Yes start you have to enjoy what you are doing!

Will the freshly baked chocolate chip cookies to overcome an existential crisis? And if you sprinkle a pinch of sea salt cookies? The life begins to emerge the point?

Over the past year I have raised the business from the ground up, and came to the conclusion that to achieve personal and professional fulfillment is not as difficult as it seems to us. It's surprisingly simple concepts. Of course, they require compromises, taking a fair amount of liabilities. But life in the big city helps us understand one thing.

If you're not having fun, you're doing something wrong.

You do not think that a glass of milk and crumbly cookies with peanut butter - is not fun?

It takes time to understand what helps to achieve personal and professional fulfillment. What I was looking for, she hid from me apathy. While I was growing up, I jump from place to place. He replaced the seven schools, three colleges, four states and two countries. I deal with this, not allowing himself too much to invest in something, just taking things as they are.

This went on until I got a job in San Francisco to work at a small startup. So small that 10 employees in a modest office sat pridvinuv tables close to each other. I worked as a graphic designer and had to "create icons and layouts, as well as everything else that can be required by the designer" (this, incidentally, the real part of my job description).

It turned out about the "other things" they were not kidding. My responsibilities covered the full range of work from the creation of icons to UX- and UI-design. By the end of the first week of my work CTO and co-founder came up to me with a thin primer of HTML / CSS - are still alien to me the industry - and casually remarked, "The applications in Facebook is very popular. Think about it".

I wondered. Last week I did not sleep. More than a hundred applications, thin textbook... Later, with the help of a talented engineer, I designed the application, and engaged in "all the rest". And I liked it: hurricane speed, a sense of community with brilliant people working together for one purpose. It was impossible not to get excited about the process - for apathy in life is simply no room.

Fast rewind the story of my life on the forward three years, to the point where the small business has turned into a successful company. I had a large work desk and unlimited travel. And apathy start to creep back into my life.

I became sluggish in the medium in which the felt at ease, could not join the system, built-managers cheerleaders all the rules. It was reliable. And absolutely settling.

And what?

I knew that I needed a change, when I first met her co-founder. I have no particular interest in helping start-ups with free design (they were poor, and I was bored), and he was going to develop a business idea of ​​baking quality delivery right to the doorstep. We immediately found a lot in common in the love of a good liver, the desire to invest in the business, in an effort to do what you love. And we were able to successfully launch the beta version.

What ensued?

We had to invest to the full in their jobTo get a chance to win and feed the whole bay area of ​​San Francisco, cookies with chocolate chips and sea salt. We learned about the existence of the project 500.coIn which investors help novice businessmen start their own businesses. They collected applications for the new academic stream. I began to chat with the people who threw a stable job for the sake of the business, and clearly understood: I need just need to make up for what I believe. The rest was a matter of technique.

And I plunged into the world of the dough, the logistics San Francisco and chocolate crumbs.

A few months later, when we sent investors to 36 (yes, 36), video, application, interviews and dozens of letters we have received in the program. Thus began our project. We hurried at full speed, our faith is forced to develop business. Joining a big family project 500.co It became the first breakthrough for us, and we were not going to miss the chance!

Came the day of open doors. We were part of a new group of founders of the business. The heads we had a plan of work, the heart was filled with energy. For most it was the time for action on a "hit or miss", and everything felt nervous tension, creates such an atmosphere. Finally, all of us gathered in the conference room, and Sean Persvel (Sean Percival), the investment partner of the project, invited us into the program.

Of course, we were told to move quickly and to overcome obstacles. We were inspired to make a challenge themselves and create their own brands. But as we have been told that you have to be honest with ourselves. And get this damn fun.

That's what I liked.

This simple, obvious advice, it seemed to tie together all what I went through in my life. I became a part of the delivery of cookies DoughbiesBecause he believed in it. I remembered how I liked working in a startup, when I arrived in San Francisco, because I enjoy working in a great team, which believed. I liked the new project because I have a great time, doing what I believe.

Get your damn fun. Not the most original idea. But I needed to hear it.

And yet four months until lasted investment program, we are reminded of it, when they thought that the collapse is inevitable. We looked at the other side of our business, provided that they could never begin. And recorded on a card five rules, which we were told at the open day, to constantly remind myself: "Get this damn fun!"

These words all around repeated like a mantra. When I did not sleep for two nights, another participant 500.co He took me aside and helped to find support and recalled that the need to continue to get high. It was an intangible fuel that runs the idea.

This post I'm writing a month after the launch of his start-up, thinking about how to learn. I've come a long way: work in a startup, working in a large organization, search for a co-founder of the business, and finally, the creation of a startup with the help of 500.co. I will never go back to apathy, it's not worth it, because life is too short.

So believe in what you are doing. And get this damn fun!