Engage the world, have a vision, build a city, now go die in it.

Building a company isn't for everyone, and for those who love it, it is an act of sadism. The impetus to build a company is rooted in deep feelings, deep primitive reactions to the world. It is founded on anger, from not fitting in, and from a desire to own your own destiny. It is not a lifestyle or a privilege or an achievement, it is an act of vengeance upon everything that is wrong with society.

Building a company is not the same as making a product. When you make a project, you take an action and you get a response. You put paint on the canvas and it just remains there. It doesn't change. It doesn't talk back. It just sits there until you push it again. As a leader, your job is to create systems for other people to succeed. You must invent systems to hire people, to give them direction, and to help them flourish. You must create systems to help people communicate, to manage each others feelings, and to make progress toward your goal. You must create systems to make them feel considered, to recognize their own visions, and to passionately work toward yours.

But then what happens? You found and inspired people with a codified approach to realize your dream. What does that become? Where does it go? After you build the ship, can you still steer it forward? If there is a challenge ahead, that might keep you grounded, it will make or break you. But what if there is no immediate threat? Where do you go? 

With or without the challenge, you will find a moment of decision, when it is most difficult to remain clear headed and you must persevere. You will find a moment where your previous methods didn't work. You won't working right. You landed the spaceship on the alien landscape and there is no oxygen in place. You try to stick to your gut, or you open you mind, either way you double-down on the direction to see it through. And then you die. There is no air. There was no lifeboat. You were alone and you died alone. 

If along the way you found others who really understand what it is like to drown and resuscitate, then maybe they can give you the right coaching. They can't make oxygen from ether, but maybe they could have told you to prepare and you listened. Maybe they were wrong and you prepared the wrong way. Maybe it all came together and you made it out alive.

Can you make it out alive? All the anger in the world is not enough to save you, and so at some point, the piss and vinegar that gave you fuel to create will ruin you. You must change. What do trap rappers rap about when they become millionaires? Many of them still rap about dealing drugs and fighting gangs. They never cross this chasm. What do great comedians tell jokes about once they told all their personal stories and stories about travel? They need a new act. Many never find one. 

Heidegger said that moments of revelation are when the scrim is pulled back, and you can see the tower on the hill. It was always there, but you could never see it. Heidegger was wrong. The tower is only there if you want it to be, and you don't pull back the scrim, you build the tower. You incentivize others to build it with you and it becomes a city.

Engage the world.

Craft a vision. 

Build a city.

Now go die in it.