# My Most Valuable Lesson in Life Learnt the Hard Way

Hollywood movies are often introduced with a main character living his life until a big event happens, something that is enough life changing to justify a compelling story. And we, as an audience, tend to identify to that hero or some event in the story that helps us forget the boredom of real life. I believe this is one of the secret ingredients that make the movies industry so successful. People need to forget about their daily life because they believe it’s boring. In the timespan of 159 minutes they are thrilled in something more exciting, adventurous, romantic … everything that does not seem to exist in “real life”.

I love movies and cinema, and I really enjoy seeing a good one. However, something have always kept me a bit skeptical about the whole phenomenon. In my sight, real life is more exciting, there’s an infinite amount of possibilities and outcomes to what you do. Everything seem possible when you stop picturing your actions and ideas in the way society expects you to do. This feeling has started filling me since I was a teenager. It forged my personality and made me what I have been until now. People nowadays call it being an “entrepreneur” or “hacker”. I don’t think any word could describe the way I feel about my life and my role in the current society.

I left my country 6 years ago and came to France in order to study computer science. I had been to medical school before, trying to follow my dad’s footsteps. My path through my studies has been the same thing as it has always been my whole life: trying new things, never settle down at the same place, always thinking of the next project and moving forward. As an immigrant student I have done many little jobs, worked for big IT companies ( although I was not always allowed to ), joined a prestigious computer school club where I learned so much about sysadmin in system engineering and met many people. Still, I was always feeling something missing. Deep inside, there was a voice who has been there since the beginning. It kept telling me what I needed to do. I was working as a system engineer on a short term contract when a friend (at the time) offered me to start our own startup where I would be responsible for all the technical aspect. When I think about it now, the idea was not that attractive, there was no business plan and we were just a team of three guys without any previous experience in the startup business. It was one of the most important choices I had to do. Either decline a comfortable job offer which would’ve let me acquire a legal worker status and finish my studies working with cool technologies, and maybe even travelling. Or jumping right into the startup adventure, with no guaranty of success, no market research whatsoever, and no immigration status possible especially in France which is about ten years far from a Startup Act .

Flash forward, I am co-founder and CTO at jib.li. Many things happened since and long story made short, we made a pivot and had new people in the team. I will share this story with my friend and co-founder Ryadh in an other article, a story which I think every foreign entrepreneur to France should know about. For the time being, Jib.li has been launched 6 months ago, had some worldwide press and media coverage, and is currently one of the first crowd-shipping/shopping platforms.

Then comes last week. Something big happened. Actually it was a succession of events that, taken alone could be considered probable, but thinking they would happen all at the same time in the lapse of a few days made them what we define as “life changing” events. They are totally unrelated, each having a huge impact in some aspect of my personal and professional life. But still, they are all connected together with the same variable that makes them what I feel like being born in a new life.

Each one of these events could be considered a failed, depressing twist filled with despair. In fact, they made me feel that way and I could barely sleep at night, always feeling a pain in my stomach like I have been punched in the nuts. I am not enough comfortable to talk about the personal one and the next articles will explain the rest of the story. What really matters here is the key denominator, something I can now consider, with confidence, as the most important factor in any future project and my whole new life. I am talking about Trust. Of course, it seems obvious ! Well I taught it was too.

The history of humanity has been shaped by trust. You can’t build a pyramid if you can’t trust the architect. You can’t build an army when people don’t trust you. You can’t learn if you don’t trust a teacher or a mentor, and you can’t found a family if you don’t trust a partner… It is something that must be earned. Something you can’t afford with money and power. Something you can fake with lies and charisma . I am now convinced the only way to find trust is to look for Passion inside people and that every human being have to learn it the hard way. You must be betrayed in order to acknowledge it’s worth. I sincerely hope for you it won’t be the same as me, but I can say for sure this was my life changing event. Anything that will come after will be different and I am very thankful I was given this precious lesson in my youth.

I don’t know what words could describe the aftermath. I feel new, free, light. I feel a strength rising inside me, like the power to shape the future. I still have so many things to learn and experience, and the pains that come with it. Entropy makes life beautiful, the uncertainty built in the entire universe makes our lives much more interesting than any Hollywood movie.

Good luck to all those who create, make and change things, and for anyone else, just listen to the voice speaking to you.

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