The journey of building a startup is probably one of the craziest roller coaster rides one could ever put themselves through. It's not easy by any means, but there's some sort of gratification when things finally come together that's really difficult to explain. The only way to which I can describe it is "a moment of genius..."Working on a startup has a tendency to amplify your highs and lows. The beauty is that the highs are phenomenal! But, the lows are sometimes extremely depressing. Nevertheless, with the help of God, family, friends, partners, supportive people around you, etc. you can push through those times to reach these unexplainable moments that seem to peek themselves every now and then and simply make everything you're working on, worth it!
Seth Godin put it perfectly in his book entitled Linchpin -- "Brilliance comes in tiny bursts. The rest of the time, you're doing work that most any trained person could do." Very true.
The Viewpointr team had one of these moments that I call "a moment of genius" last week. Throughout the nearly 3.5 years I've been working on this idea, things have never come together so perfectly as it did and has from that moment onwards.
As a result, we have decided to re-launch Viewpointr. See our most recent company blog post for the details here.
I must say that the moment of genius my team experienced has made the entire 3.5 years worth the journey!
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By way of encouragement to those of you who think you don't have good ideas, or that you're working on something that hasn't manifested yet, don't give up or you'll just sell yourselves short. Seth Godin again put it perfectly in his book Linchpin, "they don't have ideas that are valued because they're not investing in their art." What does Seth mean by "art"? Art is your business, writing, music, teaching, preaching, engaging, leading, all of it.
The question becomes how do you create a situation where you can spend the time that's needed to create and perfect your art. This is where one needs to be as creative as possible. The problem I feel is that not enough people think about creating that situation or even think about how to create that opportunity for themselves.
I think there are 2 components that can help create your moment of genius:
1. Create time to work on your art -- Stop focusing on living day-to-day and spend time thinking about creating a situation where you can spend more time perfecting it. How? There's no right or wrong way. Again, from Seth Godin (as you can tell, I'm a big fan of his), "if there were a map, there'd be no art, because art is the act of navigating without a map." Do whatever you have to. Raise money from friends and family, partner with people, work nights, consult, generate revenue from day 1, etc.
2. Spend time on your art -- Once you've created an opportunity to work on your art, spend as much time as you can working at it. The more time spent on your art, the higher probability you will experience a moment of genius that could change your life, your world, or the world at large.
At face value, those two steps may sound easy, but they're not. However, as you work at them, I'm confident that you're bound to experience a moment of genius that will make everything worth it!
Cheers,
Andre
http://andrecharoo.com
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