The way I make sense of the world is to talk about it, at length, with anyone who’ll listen. Which frequently means the people closest to me are stuck listening to me as I work out any complicated long-poll decision making process.
A couple weeks ago I had an idea. The problem with a new idea is that if I do too much due diligence, I’ll lose enthusiasm for it. Sometimes, I think, it’s important to just carry forward and see what happens. On the flip side, sometimes I end up doing a bunch of work only to find out that the idea won’t work out, for reasons that would have been obvious from the start if I had done some investigation.
This new idea lives somewhere in the uncomfortable middle. The reason I wanted to do it, it turns out, is no longer valid. But the idea itself has taken root in my mind with a life of its own.
You might notice I’m being cagey. What is the idea? I can’t say, because as soon as I explain what the idea was I’ll lose enthusiasm for it. Being able to tell people about the thing I want to build removes all of the urgency around building it so that I can show them. So, I’m sorry if it makes this post a bit harder or more frustrating to read.
So I’ve got this idea to build a thing, and the reasons I originally wanted to build it are kaput. But maybe I should still build it anyway? That’s the process I’m currently working through (by which I mean my friends and family are suffering through.) Fortunately, I think I can distill it down into one big pro and one big con.
PRO - I think this thing could be the chewy nougaty center around which an interesting community develops. The thing itself may not be viable for any of its original intended purposes, but I love building communities.
CON - This will, like everything, suffer the opportunity cost of all the other things I’m not doing instead. Of which there are many, because I have too many hobbies.
There’s a core risk / reward decision to be made here. I could choose to spend that time doing many other things, some of which would be a lot more materially productive. But I will note, and it has been noted to me, that I have never been as visibly “excited” to be working on a project in the entire time my partner has known me. There’s a certain magic about this kind of thing, and anything that brings the magic and vibrancy this idea has brought probably ought not to be ignored.
So, sorry for the vagueness. With luck, someday, I’ll be able to talk more concretely about it. Either because it exists, or because I have decided it never will.