Building Startups Like Writing Songs

If I could build a startup     

Like musicians

Write songs

I'd be

Cranking out

Amazing

That feeling

You feel when

Your favorite

Song

Hits you

Yeah my startups would wrap around you with all kinds of wonderment

Happiness 

Enhanced by

All your choices

of

Recreation

or 

Not

I 

am 

Building

Wow,You Are So Serious Startup -

The day I started this blog some three years ago I had no idea what a blog was. I did my research after, and found out some interesting things. Mostly those things pissed me off.

First thing I should do, is lure you into doing what I want.

Yeah, there are things I should do 'according to the blog gods' to get you to follow me and all kinds of other things I should be doing. Of course this is all in the search for success. If I do not do those things then I'm some kind of loser blogger chick who's not successful! Fuck that. I'm not going to blog to get you to do something. Personally I just feel that's evil. 

I may have a mere 40K views and ZERO followers, and no comments, but I don't care. I'm me. I don't blog to gain some fame. If that comes so be it, but screw these people who are masters of the internet and tell us how we should behave. I'm a regular Joe Schmo, and I'm good with that.

My last post was about homeless people In Startup Land. I am a bit sad that you could have really cared less. I got 4 views on that post even though I tweeted it out with the same cycle as all my other post. (Again I don't play games and post at high times and what not. I just post when I post) You seem to be a crowd of people who only like when I post about startup stuff. You really like the last startup I was in Kazamster. With this post: Nothing Better Then Working On a Startup That Has Something To Do With Music. Yeah,you like that that post. Problem is, it's another struggling startup, that I'm not even working on now cause the guys joined a pot startup. The potential of it is unknown.

I'll work on writing more about startups if you work on caring about humanity's problems. Deal?

The Problem Startups Cannot Solve

Here I was in San Francisco. So happy to see this first thing, five to ten minutes from the airport. 

I was in the land of startups, and filled with joy! Lyft had a pink Van on a pole in the sky! Y Combinator, Google, Facebook, YouTube, and so many more were in my realm, yet the center of my universe became the Homeless. My husband had booked his Salesforce work conference late, and the only hotel, well motel left within walking distance was The Alexis Park. Yeah, baby! We are talking smack dab our hotel was not on the dropdown list at registration for Salesforce. Nope! Certainly Salesforce knows there are a few hotels/motels in that area, but they were not on the list. We were the OTHER category. : - / Which meant to me the shame of San Francisco. 

So what's the problem? Every city has homeless people. Yeah, well that's the problem. We shouldn't have homeless people in America, especially in the startup capital of the world. The wealth, the unbelievable wealth that has been created there, and still with all our startup brains we can't help this group? We can't stop them from living on the streets, from doing drugs, and becoming alcoholics. We can't stop them, which means we can't help them. : - (

This is a profound sadness in me, as I kicked my alcoholic brother out of my house, and then watched him live as a homeless person in my city of Denver. It broke my heart,when he was found decomposed in his apartment a few years later. I still felt I failed him even though he had grown his responsibility to get an apartment.. I failed my brother!I failed the homeless. To be traveling to San Francisco, and to end up surrounded by extreme filth, and a urine stench greater then I've experienced in the healthcare industry, and to see so many people, street after street, everywhere homeless! Yeah, we could walk to the Salesforce conference and be in some alternate world, that just didn't help my soul at all. Living on the street and smelling like a pig, or freshly showered dressed casual;attending a conference to better your work life. The hopeless or the hopeful. My soul was terrorized with conflict.

I felt guilty, I had a clean nice room to stay in. I felt guilty I was a responsible person who paid the bills. I felt guilty,and immense shame. I felt shame, shame, shame on me. How could I just walk past these people? I ignored them when we did, because I was afraid of them. Sometimes they would be fighting among themselves, and other times it was the mental illness spilling all over me like a waterfall of insanity. How can we have all this money in all these billion dollar startups and we can't solve this problem? It made no sense to me and to other founders who created startups and lived in the Tenderloin area of San Francisco. They too, felt this utter shame on us, and hopelessness to help, followed by the annoyance of the filth and smell. 

