Love is the inspiration that sparks the vision. The relationship is the venture that comes from that dream, it’s the product of the love. To grow, to scale, one must always be reexamining and tweaking their strategy. Gathering new tools and learning to maximize them to their greatest potential: sometimes by learning from or working with an expert: this is prudent, this is wisdom. Being honest about where you see weaknesses in your venture is an advantage, believe it or not — really a strength. Some cannot see the imperfections in their business plan, and therein cannot prepare, plan, pivot: to evade loss of traction. We see a need, we must satisfy it: add new features for ease of use, tweak messaging for better understanding, optimize your offering to increase retention.

Every single successful venture has to overcome obstacles and barriers to the top, and will always need to innovate to hold their position. Statistically the average millionaire has gone bankrupt 3–4 times. They risk everything and lose it all, before seeing their dream materialize. But the ones who believe in themselves and their vision, the talent of their partner, their team… They truly want to succeed and so they try, more so in the darkness, sometimes many times over. They explore and experiment new approaches until they master their domain and start to see a return on their investment… Literally, millions of times over, they are rewarded. Had they cut their losses, earmarked their venture as a failure, welcomed defeat, refused to learn another way, accepted the belief that if it was right it would all have just fallen into place from the start — they would never have landed, an “overnight success”, seeming to have happened so easily to the onlooker, right at the very top of a goldmine.

The risk and investment is proportionally equal to the reward. Satisfaction, contentment, support, security, comfort, fulfillment, pride in what you’ve built, a role model for future generations. An ROI only seen by those with endurance. This is the real American Dream: to be inspired, manifest a vision, and execute it from nothing but your two hands and your gumption, your very soul, your blood, sweat, tears, time, your faith — which was not blind at all. To have created for yourself something that is a legacy, that leaves your mark on the world: or just the heart and life of another human being.