Here’s to the crazy ones.

It was quite ironic that I was eating an apple on my drive home when I got a text message:

 ”Jobs Died”

As soon as I got home I opened my macbook and launched the TWiT network.  My wife and I watched as Leo flipped over to a YouTube video of Steve Jobs’ commencement address at Stanford University.  I stood there listening, overcome with sadness for a person that I had never met in my entire life.  My family had gone through this a couple of years ago when my mother-in-law was diagnosed with pancreatic cancer.  Unlike Jobs, she left us only a few months later.  I felt a sadness for Steve’s wife and children as well as a sadness for someone who had helped create the technology that shaped my life and career.

And then Jobs said something in the address that really hit home for me.

 ”I have looked in the mirror every morning and asked myself: ‘If today were the last day of my life, would I want to do what I am about to do today?’ And whenever the answer has been ‘No’ for too many days in a row, I know I need to change something.”

It was also ironic that I had just put in my two weeks notice a day before to, as Jobs put it, peruse something I love doing.  In a strange way it made me feel justified that what I was about to do wasn’t an absolutely crazy idea.

 ”Stay Hungry, Stay Foolish.”

Tomorrow I’m about to embark on that “foolish” adventure.  Over the past two weeks I’ve talked to a multitude of people about going out on my own.  The ones at my soon-to-be ex-job mostly think I’m nuts.  They give me kind works and good luck statements, but you can hear it in their voice that they don’t understand why I could possibly think this is a good idea.  On the other side of the coin, the people outside of the corporate shell have a completely different view of the situation.  I haven’t talked to anyone who has left the cubicle world that said I was making a mistake.  Their words are sincere and you can see the excitement in their eyes – I’m another person who dared to take the red pill and unplug from the matrix.  It almost feels like they are welcoming me into a very exclusive club, and the first rule of “quit club” is to not talk about “quit club” until you have taken the plunge.  One fellow cord cutter said this to me last week.

“Dan, it was a long time coming.  I always though that you would eventually do this.  Trust me you’ve always has the right mindset for this and you’ll do great.  It was the best decision I ever made in my life and soon you’ll understand.”

So here’s to the crazy ones.  I’m not in it to change the entire world, just to change mine.  And hopefully in the process I’ll convince a few others to that it’s ok to take the red pill with me.