Years ago, I was talking to a contemporary from an IIT, who was well-settled, working in a good, stable tech company, with a good salary. He didn’t mind the job even if he wasn’t madly in love with it.
During our chat, he started talking about a passion that he ‘someday’ wanted to pursue by doing a startup.
I asked him, “Why someday? Why not now?”
He said, “Pata nahi, dar lagtaa hai”. Translated in English, “Don’t know, it feels scary.”
While I could relate to his sentiment, here is why we need to think differently:
1. You don’t have to quit your job to start working on your startup idea. Why not start writing a blog to educate your customers or test prototypes?
Start now — don’t wait to formally launch. In fact, we launched the HabitStrong website 3 months after we had paying customers.
But how do you find the time?
You already have the time (outside office hours) — what you need is focus and discipline.
2. Fear is a good servant (it keeps us cautious) but a bad master. If we let fear hold our lives hostage, what’s the point of having a degree from IIT/IIM/BITS/SRCC or other good colleges?
A good degree is a safety net.
But a safety net is not a bed to sleep on — it is meant to break the fall if we take a risk but fail.
– Rajan