Is San Francisco hardened? Have they grown used to this endless battle? I think so. It's the hardest battleground to conquer. No one has made any ground in any city in my opinion. Oh there are a ton of help groups that help the homeless. They feed and clothe them. That's why the homeless live around the places that feed and clothe them.They do rehabilitate and help the ones who want to be helped. But there are the ones who will never be able to return to what we know as a responsible person. My brother was one of those.

My brother Mark

You could help him and he could be what we think is "normal" and responsible for a time. But he would always return to a homeless type of life. He couldn't live in our world of responsibility. That's the problem. The unsaveable, cannot live in our world of responsibility. 

I have ideas to help the homeless, and so do probably thousands of others. I don't know, I think we should start working on this problem from the tech view, yet I ponder, maybe that's a wrong thought to think, cause maybe, it only hurts us to see them live this way. Maybe they are perfectly fine living the way we see as repulsive. 

I never took any photos of these homeless people. I wanted to but my heart would stop my hands. As they lay strewn about the street sidewalks still asleep, I couldn't take photos of them because that's their bedroom. That's their bathroom. That's their living room, kitchen, garage, carport, yard. I wouldn't like someone wandering into my bedroom and snapping me. So I couldn't do it to them. To me that's the only thing I could give them. 

My Take On My Blogs Ten Most Popular Post List

I am patiently waiting for the day my post Titled: 5 Days On Whisper, gets knocked out of the number one spot of my blog. Not because I have any ill feelings towards Whisper App. It's because It's been there too long! I'm sick of it being number one. Surely I can take down any of them if I wanted to. Yet I don't pick the spots readers do. I have to honor this sacred ground.

Here Is The Number Of Views And My Take On My Top Ten Post

1. 5 Days On Whisper.....1260 views. Almost all the hits to this post came from China. It got pounded from the entire country of China for a long time. I suspect the reason for this was that Whisper had hired a woman (who was famous in China) to work for them. I think she was and maybe still is in charge of getting traction. All she had to do was reach out to her China fans and ask, and they did it. I suppose it helped Whisper to grow, and maybe it still does. Maybe someday WhisperApp will help me out? I'm not famous in China, but I did adopt a beautiful girl from China. You Might like, Beautiful Tech Girl Growing Up which has 294 views.
2. An Entrepreneurs Timeline To Success: 784 views. ThankYou for liking this post so much! It means the world to me. 
3. The Dream Continues To Torment: 551 views. I was pretty down when I wrote this post. It's kinda weird I think. I think it came from those dark places in my brain. 
4. The New Frontier Of Suicide: 522 views. Woah Kind of intense. You also might like Invisible Suicide: The Tortured Soul: 168 views
5. An Entrepreneurs Beautiful Love Story:483 views. Incredible sad time. Still miss my brother-in-law and fellow trep. Sara is doing great raising Ariele. She is the best mom.(This post should be #6 and #6 should be #5) As this has less views. Must be a bug in the blogger software.
6. The Yellow Book Of Skills To Get Traction: 503 views. Whew! So happy this is on the list. This is the first printing and I see Gabriel and Justin changed the cover and maybe some of the book. I'm so grateful they wrote it. I told Tom and Sean that if I joined Kazamster I would  be using this book. I did and we are. It's literally a blueprint for how to grow your startup.
7. Startup Porn: 419 views. Another amazing book for startup builders Venture Deals. I have no idea why I named the post startup porn. I took the class that goes with the book. Super hard and very cool class.
8. My Funny Dream About Gary Vaynerchuk: 406 views. This is a true story. I did dream this. I also met Mr. Vaynerchuk on WhisperApp. Yep, you think you are all anonymous, and there was some glitch in the software, and I found out who I was talking to. I had put a Whisper post out asking for investors, for my idea, I didn't even have a product! I had no traction! I had no idea what I was talking about,but Mr. Vaynerchuk was very kind to me and told me that I had balls! I took that as a compliment. I am confident the next time I ask him to be an investor, I'll know what I'm talking about, and I will have traction! 
9. 87 Edits and Counting On My Y Combinator Application: 399 views. Ah yes, I think this was my second time applying for the YC. It's a good experience to apply to accelerators, you'll learn a ton and yes, practice being disappointed perhaps. Who knows you might get in.
10. Nothing Better Than Working On A Startup That Has Something To Do With Music.283 views. Hallelujah! This is a record. I have never had a post get on the top ten list in such a short time. Seven days! I'm shocked, especially since the title is super long. 

