7y ago
  Isn't this just essentially just a reflection of maslow’s hierarchy of needs? I mean, everybody has their demons, and the founder of the billion dollar company has the time and resources to face those demons by receiving top quality professional assistance, leading him/her closer to some kind of self-actualization. Whereas a large majority of the population (even in developed nations) are still struggling on much lower levels of the hierarchy, such as fulfilling their "safety needs" (e.g. employment, health, etc). I would therefore argue that the "untouched wounding" remains buried for most people because they are never in a position to address it, and the "ego-striving" remains essential part of their survival toolkit. There is simply no "salvation" in this regard for most people and it's quite sad.

0xcraft 7y ago

Thank you for sharing so openly! My career and business life has been at best mediocre by most common measures. The inner journey though has been immensely rich.

LeonW 7y ago

I'm touched by your vulnerability and openness. It reminds me of a client who had built a billion dollar company and wanted my help building his next one. My immediate sense was that that was not really why we were talking or why he was here. We kept going and eventually I challenged him asking whether he had really built a billion dollar fortress to never need to be vulnerable. He broke down and we went deep, uncovering some of the deepest trauma I'd seen someone go through when they were 4 years old. From there, everything shifted and things took a very different direction. It's those kinds of insights, when as you say "as my healing journey has progressed, any ambitions I held to achieve business success on par with the Airbnb founders has faded, and been eclipsed by the realisation in order to anything really well – from running businesses and leading social/political movements, to simply having successful friendships/relationships, a healthy family life and a physiologically healthy body – a healthy emotional foundation is of prime importance.", once we really get in touch with our inner world, things shift dramatically and what has meaning to us changes. That doesn't mean that we don't want to to continue having a meaningful contribution to the world, but the sense of ego-striving that is often just a mask for our wounds can gently fall away and allow us to walk through life a little more freely. My learning has been whether you get to the billion dollar level or not, the untouched wounding eventually comes through and takes its toll if it stays unaddressed. It's stories like yours and the one I've described that make coaching the most meaningful thing I've done in my life to date.

iliketosleep 7y ago
Isn't this just essentially just a reflection of maslow’s hierarchy of needs? I mean, everybody has their demons, and the founder of the billion dollar company has the time and resources to face those demons by receiving top quality professional assistance, leading him/her closer to some kind of self-actualization. Whereas a large majority of the population (even in developed nations) are still struggling on much lower levels of the hierarchy, such as fulfilling their "safety needs" (e.g. employment, health, etc). I would therefore argue that the "untouched wounding" remains buried for most people because they are never in a position to address it, and the "ego-striving" remains essential part of their survival toolkit. There is simply no "salvation" in this regard for most people and it's quite sad.