Especially early on, starting a company is about addressing one overarching concern that, if solved, will totally make everything so much easier.

When I first started thinking about SpotDJ, I had a job. Being a loyal employee not looking to get sued, I only worked on the project during nights and weekends. Which is to say, I didn’t really work on it at all. I can’t remember what was filling up all my free time back then, but I knew that I could build and launch a product if I just quit my job and devoted all that new found time to it; that was all that was holding me back.

After quitting the job, I realized that I couldn’t possibly go on without a cofounder. If I had somebody else, particularly someone who understood all that business stuff and could worry about money, everything would fall into place. Once I found a cofounder, I needed money. After all, I had quit my freakin job and hadn’t had a salary for weeks now! We were just one step away from success and that step was raising a small seed round.

Okay, round raised. Now if we can only find another engineer. Because it’s very risky to build something solo… Then we needed a designer, because I sure as hell can’t draw….

It went on from there, and still continues. There’s always just this one thing that’s keeping you from success. The only thing that changes is that eventually you figure out that once you get that one thing, there will always be another. Nothing really makes things that much easier — it just reveals the next challenge.

Up next: Your Friends Won’t Be the Rabid Beta Users You Think They’ll Be