~ I Truly Thank You ~

#Slack:How You Show Up For Work

I was surprised to see a major television advertisement for a product I had used just two years ago.  As far as I knew, Slack was an unheard of internet tool to help people collaborate on a business idea. I had no idea it WAS the new way we run a company. Or more to the point, the new way we show up for work.

Yes, I used Slack very briefly. I didn't know how to use Slack, yet I knew it was a tool to help people build companies.

It was one of my startups DigiThin. I dabbled in Slack a bit with one other person. That startup ended and I never thought about it again until I was asked to join the startup Kazamster! Immediately they linked me to Slack. It was different then what I had seen previously. I was sort of scared of it. I didn't want to screw up any work Tom and Sean had done. I wanted to be accepted to the team. Therefore I was hesitant to post, share, click, or generally use Slack. 

I got over myself. It doesn't matter if I screw up using Slack. This is the new way the workforce communicates. I'm learning a ton with this new business model. It's extremly weird cause you don't get to walk past the people you work with in some art filled hallway and make a traditional comment, like "Hey, how is your summer going?" instead you look at your feed from Slack and wonder. 

• I wonder if they like my work ?
• I wonder if what I'm doing is making an impact for the company?
• I wonder if they think I'm crazy?
• I wonder how many people work from home?
• I wonder if they realize how much work I'm doing?
• I wonder if they realize how valuable I am?
• I wonder why they don't answer my questions?
• I wonder what they are working on?
• I wonder if I will run a company with Slack?
• I wonder why my brain ticks and quivers with excitement!
• I wonder how Slack became so big they could put an ad on T.V.?
• I wonder if Slack is how 90% of the workforce will show up for work?

Trep Enjoying The Day Job

Today was a great day at my day job, which I consider my side job. My startup work is always my real job. I have an interesting day job. I work in the Central Monitor room of a hospital. We monitor the patient's heart rhythms; you would be surprised at all the different human heart beats. 

It was a slow day so we had time to talk amongst ourselves a bit, as usually we do not. It was a great opportunity to bond with each other and build a stronger team. We were making up funny things and laughing at just about anything. Silly crazy stuff. Then Megan asked me "how's your new startup?" I told her I don't know. I really love it and want to be a part of Kazamster as I can get behind the founders smart idea! (Playlist converter) 

Yet, I'm not college trained. I'm not typical, I'm most likely not what these two brilliant men expect or hoped for. I'm off the map in many ways and I often consider myself an outlier. I've had some mishaps or not sure what to call them 'not good interactions with them in respect to my work' so I sweep my soul across the floor dreaming that learning disabilities don't exist, that I graduated college, and my oddness wasn't so easily seen.

Megan promptly noted that I write great post and my style is awesome! And what I do is amazing! (now that's a good friend) Then she of course, as funny as she is,she brought up the day the staff looked up all of us on Urban Dictionary (when I was not at work) She said: Jana we could not believe that you were the only one that actually fit the description, and we all thought it was AMAZING. 

Oh oh, let me look this up I said. 
Urban Dictionary: Jana 

Yep, pretty much sums up who I am. : - ) Not really a spy though. All this is true of me. Especially the part that people think "I'm crazy, dangerous, powerful and straight up weird. Even the people at work were surprised and trapped in awe of it. Cause their urban dictionary descriptions of their names didn't fit them at all. When they read mine they all knew it was true! Now that's weird!

I laughed with them. It' so funny. I am who I am. I will never be some polished professional, but I may achieve high places. 

The Greatest Graphics Interpreter Of Your Mind

If you have a startup, and you are not artistically gifted, you most likely will need a graphics person or a company to design your logo among other things. I remember designing my own logo, and my WordPress teacher Greg said "Uh------- No" Greg is great at spotting crap and telling you it's just that. Greg also lead me to Sultan of Pixel Pickers.

Sultan is the greatest business artist in the world. He may not be well known right now, but he will be. This man is not after your money. Sure he wants to be paid. He has a family to support in a country that is not economically blessed like the USA. Yet this man loves to create, just like you treps do. He loves to create your vision. My interaction with him has shown me how honest he is, and how he works.

