Passion+Trust: Three Years Later

I’m writing this while returning from a family vacation, my wife and daughters asleep as we cross the country through the nighttime sky, returning home. Three years ago I was in the same situation, yet very different. I had just left my previous job and was unemployed with no definite plans, no job opportunities, and no income.

Over the course of the last three years, I’ve returned again and again to the ideas of “passion+trust,” how they guide my life and how they’ve formed a company. I didn’t realize it then, when Substance opened its metaphorical doors (we couldn’t afford real ones) on a cold, rainy January day in 2007. And while I always knew this on some level, I now understand that we didn’t set out to create an “interactive brand strategy company,” or a “digital agency,” or a “creative shop,” though we’ve used those words to describe ourselves.

We set out to create and build a company around “passion+trust”: a business based on equal parts passion and love for what we’re doing, and a deep trust and respect for each other.

Our past actions determine our future. When I get off the plane later tonight, it won’t be into the unknown like it was in November 2006. I’ll be walking off the plane into the future I’ve created, based on what I’m passionate about, what I love to do, with the people I trust to always do better.