This image is the difference between taking on work from anyone that's willing to pay you, and building a product that you can use to generate demand for yourself.
The biggest thing building an agency taught me was what I didn't want.
I was so tired and frustrated at the inability to escape the endless loop of selling more hours, taking on more work, and hiring more people. I knew there must be a better way.
Despite the earlier realization, it's something I didn't properly pursue until stumbling upon the words of Naval Ravikant in early 2018:
"What feels like play to you, but looks like work to others?"
If you can answer this question, you're halfway there.
In early 2018, I couldn't.
But since then, I've run hundreds of experiments to figure it out. For me, it was a combination of a few different things — a subset of the design skills (pitches & presentations) I'd acquired over a short career, and an irrational interest in internet businesses, strategy, and philosophy.
The journey that followed led me to overhaul the business from a struggling agency, to just topping $1,000,000 in product sales in its second year as I write this in 2020.