Sultan listens to what you want. He doesn't waste any time on some tangent of what 'the designer wants.' You see I've had other other graphic companies do work for me, and what is the number one thing they do? They take the name or idea you want, and make it into the design in their mind. Sultan is an interpreter of your mind. You tell him what you want. You describe this detailed vision in your mind and that's what he gives you. It's sort of mind blowing. I mean that's what us entrepreneurs want and need, but it rarely happens. We need people who can interpreter our ideas and make them real. Not the vision they think it should be, but the vision in our heads. That's Sultan. He delivers your vision right to you. Oh, yeah, it will totally freak you out, because you are used to people getting it wrong most of the time, and you succumb because you think you have made them make to many revisions. Sultan is so gifted that you will most likely not make any revisions, and if you do, it will only be a few minor things. That's how good he is. Truly he is a man oozing with talent and those who hire him will be the lucky ones, like I am. Enjoy his gift.

Here is a look at the logo's he has done, but keep in mind that he also does animations, interior designs and other things. Just ask him.

Even More

Email me with question jana@passdownapp.com

I'll Take Orange, Not Root Beer

Our family drove about six blocks on a hot summer day to A and W root beer. It was a shabby drive in root beer stand. Pretty run down, my family loved it. They loved root beer floats in the summer.

This family tradition was one I did not like. I tasted root beer, and to me it tasted exactly like it's name. Root's with beer. Surly I had done that a million times in the backyard playground. Stick your face in mud, add water, and suck and you have root beer! I didn't like it. As a grown up I tried this special pop again, and still it tasted just like it's name. Dirty roots with beer.

Problem was, I'd ask for an orange pop and my family just tore me to shreds because I didn't like what they like. They would put me down because I had to be 'special' to request an orange pop. They delighted in the root beer float and they thought I should too. Plus the fact that they wanted to purchase some special gallon root beer float special that we all could share. With me requesting a small orange soda, well that was a horrible thing to do. If I can't go along with them, than I'm a loser. 

This could be the sum of my childhood. As much as they thought that I was trying to be different they were wrong. I just didn't like root beer. Still don't.

Sometimes I think my quest to invent something people want is only a self centered desire to prove that I'm not a loser. If I just had one special thing that I could do well at. If I succeeded at something that these root beer loving bullies could not succeed at, well then I'd be an orange success! I'd finally be a worthy person. 

Is this what all my entrepreneur desires are for? Am I just attempting to prove to my childhood family that I am not a loser? Is my entire life based on a family outing that I did not surrender my preference to? 

It probably is. If I do not succeed at something then my family wins. The label they gave me will be true. I guess I'll invent Orange Cheer Floats. The drink that makes every loser a winner! ; - ) 

Don't give up. Building startups win or lose, is better than root beer bullies. 

Trove: Worth The Whirl

I get a ton of marketing companies wanting me to sign up with them. Follow them, try them out. I usually give it a look, and decide, if it's what my company needs at the time. Sometimes I go a bit further and sign up for something just to see what they are doing. I want to understand it more and signing up is the only way to do it. 

Recently TROVE sent me a little invite through Twitter. My first thought was,"ahh another marketing company" Here is what they tweeted:

This is the first time I have ever heard of Trove, and I had no idea what a Smartpick feature was. Here is my reply:

They replied:

Little does Trove know, that I actually love the word whirl. Isn't it a wonderful word? It makes me feel like I'm effortlessly dancing on air. My body is gracefully floating with the gentleness of the wind. Every single problem is vanished. It's just pure happiness, and that is what I found when I indeed, gave Trove a whirl.

I had no idea what it was all about. So I signed in with my Twitter account, because that's easy. Started looking around and then clicking,creating, or curating my Troves. 

Now for me wanting to spend anytime on a software program, to see if it will be useful to me, the program has to flow easy in my brain. When I click something it has to make sense to where it leads or what the result is. It has to take less time to figure out than opening a physical package. 

So far I have spent about ten minutes on Trove and I am in LOVE! These intelligent designers created an easy to learn and use, with smart content, news sharing program. For me it couldn't have come at a better time, as I've been dating and breaking up with frustrating news feeds for months now. 

Ohhh I'm looking forward to a very long love affair with Trove. If you are missing this kind of love in your life, well, give Trove a whirl. I'm positive they have enough love to go around.

