Starting at Square One

I think all of us have experienced the momentary or passing thought about starting a business or building a brand or living a lifestyle independent of a "day job" where we have to report to a boss and punch a time clock (physically or otherwise).

Some people have done more than think about it and have registered small business names. I know I've done that in the past. Others still have actually made sales and enjoyed some limited success. My father did that for a brief time, running his own small business back in the 1970s and early 80s for a few brief years.

But it's rarer still to find people that have actually built companies that become household names. And it's more rare that you actually hear about it as it's happening. Usually they build huge companies, become celebrated entrepreneurs, and then sit around on their beach cabanas or custom yachts and reminisce to some author or reporter that tells a condensed and shortened story of how they went from zero to hero without really being able to capture or show the hard work along the way.

I'm optimistic, so I tend to think that my efforts will one day generate a comfortable stream of income for myself and my family, and I may stumble across an idea that turns my brand into a company that rivals Apple or Google or Coca-Cola for global recognition. However unlikely that may be, I want to capture (even if nobody else cares right now) the steps and starts and stumbles and challenges along the way. Then when someone wants to know the real story, I can give them the Cliff's Notes version and point them here for full details.

Telling Stories

I've always been a natural story-teller. My mom used to tell me that when I was in pre-K, my teachers would tell her that during free time I would entertain the other kids telling them stories, usually about some random toy or object that was in our play area. As I got older, I channeled this ability into a lot of what seemed like frivolous and fanciful efforts, such as making up backgrounds for characters of table-top RPGs (like Dungeons & Dragons) or creating alternate mythologies to explain the world of computer games I played because I didn't want to take time to read the lore of the game developers (such as EverQuest and World of Warcraft).

I took some creative writing in college, but "common sense" got the better of me and I majored in technical communications, which is a fancy way of saying I went to college to learn how to write online help and user manuals. Yes, that's pretty dry and boring stuff, and believe me it gets a bit boring communicating those essential details to users all the time.

People have always told me I am a good writer, but frankly the thought of cranking out a book-length manuscript always seemed a bit daunting to me, and I was always good at starting stories, but had a hard time ever coming up with a satisfying ending. In fact the only short story that I ever remember thinking was good enough to submit to any kind of a contest was one that featured a knight on a quest to rescue the princess from a vile dragon. As the story went, the knight tracked the beast to its lair, fought it to defeat, rescued the princess, and was rewarded by the king with his daughter's hand in marriage. But to the knight's great horror, on his wedding night as his bride gazed at him with a victorious grin he noticed her pupils had the same vertical reptilian pupils as the dragon he had supposedly slain. The story received an honorable mention but it did not get published in the anthology for which it had been submitted.

Later when Internet newsgroups were a new and fancy thing, I actually chronicled the adventures of a weekly gaming group in which I participated. I played a bard, so I would write the story of our heroic adventures (always making the bard as much the hero as possible, of course) and re-writing lyrics to popular songs of the 70s, 80s, and early 90s to tell of our tales. One day I actually received an email from someone who had just moved into our city and he said he had been reading my posts since he learned he would be transferred and he wanted to join our group. So I guess that means Tom was my first real fan.

Blogs without a Reason

Since I first heard about blogging, I thought there might be a way to scratch the creative storytelling itch I had, but they came out at a time when I was convinced that blogs needed to have a purpose to be monetized, and while I would get occasional inspiration to write about something, I had neither the depth of knowledge nor the time to conduct research in order to make sense of anything, so my posts were like shotgun blasts in different directions, scattered and devoid of a focus and purpose. Unsurprisingly they never really gained a following and I abandoned them pretty quickly. Instead, I focused on my day job that paid the bills and those hobbies that gave me most enjoyment for the least effort.

Breakthrough Inspiration

Actually the breakthrough moment that brought me my first idea generating a body of material that was actually focused and sustained over a lengthy period was a dramatic and catastrophic health concern that hit me in December of 2010. I was diagnosed with leukemia (acute myleoid leukemia, to be more precise) and was hospitalized on death's doorstep. Within about 48 hours of being diagnosed, I was informed that the strain of AML I suffered was among the most aggressive the doctors knew, and it could literally kill within six weeks or less of initial onset.

Obviously I survived since it's nearly five years later as I write this entry, but in the first day or so of hospitalization I exceeded my data, voice, and text limits on my phone wildly by answering so many questions from friends and distant relatives. So I hit on an idea. I had a pretty good network of facebook friends, and I decided once I had my father bring my laptop to me in the hospital that I would create a facebook page dedicated to my illness and just point all my friends there to find the daily and weekly updates on what was happening. On the one hand it was an effective communication tool. On the other, it gave me something productive to do instead of sitting around all day in a hospital bed being bored to tears.

This page produced months worth of detailed descriptions, notes, and raw material. And many friends and relatives told me I should turn it into a book. But almost as soon as I returned to work and was pronounced out of the woods for my health, my elderly father began a long, slow spiral downward. He held on for about three more years, spending the final six months of his life in an assisted living facility where he could get the 24-hour care he needed. But I was also dealing with an elderly uncle who passed away during the same period, and between caretaker roles and my full-time job and managing estate paperwork I didn't have much time to do anything but dream about something different or better.

But in the final year of my father's life I finally began to realize I didn't want to reach that stage regretting all the things I'd never done. As a result I began seeking out and reading and researching how to do something on my own and how to break out of the monotony of the nine-to-five world. That's safe and traditional, but that's not what I wanted.

And So It Begins

Thus, in the late spring of 2014 I began a daily discipline of listening to James Altucher's interviews on his current and back catalog of podcasts and making notes about books that would be helpful and ideas that were inspiring. James calls inspiration "the idea muscle" and he says that like any muscle it has to be exercised to grow. I knew I needed to generate ideas and over the course of the next few months I did.

In February of 2015 I launched my first blog with a real purpose. It's called The Lion's Teeth, and it's dedicated to the local MLS franchise, Orlando City SC. I spent money to have a logo created and made up business cards and it's developed a small but steadily growing following among fans, players, front office staff, and even fans spread around the world that have only heard about the team but don't follow it regularly.

In future posts I'll detail more about that blog, and also about the next step I've taken, only yesterday. You remember that inspiration I received when I was sick and the encouragement people gave me to write about it? Well, I'm finally doing it. I've launched an online campaign to raise the money needed to turn those notes into a physical book and an e-book. And I have a second related title planned, which will focus on the remarkable story of my bone marrow donor.

I'll also talk more about that campaign and the effort to get that project created in future posts. But for now I'll close with a few of the books that I've read over the last year that have been the most inspiring to me.