This month's good stuff
To do your best work, you have to want to do the work.
Hi, it’s Melissa, and welcome (back) to “your founder next door”, a weekly publication with stories and tidbits of my human journey bootstrapping eWebinar to $5m ARR. No BS, just straight-up truth bombs on what it’s like to build a company without an abundance of resources or friends in high places.
What got me thinking this month
This time last year, I couldn’t imagine coming back to work.
I had no inspiration, no motivation, no energy to keep creating or building. I considered quitting. Finding some other way to make money. Maybe building something small that would float my monthly expenses, with no pressure to grow, no big team, no bigger vision. I was still showing up and trying to do the work, but the work wasn’t getting done. My to-do list was full and I was procrastinating everything on it, distracting myself with my social life.
My best friend would tell me, “I know you’re gonna figure this out.” I heard her. I just couldn’t understand what she meant. Figure what out? It all felt so meaningless. Because I wasn’t getting success from the work I was doing, I didn’t want to do it. Because I didn’t want to do it, nothing got completed. Because nothing got completed, I hated the work even more. Vicious cycle. I was burned out, and I didn’t even realize it until someone from the outside helped me see it.
That was just a year ago.
Today, I am back. Fully back. I’m motivated, I’m inspired, and there aren’t enough hours in the day to do everything I want to do. My company is still not where it needs to be. Growth is still stagnant. We’re doing a lot of work to reposition ourselves (if you’ve been following along, you know). The external circumstances haven’t changed that much.
The only difference is I actually want to do the work.
I’ve been an entrepreneur for 15 years. I know the grind. I know how to do hard things I don’t love and still deliver. But there’s a difference between doing the work to check the box and doing the work because you want to do it. When you do things from scarcity and frustration, that’s what comes out the other side. When you do things from love and abundance, something different shows up entirely. I am producing some of the best things I’ve ever made, and I believe it’s because I rediscovered my purpose for being here.
For a long time, my purpose was paying the bills. Once the bills were paid, I had to ask myself a harder question: what am I here for?
I had to rediscover the love I have for building.
If you’re in a place where the work feels heavy and nothing feels like it’s moving, I’d encourage you to sit with yourself and ask why you’re here in the first place.
What made you want to build this thing? What matters most to you? Where are you headed?
You don’t have to love every task. But you have to love where all of it is taking you.
To do your best work, you have to want to do the work.
Till next time,
— Melissa ✌️
Quick tidbits
If you only read one thing I wrote this month (other than this newsletter!), let it be this. I’ve built 3 companies without ever finding product-market fit. What I know about what PMF isn’t.
I’m a fan of Greg Head’s Practical Founder’s podcast because it’s full of stories from regular people, founders like me and you, who worked hard for years and got to the finish line. No 0-$100m unicorn p0rn, just practical founders who did the work, built a valuable company, and sold it on their own terms. It makes me feel like the win is within reach.
This episode is with Andy Alsop from The Receptionist, one of our first customers at eWebinar. There’s nothing special about this story, and that’s why it’s spectacular. Just keep going.
More and more founders, even Marc Randolph who cofounded Netflix, are talking about the “human journey” in running a startup, rather than the startup journey you’re “supposed” to be on. Is the way your company is built to grow aligned with the way you’re built to operate?
This month’s articles you may have missed
Making money is a skill: It’s a thing you learn, not a thing you do.
ProfitLed is back: passion, profit, purpose: Season 3 of ProfitLed is live. Here’s why this season is different from everything I’ve done before.
What is freedom, anyway?: Chris Walker’s 10 dimensions of freedom made me realize I’d been defining it all wrong.
The mental game of entrepreneurship: It’s not about hard work. It’s about believing in the ending of your story.
🎙️ Season 3 of my podcast, ProfitLed, is now live. We’re exploring the intersection of Passion, Profit, and Purpose, and how those shifts as founders come into financial success.
Find it on your favorite podcast app: Apple, Spotify, YouTube
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This spreads the word and keeps me writing content that will inspire founders to keep doing what they’re doing, knowing they’re not alone.
Melissa, thank you for being so open. As an operator, I can relate. My questions are: 1) did it take you a year to regain your inspiration, and 2) if so, what did you do? I am curious whether you unplugged before re-plug back in, or if you just kept pushing - even mechanically - until psychologically you finally saw light at the end of the tunnel.