An Entrepreneurs Life Pause

I have been in a dark place for a long time. Some people say I'm negative. True, as I am a reflection of my mother, a known negative person. 

Do I want to be negative? HECK NO. Do I think I'm negative? Not often. When I'm smiling in life I feel totally positive. But yes the last three years have been super hard on my psyche. I'd say only a few people in the world can handle these life circumstances to the better. I, not at all. 

Almost super ripped physically. (for an older woman this is pure joy) My body was at an all time high of sweetness and then an injury, or more like an evil life ending cruelty crept into my right foot. Then it spread into my soul. : - /

Trapped I Am

I kept buying new running shoes, as surly shoes must not last longer than three months. I could not figure out what was the problem with my foot. It hurt on and off and then one day it hurt all the time from then on. This was the beginning of my downfall as an athlete, as a woman, and as an entrepreneur. This foot problem would lead to my destruction. It would lead to my total dispare, my hopelessness, my desire to jump. 

During my battle with my foot, so many things happened. I had to make the decision to close down my startup DigiThin. Start a new startup. Quit the job I loved, as standing for twelve hours would not work as only one hour was all I could do. I had to give up running, hiking, being a free able bodied person to do anything in life that included my body working. 

My Struggle

I had never had a job of sitting. I always had jobs that I moved in. What would I do for a living? Startup life was still not at the stage of paying or doing full time. Ugg, swirling in my brain, my life was spinning out of control and six deaths in a one year period of friends or family members happened upon my personal struggle. All but one, cruel tragic deaths of young people snuffed out. The self centered sorrow of myself was extra pounding upon me. They died and my death was looking really GOOD to me.  

I don't want to be no cripple. I don't want a failed startup. I don't want to be a bad mother or wife. I don't want any of that, but that's what I got. That's what I live. Misery of life encapsulated me, like a easy pill on the beside table.

Sucked into misery of an evil that I can't seem to escape has been my life these last three years. I keep looking for the sunrise of bright hope. For the day I turn away from all this sorrow and struggle, and surge into what God wants me to do. I keep searching for my happy day. For now I'm in a life pause. 

Yeah, I do have the capability to build a startup to success. I know that. But all appearances of who I am would lead others to believe I'm some crazy woman. Some crazy sloth to be forgot. I can't stand that part of me. But that's the part that gives me visions of things others cannot see. It's my gift, and curse I suppose. 

Clouds Are Rarely Like This: Shredded Cotton Balls

As much as I hate to live through these episodes of insane life, I know my Lord Jesus Christ walks we me, as he guides me in this maze of pure torture. I will walk the path crippled, I will do what the creator wants. I will do as he says, to bless humanity. I will build what HE wants. ~

And The Day Of Beautiful Sky Ended With This

To all the people who have passed this year. I'm still smiling because we knew each other, I'm still thinking about what you left on the lives of others. I'm still adding you into the build. 

•  My bother Mark:Age 53. Found decomposed in his apartment - death undetermined
• Granddad: Old age - I feel good about this death.
• Rob: brother in law. Age 36, quick and swift cancer. Super Sad. A father to one and husband to a beautiful wife, my sister Sara.
• Jason: Christian brother. Age 41, drunk driver hit his car, instant death. Super, super sad. A father of three, a husband to one loving wife. A lover of the Lord.
• Audi: My cousin. An only child to my Aunt Dorthy. Early onset Alzheimer's. His funeral, many expressed the sorrow"This is too bad, he is a good person" My Aunt, his mother, Dorothy was there, but she went instantly blind 15 months earlier. She could not see him in his last days. It was a twofold sorrow for me.
• Jackie: A childhood friend. I ran into her in adult life. We talked and smiled. She was murdered and dismembered. 

All these deaths in a one year period. 

Geez, A Really Hard Day For Me and Startup Building

My anguish this last year was almost gone. Five deaths, four of them young people, and two of them our own, treps. Lives cut short of dreams created. Nothing sadder than that. A startup never to be built. 

Personally the toll of those deaths on my personal life has been a big burden on my fragile psyche. Grief wrecks havoc on my rarely sound mind. Building comes and goes in waves of hope and hopelessness. I'm teetering on the edge of choice. Should I carry on, or just end it all?  

