The Dandy Newsletter—02/23/21

Ahoy! I’m Sean Anderson. This is the Dandy Newsletter, which you’re getting because you signed up on my website. If you’d like to unsubscribe, just click the link at the bottom. Otherwise, thanks for your time and support!

Hey there. How have the last couple of weeks been for you?

In my last dispatch, I talked about burning down Dandy Cat Design and starting the whole thing over. Metaphorically speaking, of course. There’s no way I’m about to get all Jimi Hendrix in here and set my computer ablaze. Sure, it’s been giving me some issues lately, but taking gasoline and a match to it isn’t the answer.

Dandy Cat Design is now Dandy Cat, and I’m still feeling happy with this choice. There’s a lot of potential in front of me now. I’m excited to see where I can take things.

For example, I just published a new post. This one is called, What I Wouldn't Give for an Apple TV Soundbar. In it, I talk about wanting Apple to release a soundbar that can also double as an Apple TV. Why not? Pair a couple of HomePods to an Apple TV and that’s pretty much what you’ve got. A dedicated Apple TV soundbar would simplify this setup and breathe new life into two different product categories. I bet it would look pretty amazing to boot. The Apple TV is in desperate need of something like this. As it stands now, Apple’s charging $179 for something that their competitors offer for around half that price. They’re getting their butts kicked by Roku and smart TVs. Pretty sad for the most valuable company in the world, if you ask me.

With my new website, and this entirely new place to host it, has come a newfound sense of community and interaction. This isn’t the first time I’ve used Micro.blog, but I’m still impressed with the friendly assortment of people that can be found on the service. It truly feels like what Twitter was before it got terrible. Here’s to always hoping that Micro.blog doesn’t follow that some route. I encourage you to check it out for yourself. There’s a lot of nice banter happening on there at any given time.

I also feel happy to not be participating in the commoditization of self-improvement anymore. That’s what I felt Dandy Cat was becoming before I restarted everything. (Let’s call that “The Great Burn Down,” because why not?) Spend any time on the internet and you’re bound to run into many people who aren’t necessarily providing a service or product. Rather, what they offer can be boiled down to being an enthusiastic cheerleader. Their websites tend to be plastered with platitudes like,

“Become the best you that you can be!”

“Take my extensive mastermind course and grow into a badass—yet mindful—business boss. It’s your destiny!”

“Give me money and I’ll show you the tips and tricks I use to get other people to hand over their money!”

That last one sounds a bit jokey, but it’s also not too far off from the truth. A cottage industry has sprung up around the idea of earning money by making people the very best whatevers in their field. That’s what I feel was happening with Dandy Cat. It started as a Squarespace website design company and slowly morphed into a place where people could pay me money to, essentially, read about how I organize my computer files. I don’t know that I was really pushing the productivity conversation forward. It just seemed like another avenue toward generating an income.

If that works for other people, then what the heck, more power to them. We all need money to live.

On the other hand, it feels weird to me to build an entire business around the concept of teaching others how to build a business just like yours. It feels circuitous, like something that just folds in on itself, without ever actually growing beyond its own bounds. Like how the apparent point of getting a philosophy degree is so that you can get a job teaching philosophy classes.

I don’t necessarily think it’s predatory, but it doesn’t make me feel great to watch. There’s so much that goes into growing a successful business, and while I believe that encouraging others to get into the right mindset is helpful, it’s not what turns a person into their vision of a success. Not in the end, anyway. What so many of these success peddlers neglect to include in their courses and rhetoric is the defining key to their success: luck.

Hard work, perseverance, and knowing the right people are all important, but they’re ultimately not what makes or breaks a business. Most of the time it comes down to: were you lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time? Following someone’s Generic Business Success Mastermind Course doesn’t mean you’re going to start earning loads of cash and get invited onto all the coolest business-themed podcasts. How could you? You didn’t do what they did when they did it.

A part of me thinks that many of the success peddlers we see these days are just people who weren’t in the right place at the right time with their initial idea(s). Luck passed them by on its way to someone else. Instead of fruitlessly toiling away, they just pivoted to charging people to learn at least these two things:

• How to avoid the mistakes they’ve made, since they’ve already made them.
• How to think positive, believe in themselves, and never give up.

Apply bits and pieces from their own particular niche and POW! You’ve got a stew going. Naturally, this doesn’t apply to everybody, but I would put money down on it applying to many people.

What am I advocating for then? Well, for my work, I just want to write about the stuff that’s interesting enough to motivate my fingers to start typing. For other people, I would like to see more public consideration given to what they’re putting out into the world. Is what they’re doing encouraging their audiences to reflect on their shortcomings, dreams, and work? Or are they doing it because it’s an easy money-maker? I want to hear about and see the complete process somebody takes to get to where they are, and I want to see authenticity in that recounting. Are you peddling success because you believe, deep down in your bones, that you’ve discovered the secret recipe to helping other people create fulfilling and profitable businesses? Or are you just peddling success because you’ve got nothing left and you need to find a way to make a quick buck by taking them from unsuspecting people?

To wrap it up, if you’ve got any thoughts about this dispatch, tasty vegan recipes, or cool websites you want to share with me, then send a reply to this email. Seriously friend, I'd love to hear from you.

Until next time, stay dandy, cat.