Growth, But Not at Any Cost

I'd been going for eighteen months without really stopping.

Not physically. But there was always a next thing. Always a reason this month needed to be better than last month. The brand was doing fine. Numbers moving. From the outside nothing looked wrong.

From the inside I was tired in a way I couldn't explain to anyone including myself.

I was reading The Burnout Society that trip. Byung-Chul Han. Small book, one argument - that we've stopped being pushed by others and started pushing ourselves. Nobody is standing over you. No one is demanding the pace. You just do it. Voluntarily. Happily, even. Because somewhere along the way exhaustion started feeling like proof that you were serious.

I read that page three times on the rooftop.

That was me. That had been me for at least a year.

There's a version of Kanzan I could have built for speed. Broader reach, simpler fragrances, price points that don't make anyone think twice. I know what that brand looks like. The numbers move faster. The growth chart is cleaner.

But something goes quiet when you start making those decisions. Not immediately. Gradually, one sensible call at a time, until the thing you set out to make and the thing you're actually making have drifted apart without anyone noticing.

Nothing came together on that rooftop. I didn't figure anything out.

I just sat there long enough to feel the gap between being in motion and actually going somewhere. The Burnout Society is uncomfortable reading for a founder because Han isn't describing something happening to you. He's describing something you're doing to yourself and calling it work ethic. That's a harder thing to put down than a book.

I still think about growth. Every week, honestly.

But differently now. Less like a finish line and more like a question I keep coming back to - where exactly, and at what cost, and does the thing we're making still feel like the thing we wanted to make.

A fragrance that was rushed smells rushed. There's a thinness to it. You can tell.

I think most things are like that.