Today I woke with the plan to continue to build passdown, and then my husband opened up the mail he had forgotten about for a month. The IRS sent a letter. Yep, we are being audited. So they told us what they wanted and we had thirty days to comply. We are two days over the thirty days, when we read the letter.

It was my last startup. The one I shut down a long time ago. It was 2012 they wanted to know about, and here I am in 2015 thinking that's all done and over. Yet the government wants to know all about what I did in 2012. Ugg. 

Their check boxes never matched any of the replies I wanted to give, the biggest one being. It's a failed startup, that I spent four years on, and blew 55k of my own money on. No check box for that. Yeah, I learned a ton from it, but I lost big time on cash and emotions, if you want any more from me because I FAILED,well, then I think you are crazier than I. 

I didn't do bad things and launder money. I didn't rip people off. They never bought my product. I didn't hide or do any legal things wrong. I'm no evil business woman, I just FAILED at being successful. So, why is the IRS auditing my husband and I? Why is what I feel I have put behind me, still haunting me? I'm done with it, why can't they be? 

Funny, we filed the tax forms on time, and it took them two years to audit us. Two years to ask, what did you do in 2012? Hmm, FAILED! Duh! Surly I would love to be reaping in the black

and paying big taxes to you, but I didn't succeed. 

Today was hard for me. I had to dig through paper and digital files. It made me look at what I thought was good book keeping and see, it was all a mess. Disheveled like my soul. I was torn between thoughts of, "I know I kept good books" and "What the hell happened" 

I am suffering in such a twisted bad way right now, this was not a good day of hope for me. I tried really hard to believe I was a good business woman, but all I could see was a woman who failed her entire life. All I could see was a lifetime of struggle and a woman who had no skills in anything. It's a pretty horrible place to land on. Especially because "hope" was hanging around me. It was teasing me to think I can keep building. 

We spent the whole day sorting through all the request they asked of us. It was miserable.  I had other plans for today and the IRS changed them. I feel terrible that I wasted my husbands money,and now I continue to waste his time on fixing my past startup mistakes. To present to him a failure as a wife, and a failure as a startup builder, well, that torments my soul. How I wish I could be like normal people and just work for a company doing what they want for the rest of my life. But I can't do that. I have to build ~ startups. 






   

Pond Fishing For Entrepreneurs

I seemed to be going along pretty good this last week or so. Filled with a new hope of getting some movement on Passdown, and then the words of doom spew out of someone's mouth and crush me!

You know, it's that unhopefullness of others that brings me down. They can't see the vision in my head or on our two websites. I've failed at explaining it. Well, I haven't really, it's just that it hasn't begun to grow. It hasn't taken shape much at all. It's not just us the startup builders, it's the people who are going to use it. We need them in the master puzzle we are putting together. Otherwise it's not anything. Otherwise it gets words of hopelessness shot at it. 

This is something I had to deal with in my last build. Yes it hurts. It makes all kinds of thoughts of self doubt spring up and then I begin to wonder if I should jump ship and forget about this build. Forget about startups, forget about making something for people to use, something that will make their digital world better.

Literally I want to curl up in a ball and Netflix my weekend away ~  

Two days later positive feedback was given and it seems the path I am choosing right now to get traction is the one I should stay on. Albeit it's not the only traction channel I'm working on. I do have all the social. But the social isn't so promising for us at this time. My best guess as to why that is, is because paying for social is the way to go, but there are no funds. So this startup can only use free social, and well, maybe I'm not good at using that. Most likely that is true. I suppose I have to get over my fear of being one of those annoying shove it in your face kind of people. I know a person who uses social to push her business agenda and is doing quit well, but she annoys me. As much as she uses her personal life to expose her business, it always bugs me cause it's like I can see, it's not really personal, it's business, and that's what I don't want to be. I don't want Passdown to be something that annoys people. I don't want to shove it down their throats. But is that the true way of advertising? Is there a true way? I think it's any way you can without being annoying. Only time will tell. 

Yes I am passionate about our early stage start up. I'd like to, shove it down peoples throats, but in the most beautiful way possible. So that the shoving would really seem like swallowing something tasty. Like a good wine, or horderves. 

For me I won't be satisfied to deliver the message in any other form. As I don't want to be the fisherman, I want the people to seek to fish, out of our pond. 

