The man in the arena

it is the beginning of the year.

happy new year. 2012. the end of history?

maybe just something different.

expect the unexpected?

some of my companies are struggling.

the 2nd half of 2011 has been miserable. everyone is waiting. people seem to prefer to delay decisions. channels are clearing their inventory levels, with no new orders. people are zipping their pockets. money is not coming out. with a few exceptions.

two classes. the haves and have-not’s. the ones who have clear growth.  predictability. visibility. and the ones who are working just as hard. trying to figure it out. that is why we choose this.

i realize i am not in the trenches. my job, my line,  is to support the entrepreneurs who are in the front. not a lineman, a line-backer.

Here is how Teddy Roosevelt described it in an April 23rd, 1910, speech in the Sorbonne, now named citizenship in a republic.

here is looking at you

Amir, Israel, Yuval, Omer, Nili, Yonathan, Zvi, Tal, Guy, Avner, Pierre, Guri and Doron:

It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.

The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood;

who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause;

who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.

Tags: america, dreams, entrepreneurship, great, passion