Month: July 2011

In light of the big changes underway, my wife and I have been pretty fully occupied lately dealing with all of the logistics necessary to make it all reality — getting our house fixed up, inspected, “staged”, and on the market, getting rid of Stuff We Don’t Need that isn’t worth moving, etc. Our “To Do” list has seemed endless, and yet I know it’s ultimately finite, and we’ve managed to keep checking things off, day by day, so I feel certain we’re getting closer, right?

To keep myself amply motivated through it all, I turn my mind to the tremendous possibilities this necessary effort is opening up. Day One sitting at my desk in my newly appointed home office, ready to create wonderful things, seems a long way off now, but I’m so charged with excitement about it that it’s getting me through the day-to-day tasks necessary to reach my goal — and that kind of focus is exactly what I need.

I’ve added a new tag, “The Venture”, for posts related to this enterprise of mine. I hope to keep them frequent, concise, and interesting, while also resuming posting on my usual range of topics when time allows again (most likely about a month from now). Stay tuned!

I’m about to make some big changes in my life, and it’s hard to imagine a better occasion to announce them.

After nine challenging, rewarding, and at times arduous years working at a Silicon Valley company that was once a garage startup itself, I’m amicably parting ways with my employer to pursue my own projects as an independent software developer.

I’ve had the entrepreneurial bug for a while now, and a new job for my wife that requires us to move cross-country has had the welcome effect of forcing/facilitating Decision Time. We’ve put our house on the market, and later this month will be moving to lovely Packanack Lake, New Jersey. I’ll have a couple months of working remotely for my previous employer ahead, to tie up loose ends and leave my areas of responsibility in the best shape I can, but come October 1st I’ll be striking off in pursuit of my own American Dream — which, to me, means taking a chance on myself and my ideas and aspirations, embracing risk and challenge, and developing my talents to their fullest, with the hope of producing things that other people find useful, and in the process making the work I love my living. I’m grateful to have enjoyed something close to that in my current job, but this is an opportunity to own the entire creative process from end to end, to challenge and take chances on my own design sense, and to pursue areas of application that serve other markets.

I’m tremendously excited, and am positively chomping at the bit to get started. There are plenty of logistics to take care of between here and Day One, but I feel lighter with the knowledge that I’ve committed to this new course, and that I’m giving myself permission to do the very things I yearn to. I also hope this change will enable me to do more writing here, and I mean to include among that writing the story of my startup venture as it unfolds.

As I set my sights on this Big Dream (and, when I think those words, Bill Whittle’s “Trinity” (part 2 here) is on my mind as having so brilliantly put into words what I feel about it), in the forefront of my thoughts is a deep and abiding appreciation for a culture that, in its very bones, cherishes, celebrates, and strives to exhort exactly this kind of big dreaming. What I’m setting out to achieve is exactly what a culture founded on the individual right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness designed itself for. My gratitude for this opportunity is immense, and I mean to make use of it to achieve great things, while always remembering my debt to those who took tremendous risks before me to make it all possible.

More to come later, but I wanted to share the exciting news. I can’t wait to write more about this new adventure.

Wishing my American friends a very joyous and grateful Independence Day!