My way may be, a longer harder journey. When the people come to this pond, I will be pleased when they stand at the edges, and see the beauty, and dive into the water willingly.

~ May The Pond You Build Be Desirable Tasteful ~

Yodi says YO!

The Rules Of My Startup Blog

The first few rules are, for me.

1.  I must always improve my grammar and spelling. I must never say hurtful things about others. (yep I've screwed up on that one)
2.  I must work to be positive (which has been hard with all these deaths)
3.  I must never delete a popular post even if I'm unhappy with it later.

You see the top ten most popular post are not me who picks them, it's you. I've watched my top ten change over time, and it's the articles I write that you like the most that get on my blogs top ten list. I don't pick them, it's not my top ten list, it's what is the most popular with you.

It's What You Pick

 I find so much joy in seeing what you like. I'm happy when an article I write resonates with you. For almost a year this one was on the top ten list Wrapping Your Head Around The Self Judgement Of Yourself. It got bumped about two months ago. I was sort of sad about it being sent to the below ten list. It wasn't such a good article, but it was special to me.


I'm super happy that you made An Entrepreneurs Timeline To Success number two. You don't know how much that means to me. I am honored by you in the deepest way. I hope I said the things you didn't expect to be in the timeline. Maybe I made you upset because the timeline is life? not the fast expectancy of a startup. Yeah, we all want to get it done in five years, but hey, what if you gave yourself some breathing room and chose to not follow the pressure of all the other successes? Can it ever be bad if you succeed in maybe thirty years? If you succeed, it's always good. Who is to say that success has a time limit? 

I can never be a failure if I have no time limit to my success. I will succeed one day. I have never doubted that. Oh! back to the rules of my blog. There isn't any for you. That's kind of nice

Okay so the number one post on my blog, well, it's Whisperapp. It's not a very good written article of mine. It has problems, but it was the truth for me at the time of my writing it. And it had the skills of mine at the time. Hopefully I've improved since then. So why is it number one? The answer is CHINA. Yep, after I wrote it, Whisper had a worker who was from China or was popular in China, and she had a ton of connections, and she worked that article as much as she could to get it to be number one on my list. Now, why would my list matter? I'm not some popular blogger at all. I'm nothing really. But to this Whisper worker it was important that she make it BIG. So she did. She did her job for Whisper. For about three months the country of China hit that article like crazy. Today it stands at 1,176 hits. You see none of my articles I write have come close to overtaking that. I hope An Entrepreneurs Timeline To Success will beat it one day. It has to date:517 reads,so a little less than half. 

Now I do have the power to just delete the Whisper article, but that would break one of my rules. The people picked it. The people hit on it. I do not have the right to take it away even if I don't necessarily like it anymore. I do admit I have deleted a few of my articles that were rants of hatred towards people who made me angry. Yep, I'm human, I get mad and I do stupid shit. So yeah, I delete those. The Whisper article is not of hatred, it is joy and love. I love Whisper, I do. It's an amazing startup. It's spot on what all startups seek. Getting humans addicted to their product. I just don't think that article is the best one I've written and I kind of wish my other writings would over take it. Not because I don't like Whisper, I do. I just don't like my writing, and why cry over spilled milk? It was pure and clean when I wrote it. 

As crazy as I and my life are, I will continue on finding my startup way. I will keep improving my writing and using courage to do the uncomfortable parts. I will grow old building. As frustrating hard as it is, a trep life is who I've always been. Okay you do have one rule: Never stop building startups.

Challenge To Accelerators

Wow, tonight I received my first ever invite to apply to Y Combinator. This is a first for them. I'm stunned. I threw my hands in the air with disbelief! Why would they even need to invite my team and I to apply? Y Combinator is the top accelerator in the world and they don't need to advertise or invite past applicants to apply again. They get thousands of applicants each cycle. 

So here it is:

Here is what I think all accelerators should do. Well, MUST DO, if they are cool. Out of all your applicants you should pick one team as a "Wild Card". One team that does not have to be subjected to the "interview" one team that just has that something odd about it. One team that's application may have really sucked. One team that knows, they are only there because they got the "Wild Card". That team knows they have to prove themselves because they didn't pass the application, and they got a free pass on the interview. No team will know who the wild card team is. 

