Let’s just start out by saying that I’m really glad 2010 is in the past.

I started off 2010 with some enthusiasm and even determination. My intentions were good, but apparently karma didn’t like it. Maybe I came across too arrogant, I don’t know.

All I know is that in 2010 it seemed like the blows just kept coming, one right after another. You know in those Rocky movies (just pick one, they are pretty much all the same after Rocky 1) where, at some point during the fight, he just stands there and keeps getting hit over and over and over again? Yeah, like that. $12000 of car repairs in a single year alone can do that to you, even if you aren’t trying to do the Dave Ramsey dance. If you ARE trying to do the dance, that makes it worse, because it compounds the feeling of failure. Combine with that a major misunderstanding at work plus missing a coding deadline right around the same time my daughter came down with a serious life-threatening illness causing me to miss a week of work with her in the hospital right at the time year-end evaluations were due…

It was not a very good year.

So it was early last fall when a friend of mine suggested I read Seth Godin’s book “The Dip,” which I immediately followed with “Linchpin.” Reading these two books in that sequence changed my entire outlook on my career.

The premise of “The Dip” is very simple. Think of a time when it has seemed to you like things just aren’t working out, when they seem harder than they should be and not nearly as fun or fulfilling as you had hoped when you began. Maybe it is in a job or a career. Maybe you are trying to learn to play an instrument or you are training for a marathon. “The Dip” that Godin is speaking of is this time — the time past the beginning, when things were new and exciting, but before the time when it becomes fun again because you are really good. In “The Dip” he explains how to tell whether the low point is really a dip or just the beginning of the end.

To me, however, the biggest lesson was this: If you try hard enough, you can envision what the dip will be like for any new endeavor you think of starting, and you can decide early whether you think you are interested in going through the dip.

I think it is a natural law that anything worth doing or having has a dip associated with it, where the size of the dip is proportional in depth to the value of the thing worth doing or having. Learning Spanish was like this for me. At first, it was interesting and novel (“Hey, check me out! I can say an entire sentence in Spanish!”). But then there was the long arduous time period where it just was not happening. I’d hear people speak in Spanish but I couldn’t translate what they were saying fast enough to understand them; I’d try to reply but I couldn’t translate my thoughts to Spanish fast enough to keep their interest. But I pushed and pushed, and suddenly one day it happened: I was suddenly thinking in Spanish. I could understand and speak without any problem. I was truly bilingual, and it was fun again.

Learning to write computer software was like that. So was learning to play the piano, and a host of other things.

Since I know that anything worth doing has a dip, and since I also believe that the size of the dip is proportional to the pursuit, I should be able to objectively analyze a new endeavor at the beginning. I should be able to imagine how it will be to achieve excellence in this endeavor, and I should be able to envision at least some of that which will constitute the dip. Then I can analyze up front whether I think it is worth the effort. Then, if I so choose, I can move forward with a bit more awareness and less surprise when the dip hits.

However, there’s another perfectly good alternative: I might be honest with myself and realize that I’m not willing to see it through. In this case, I’m better off to focus my energy in other areas where I AM willing to make the investment.

(There is a point to all of this, really. I’m getting there.)

For a good 15 years of my career, almost since my career began, I’ve thought about starting my own software company. I’ve had numerous ideas for products that might be monetizable over that timeframe and have conducted various levels of research for many of them. Eventually, every one of these ideas got shelved or abandoned. And suddenly, after having first read “The Dip” and then “Linchpin,” with the context of the Money Flow Principle, I knew what I had been doing wrong.

See, all this time one main reason I’ve wanted to have my own company was because I’ve wanted to work on what I wanted the way I want to do it. So I’ve had all these ideas for possible software companies. And every time I’ve had an idea, one of the first things I start to think about is, “How can I make a business out of this? How can this idea make money?”

It is at this point where I start exploring financial models and business plans. I spend time thinking about how to deliver the product and how much to charge, whether it is a rich client or a web application, whether it is a product or a service, whether it is a subscription model or a license model. I think about the customer I want to target. I run the numbers to see if it can make money.

And I either can’t figure out how to make any money, or I simply get bored and quit.

When I read “The Dip” and thought about my career, I had a major epiphany: I’m not sure I am actually willing to see my business through the dip. I think I understand a little about what needs to be done. While I don’t claim that I’ve thought of everything, I think I’ve got a fairly representative picture. And I’m not convinced that I am interested in seeing it through.

However, I AM still interested in working on what I want to do, the way I want to do it. But now that I realize that I may not be interested in doing it as a business, I feel relieved. Suddenly I’m not compelled to monetize whatever I choose to do, because I’m not sure that is really what I want. I’m free instead to just pursue something interesting and try to give society a valuable gift, and trust that if I do, the money will eventually flow in my direction.

I don’t think I can clearly express how liberating this was to me. At a time where I was feeling somewhat trapped and beaten down, I realized I could start creating fulfillment for myself, with no obligations other than just those I make to myself, to create something that is enjoyable and satisfying and interesting to me, the way I want to do it.

So I did. I created an open source software project, called Zoomulus. I’ve been working on it ever since, and it has been great. There’s not much there yet, and I’m not even sure yet what it will actually be. But it is mine, interesting to me, done my way, and it is making a big difference in my life.