What you’re doing just started to make sense — Be courageous!
3 thoughts that I have been having as a first-time founder
There are still 115 more days till 2023, but so many great things happened this year and I think it’s fair to say 2022 has been a genuinely fruitful year for me! In the past 9 months, I was able to:
soft launched boltbolt.io
received the first functional prototypes
worked with an exceptionally talented team to build the coolest products from scratch
connected with incredible and fun people with great visions of making the world a better place
It was the mission and process of building BOLTBOLT that made all of the exciting events listed above happen.
Once a founder and now the Pear VC partner Ajay Kamat told me “By doing a startup, it completely elevated my career. Go do your project. The worst thing that will happen is it fails in one year and you can find a job.”
For the first-time founders, what we are doing not only just started to make sense for others to understand who we are as individuals, but it’s also a journey for us to truly get to know who we are, what we want to do, and where we want to be.
There are 3 thoughts lingering on my mind for quite a while. I want to write them down so when I look back at this blog post, it will remind the future me of what I am feeling and learning at this moment.
1. Find what makes you talk really fast
The first one has to be about passion.
I often think people are really lucky if they are able to find their passion at a young age and decide to keep developing what they are passionate about because I have been struggling to find my own passion for a long time.
Throughout the years of trying different things (playing flute, accordion; studying German, French, Sanskrit; snowboarding, skateboarding; making podcasts; learning film production, painting ….), I realized that it might be difficult for me to settle on one thing as my only passion. And I told myself, to try it first, be really good at it, and then make sense of it.
When you cannot find the so-called “passion”, find what makes you talk really fast.
It was earlier this year when I started to present BOLTBOLT to people at events and conferences, I realized that I was constantly talking fast, pouring ideas, and really enjoyed sharing every bit of the project with everyone I met. Although I would be so tired from all the talking at the end of the day, I was still looking forward to meeting more people and discussing, even more, the next day.
Thinking about all the “difficult and boring” work-related conversations I had throughout the years, I knew something is different this time, I found the inner drive that pushes me out of my comfort zone, and gets me into mind flows.
2. Don’t be afraid and try again
The second one is about asking for a second chance.
About three weeks ago, I was attending the #LATechWeek, a tech-themed networking/conference/‘party’ week initiated by a16z (Andreessen Horowitz) back in early July, and soon followed by countless venture firms, founders, and operators, putting up all kinds of creative events (yacht party, hiking, surfing, and powerlifting… you name it!).
If you were also in the middle of this a16z tech week FOMO madness, then you can probably relate to the topic I’m talking about next: getting declined to events.
No one likes the feeling of getting rejected. Me either.
I signed up for all the relevant events possible to get more opportunities to showcase my product demo. However, I got declined for a lot of the requests. At one point, my mailbox was filled with emails titled “Registration declined” and I felt extremely discouraged (for a sec).
Instead of taking those emails as final decisions, I replied to them by introducing myself, telling them what I can bring to the event, and asking to be reconsidered. If you look really closely at the screenshot below, there is an email titled “Registration approved” and another email saying “Allow me to re-intro myself.”
So there you go, asking for a second chance does work sometimes! I also firmly believe that rejection can be a good beginning for an unexpected way to build a relationship.
3. Always be nice to people
The last one is about being a good person.
This is also a reminder to myself so I will remember to be nice to my surroundings and make wise and consistent choices. I am often amazed at how small nice gestures can foster great relationships. Everyone deals with the challenges, the ups, and downs in their own life. Nice gestures can be energizing to people who are going through a bad time.
“How can I help” has become one of my favorite lines in conversations lately. Instead of asking for help, I force myself to be in a position to give something or provide value to others before asking for anything. Just because people are being nice and offering help, it doesn’t mean that I should take those nice gestures for granted.
Doing the work is hard, doing the work for yourself is hard, and doing the work for others is even harder. A lot of the time, being nice to people requires us to do a little extra work, but for the rest of the time, being nice can simply be: 1) engaging in conversations 2) making micro introductions to people 3) providing genuine feedback. Let’s start planting seeds.
Felt deeply gratified writing this blog, I can’t wait for what’s next and feeling even more pumped for my journey ahead. I’ve been told so many times that hardware business is difficult. Well, I’m doing the difficult work now so you will have high-quality, fun and cutting-edge products ready to use 😉
Build. Deploy. Flaunt.
Together.