My father and I began our music business in a basement. For ten years we were doing quite well, having a comfortable income and relatively stress free. Then I had all kinds of dreams and ambitions and the basement became annoyingly small. In 1993 we expanded to include the ground floor of the building. Since then, it had been an uphill struggle all the way, until I sold the business in 2005.
What was not calculated in my mind was the human costs. In doubling the space, responsibilities blew up into monstrous proportion. Solving daily crisis thwarted my energy. Many well intentioned programs were wasted by the road side. My income was also compromised.
In retrospect I realized it was my greediness in achievement that had made life difficult for me. I was not content with my smallness. Like Icarus in the Greek mythology, and other immediate examples in the news: the downfall of dictators and News of the World,etc. And Netflix’s price hike—abandoning a perfectly fine business model and opening themselves to competition—I can almost smell the singed wings…