Just do it. Let someone in that you normally would not let in. Each cycle. See what happens. 

Founders Path Determined by Childhood Book

From time to time I come across this book I've had since I was a little girl. The title is Finding My Way by Chisachi Suehiro, printed in 1967. Every time I come across it, I think of how it seems to fit the story of my life. I'm always finding my way. 

I think because I am a creative type with a mind full of ideas to help humanity that I've bounced around the career path like the little girl in this story, finding her way. 

When we match up to our childhood book or look like our dog when we are out walking the pooch, it just seems eerily odd to me. Was it because I had read this book as a small child that the title Finding My Way, went into my brain and lodged into some sort of spot that holds the key to my life's walk? 

On the fifth page of the book is the oddest statement.

Here it is: 

In a dark green forest

The trees watch my walk

They make me ashamed

Of my own footprints

What would I have thought reading this book around the age of four or five? What small child knows what ashamed is? Why would I be ashamed of my footprints? 

Shame is a powerful crippler of humans. To be ashamed of your footprints in a forest would mean you trashed the forest. You ruined it or dirtied it because it was so perfect and pure, and your footprints messed things up. 

Green is my favorite color, but not dark green. I love trees and I take photos of them often and post them. I have things I'm ashamed of, as we all do. I'm only ashamed of my footprints if they hurt another. Otherwise it's my path, and mine is not shaped by a five year plan. It's the, finding my way plan. 

She went through all kinds of travels and in the end of the book she finds her way home to her mother. Well, my mother is a successful startup. I am not searching for my birth mother. I take care of my birth mother, as she went blind in old age. I don't need to find my way to her. She cannot see and I help her see.

I need to find my way to humanity. I will go through every dark green forest, fear, physical pain,loneliness,happiness, rainstorm, to find you. 

Keep Building Your Startups.

An Entrepreneurs Timeline To Success

I've been in a startup rut. It started with a life rut and grew into a big gaping hole in my startup world. I've been standing at the edge of the hole looking into it for a month now, sometimes dipping down and swimming in it. I cannot decide what direction to take.

The whole point for Passdown has been to build a test product. Just put something out there and see if I can get enough feedback or test traction to know if people want it or not. It's just supposed to be a test!

Completing the test part has turned into a struggle in itself. Filled with highs so high I kept on chasing. Now it's, lows so low that I have fights in my mind. "Keep going, you haven't even achieved the test" "Stop chasing this crazy one and wait for the next one" or the useless one "Quit being an entrepreneur at all" These fights between self doubt and hope for digging out a creation for humanity, well, I hate this part. It doesn't play well with the tormentor of my soul. 

I have managed to excite people, get people to join my build, fire people, make some enemies, get rejected regularly, be a jerk, inspire some, and mostly frustrate the hell out of myself. Yep, that's startup building. I still suck at it. 

I'm not quitting Passdown yet. I haven't done much in a month or more. What I have been doing is letting my mind figure out what to do. It's been thinking seriously, while I dealt with some life struggles. If I quit before I accomplish the test, then I'm just a quitter. I don't want to do that. So I must move forward and figure out the best, fastest, smoothest, way to get test results. What ever the test shows to be the answer is when I can rest assured that either Passdown moves forward or becomes another skeleton. 

Haunted by my startup ideas I will always be. Today I had a horrible thought. It was that I would be remembered as the Terminally Failed Startup Girl. The trep that never had a success. That was a very depressing and sad thought. I don't want that. 

My timeline is: I will build startups until I'm ninety years old. From ninety till one hundred I will retire and enjoy life. If I have had no successes, I will be successful, as the oldest person living who never gave up the desire to build gifts for humanity. I will also be a speaker at Y Combinator from the age of ninety one to the age of one hundred. If my gift for humanity is to inspire others to not give up, even when failure after failure beats you down, well, maybe that's it. Maybe that's why I do this. Suffer millions of failures to build just one successful startup, or help another person who suffers from failures. I don't know. I just have to follow the drive inside of me, even if a simple life has always been available to me. I have something in me for humanity,I can feel it. I just have to suffer the struggle to get it out of me. No matter how many years that will be.

*all photos taken by me at Denver Botanic Gardens of Dale Chihuly 2014