Is it really failure? Or is it all on Purpose

7 min read·

Wellbeing and a sense of purpose are amongst the highest states we can aim for in life, and although I’m not so much of a public story-sharer, some people have said to me that there are important learnings in one of my stories that might help others along their journey.

Back in 2017 I thought it might be a good idea to bring the Fuckup Nights movement to Western Australia. Its the most active creators movement on the planet, where 10,000 people gather in over 300 cities each month to share stories of ‘failure’ in the name of mental health and wellbeing.. and in that spirit, here is one of my own stories.

In a nutshell, after many years working for and helping other people make more money than anyone could hope for, growing small businesses large, I decided I was done. I left some great people behind, and decided to strike out on my own. The end..

That’s what I tell most people. I’ve not shared the rest of the story openly..

..not because I’m a private person (which I am). Or because I believe that some things don’t belong on social media (which I do). But, often sharing grief and suffering is more difficult for the people who are listening than those who are sharing the story.

My own journey turned out to be the most intense and life-changing of my (then) 35 years, for more reasons than the long days and sleepless nights that go with startups.

While I was working 18-hour days on building the first startup that I had a stake in, my wife Jane was suffering from a physical illness that came after 6 years of battling a debilitating mental illness. The stigma around anxiety and depression was pretty awful back then, and we constantly felt we had to cover it up and deal with our private pain, well, privately.

It took its toll on both of us. For Jane it robbed her of so many things she took for granted, like belief in doctors, life routine, work and social interaction.

Jane often joked how much better it would be to have a physical illness than mental illness because at least it could be “seen” and validated and understood.

Ultimately Jane’s battle with mental illness was largely overcome, and we had a couple years of relative stability, peace and happiness..a time where we could think on the future, on a family. There was hope and love and joy.

However nature would extract a far heavier toll on Jane, and after 2 years of ‘wellness’ she was diagnosed with a cancer that over the next 3 years (in the awful parlance of the medical profession that understands as little about cancer as it does about mental illness) would recur, then be “removed”, and recur, and then go into “remission”, and eventually metastasise and then progress to what doctors like to call terminal. This was the 3 hardest years of our lives — the same years I was spending long long days and nights at this ‘business-building’ thing.

In the wash up, the business won life (for a while anyway), but Jane didn’t. In 2010 she died in my arms, after 3 days in hospital, a place she desperately wanted out of for the end of her life. Just 2 months earlier, in almost constant pain, she made a note that even if she had *one* good day a week, then that was quality of life.

She was an inspiration, and that someone so full of love for everything and asking for so little had to have her life cut short so young made no sense. The relief that she was out of pain, and grief and disbelief that she was gone came in waves. Even today there are small reminders. But I know she’s free now, and after this experience I have been constantly reminded that there’s something more to this life than what we see.

Sometimes I wonder if I would have done things differently if given another chance. I learned a few lessons:

• Some things that we think are important in the moment.. aren’t
• There are a few constants in life. Change is one of them. We are doomed to make choices
• And.. every pleasure holds an equal share of pain

But do things differently? No.

Regret is a curse and leads to very bad places if we let it take over our lives. Life is to be lived, the good and the not so good come together, and both are either opportunities to grow, or things that prevent growth.. we get to choose.

In the quiet reflection on life after losing Jane, I also found that serendipity surrounds us if we’re open enough, and allow ourselves to be still for long enough to recognise it.. even in the hardest things, and the smallest things.

If it wasn’t for that searing experience, I wouldn’t have latched on to the preciousness of life when I did. I wouldn’t have had the financial freedom to pursue what I really wanted in life, which was to use my business experience to help others build a new economy, one based on investment in recreating what I think we’ve lost in this world — our sense of community, a sense of purpose and belonging — through more sustainable and less extractive business and economic models;

And through this process I wouldn’t have met Kylie in 2012, my amazing, beautiful life partner, and wife since 2015. Have I mentioned her brilliant mind, loyalty, commitment and razor sharp sense of justice? I am fortunate and blessed.

I was trying to pick a photo, and it occurred to me that we both like to ‘have it all’ in life, and often can’t agree on what that looks like. Our wedding was a good example. We couldn’t agree on one, so we had two of them!

And obviously we wouldn’t have started-up Impact Seed in 2015.

So, everything has a purpose, and every one of us has a Purpose; And the road is full of potholes and dead ends and stress and grief trying to find or fulfil it.

This brings me back to the beautifully branded Fuckup Nights. Reflecting on all my fuckups in life that have led to good things, it occurs to me that in this age of social media pervading so many corners of our lives, we have all become very well rehearsed at spinning our success stories, and lionising our ‘successful’ risk takers.

However, we are very very bad at acknowledging (publicly) the many many fuckups, the depression and the anxiety that every single one of carry at some level in order to put on the big front to our friends, family and colleagues.

Our communities, our sense of belonging and purpose have been losing out to to some kind of race for business success, as though that might make us feel kind of ‘safe’.

The fact is: starting a business or any new project requires a tremendous leap of faith, risk and long term endurance. It is often lonely, takes us away from our families, costs relationships, destroys finances, all in the name of creating something new. And it comes with an overwhelming 90% failure rate after 3 years

Unless we want to take a bottle of wine to bed just to sleep every night, we need to start sharing, reconnecting and becoming friends with failure, and with each other.

Health and family is what most people claim is their number one priority, but when you look at the people around you, how many actually live and breathe that? Often health and family comes second to our work, and that’s not how we’re supposed to live.

A sense of purpose and belonging is what makes us humans fulfilled and when allowed to flourish, it creates vibrant communities.

I am hopeful that we can all reconnect with what’s important in our lives…. not what the business and economics machine says is important.

Cheers,

Sven