It Is Hard

August 27, 2026

It is hard.

This is a journal entry / brain dump for whoever is reading right now, but it is also for myself, so I can look back on this one day.

Been working 65-80hr weeks recently, trying to build the most useful products and tools I can for the video editors and creators I serve. A lot of stuff has been on my mind but I try not to think while in the act of doing the work itself, so here is where i like to dump all my thoughts.

It is hard to build and constantly provide value. It is hard to create these tools, give away so much for free, and put my blood, sweat, and tears into making them useful.

This is not me complaining. By no means am I complaining. Life is still very great, and I am very grateful.

Gratefulness is a practice. It is something you have to actively practice.

I actually think there is an interesting relationship between gratefulness and greatness.

Gratefulness means appreciating your circumstances, yourself in the present moment, and life as it currently is. It means recognizing what you already have and understanding how fortunate you are to be here.

But to pursue greatness, you almost have to remove yourself from the equation.

It is not about you at all. It is about everybody else. It is about your contribution. It is about building something great, giving your all, and creating something that serves people beyond yourself.

I think that is so interesting.

You have to be grateful for your life as it is while still giving everything you have to build what does not exist yet.

And it is still hard.

It is not easy to build anything great. It is going to take a lot out of you. It is going to take a large, disproportionate amount of your time. Some people may say that is unhealthy, but I honestly think “realistic” is wrong.

I think thinking realistically is wrong.

“Realistic” is defined by a preset combination of limitations that other people have imposed on themselves and the people around them. To be realistic is often to limit yourself and confine yourself to a box.

It is easy and even fun to say this and act inspirational. But in the moment, especially at times like right now while I am writing this, it is fucking hard.

It is hard to build new features that are genuinely based on what customers request, release those features, and still receive complaints about them.

You make some people happy, and you make some people mad. You have to continue listening, improving, and finding the editors and creators you can serve best.

Then there are the refunds, the support tickets, paying your team, doing the marketing, doing the outreach, and everything else that comes with running the company.

It is a lot of hats. It is hard.

I am not saying that to pity myself. I chose this, and I am genuinely grateful that I get to do it.

But it is fucking hard, and I put my blood, sweat, and tears into these products.

Right now, we are building our next major AutoEdit release. It is hard to spend all night building and designing the next great free templates, giving away so much work for free, and then waking up the next day to people telling you that you are a scammer, that the product is vaporware, or that the work you have spent so much time building has no value.

By the way, complaints are still a very small percentage of the feedback we receive compared to the positive feedback and the number of people who tell us that the plugins are helpful.

When volume grows, everything scales.

As you grow, you receive more complaints, support tickets, and refund requests. That is part of the growing pains. But you also receive more positive feedback and help more happy users as you grow.

The goal is obviously to have far more happy users than complaining users, which we do.

Still, handling that influx of support tickets, complaints, and refund requests can be taxing and energy-draining. It can pull on your emotional side because it makes you ask yourself difficult questions.

Am I actually building something great?

Am I actually building something valuable?

Are my products actually good?

It makes you question yourself and your work. Even when you have a vastly higher percentage of happy users, the negative feedback can still fuck with you.

At the same time, I am honestly all for taking in as much customer feedback and data as possible. Lately, I have been focused on removing my emotions from the process.

I think this is, in many ways, a game of removing your emotions from the process.

You have to love the process, but sometimes you also have to stop thinking so much about the process. It is very easy to get into our heads and become emotional about every decision, comment, and action.

Sometimes, it is just more reps.

Shots on net. Shots on net.

It is a game of removing your mind from constantly thinking about and complaining about these things, because if you're set out to build something great... we do not have small goals. We do not have small dreams.

I have an interesting verdict when it comes to the lifestyle businesses we often see on Instagram and social media. We see founders living on the beach, traveling, relaxing, and showing everybody how great their lives are.

To be honest, I very much dislike those posts.

That does not mean I dislike the person or the creator. I am not trying to hate on anybody. I just dislike the way lifestyle businesses can make everything about the founder.

It becomes about one person. It becomes about their freedom, their lifestyle, their money, their schedule, and what the business has done for them. It can become incredibly self-centered.

To me, that is not what this is about.

For me, it is about the editors. It is about the users. It is about the product. It is about the time we can save people so they can focus more on their families, get more hours of sleep each night, accept another client, or spend less of their lives completing repetitive editing work.

That is what matters to me.

Building a company may require everything from you, but the company cannot only exist for you.

To anybody who wants to build something great, just know that it will take almost everything out of you.

It will also be the greatest run of personal improvement and self-improvement you may ever experience. It will challenge you and push you in ways you never imagined.

All of your limitations and weak points will be exposed. Your ego, your incompetence, your stubbornness, and whatever else may be hiding inside you will come to light if you want to build anything great.

If you want to build a company, build a product, or start a business, I think entrepreneurship is one of the greatest forms of self-improvement.

But, interestingly, it is also not about you.

It never will be.

That has been one of the hardest mental shifts for me personally.

As an employee, funny enough, it is all about you. It is about your benefits, your overtime, your wages, and what you receive from the company. In reality, though, the company may see you more like a gear that can eventually be replaced by another person or another tool.

But when you build a company, you are practically its sole driver at the beginning. It requires everything from you. You are the company when you start it. Without you, the company is nothing.

Yet somehow, it is not about you at all.

That is the trippiest fucking thing.

It is about the user. It is about providing the most value you possibly can. It is about making a tool that improves people’s lives, saves them time, and becomes something greater than yourself.

You have to give everything you have to build it while understanding that it was never supposed to be about you.

Maybe that is the balance.

To be grateful is to appreciate your life as it is. To pursue greatness is to take what you have been given and turn it into a contribution to other people.

It is hard. It will expose you, challenge you, and ask more from you than you thought you had to give.

To anyone out there trying to make something great....

It is hard.

But please, for God's Sake... keep going.

You have no idea how close you are.