Doubt is the goldmine

Embrace uncertainty to increase momentum

When doing a startup, founders find themselves riddled with uncertainty and inescapable feelings of doubt. Instead of avoiding doubt, you should embrace it.

The worst founders avoid feelings of doubt and live a fantasy startup that is destined to hit a wall. Embracing doubt should launch questions rather than avoiding them.

And the best entrepreneurs I’ve worked with know this. They are open to explore assumptions that might prove them wrong or hurt their ego. They don’t shy away from doubt. Peirce, a famous Philosopher in the pragmatist school, once laid out the distinction between doubt and being certain beautifully:

“We generally know when we wish to ask a question and when we wish to pronounce a judgment, for there is a dissimilarity between the sensation of doubting and that of believing. [..] Doubt is an uneasy and dissatisfied state from which we struggle to free ourselves and pass into the state of belief [..] Doubt [..] stimulates us to inquiry until it is destroyed.” (Peirce, 2017 [1877])

So, when in doubt: ask questions - and get answers - to get rid of the doubt. But don’t avoid the uncertainty. Embrace it.