Don't dilute your vision
There has never been a sliver of doubt in my mind about why PopSchools exists.
A few years ago when I was just getting started as a new solo founder, I received advice from a friend that has stayed with me all this time.
"Don't dilute your vision," he said.
It felt like advice worth holding on to. I have held on to it and kept it close to heart. PopSchools has always been about working towards solutions to painful problems I and others in my community face. I have always been the sole founder and there has never been a sliver of doubt in my mind about why PopSchools exists.
The whats and the hows of it all have changed over the years. You might remember PopSchools was pitched as an alternative school for homeschoolers, an online community for families with cryptocurrency earning opportunities, and a co-working/co-learning space for tech-enabled families.
This may seem on the surface to be completely different from the direction we’re headed today. Today we’re building a community for pre-career technologists. If you could look deep inside and see the roots of PopSchools, you would see that nothing has fundamentally changed.
I started all of this because I wanted educational options for my children and for families like mine — low-income, single-parent households. It didn’t take long to realize that without financial independence and security, people like us don’t have choices.
From even the earliest iterations of PopSchools, the financial well-being of the adults in the household was something I considered. Over time it became less about how a person chooses to educate their children and more about getting them to a place where viable options exist.
I am a sole founder solving my own problems. You can’t separate Nikema from PopSchools. It absolutely is about me, my experiences, and my abilities. I’ve just learned the hard way how essential this cohesion is.
I have a lot to say about this, but I’ll stop here for today after one last thought.
I only work well when I’m in alignment with my vision and values. I’m there now and it’s such a relief. I wake up every day passionate about the work I do and the people I connect with. This is the only way I can remain relentless in the pursuit of solutions to these problems that keep me up at night.
You won’t catch me doing work I don’t care about or promoting ideas I don’t believe in. It literally makes me unwell.
Hold me to that, will you?
Thanks, Nikema ❤️