Solution Builder
I started this year trying to stop worrying about things I can’t control. I’m still failing—every single day—but I start over anyway.
By worrying, I don’t mean apathy. I care deeply about what’s happening in the U.S. right now. About Ukraine. About the rise of anti-democratic forces in Europe. About climate change. About how nations can’t even agree on basic guardrails for AI before things spiral out of control.
I worry about all of it. But I’m trying not to let it consume me—not to let it sit in my stomach until I feel like throwing up.
Lately, I’ve been focusing on something more immediate: not worrying about the state of the company I work for. About how the media industry is, once again, failing to keep up with a revolution. And sometimes, secretly, I catch myself thinking: maybe we deserve where we are right now. Christian guilt, I guess.
But I’m also forcing myself to shift that mindset. Instead of dwelling on what’s broken, I ask: What solutions can I build?
Don’t get me wrong—I still feel incompetent and powerless most of the time. But I’d rather try and fail than not try at all.
Sometimes, I have this morbid thought about what I’d want written on my tombstone. Not in a suicidal way—just a practical, inevitable question. Lately, I think I’d want it to say: “At least he tried.”
Building solutions is hard. And every solution builder should know that it’s easy to get trapped in your own certainties, mistaking them for universal truths.
But every now and then, I remember a slogan I once saw in a co-working space in Berlin:
“Where ideas have sex.”
Maybe I’m an idea voyeur. But I love seeing ideas collide, mix, and create something new.
And that—more than worrying—is where I want to put my energy.