Accepting Failure

Imagine yourself out on a pond and your boat springs a leak. What is your first response? Perhaps see what you have in the boat that you could use to patch the leak. Or maybe see if someone is nearby that has space in their boat for you. Maybe you are close enough to the shore to paddle to safety. What if you did nothing? It sounds silly, but simply going down with the ship is a viable option. We often think about business ventures as boats on a pond (well, perhaps ships on the ocean) and we toil endlessly to keep the boat from sinking. I’m here to let you know that I will not.

I have been working on Agora for several months. I have put in a good amount of time and effort into making sure that it is what I want to world to experience. But the honest truth is that I do not have a complete understanding of what the world wants. Sure, in my day job I see so much anxiety, depression, loss, and frustration, but that only sheds light on what the world needs not what it wants and often times the wants outweigh the needs. We need nutritious foods, but we want junk food. We need to exercise, but we want to be sedentary. We need to avoid debt, but we want the thrill of the purchase. I am not immune to wants over needs. But I am thankful for the opportunity to go down with the ship.

I love the idea of Agora, but my identify is not wrapped up in its success. I am so much more and am thankful for the opportunity to build a social media platform that will, hopefully, be a refuge for those who are tired of traversing the wilderness of the internet. But its success is dependent on users and how they use it. I recognize how little control I have and it is freeing. It is freeing to not be dependent on its success. It is built on the shoulder of giants and a product of the times. It is a stab in the dark. “It’s a dangerous business…going out your door. You step onto the road, and if you don’t keep your feet, there’s no knowing where you might be swept off to.”