I set a rule for watching Netflix only on the treadmill (like Arianna Huffington), believing that before long, I would run my first marathon. I would start with two minutes a day on my startup, knowing that soon I'd be coding for hours on end. I craved the heartbreak we're all inspired by: Oprah Winfrey when she got demoted as a news reporter, Sara Blakely, who bombed the LSAT twice before founding Spanx, and Min Jin Lee, the author of 'Pachinko' who had two manuscripts rejected before publishing her first book 12 years after quitting her job as a corporate lawyer.īrimming with Instagram wisdom, I believed even the smallest changes could be transformative. The worst part is I even planned for failure. I had enough savings to start a company in two years, I told myself, before going back to work.įive months later, I was in bed watching TV, wearing the same pajamas I had on for the past four days, with a startup business proposal mostly forgotten. I was ready to become a svelte, stylish entrepreneur who went on fabulous vacations. 'Goodbye, I'm off to pursue my lifelong dream of becoming a startup founder,' I wrote in an email last year addressed to everyone I knew at Google, where I worked at the time. Account icon An icon in the shape of a person's head and shoulders.

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