Failing.

Last week, Dynamic Jack, the cannabis company I founded and ran for the last 2+ years, announced on Instagram it is closing.?

I had to think long and hard about whether I wanted to say anything publicly about the closing, outside of prior communications to those who invested in DJ, most of whom are my friends and family. The truth is, I’m pretty spent - emotionally and physically. At Benesch, the law firm I started working for in January this year, I’m able to write as much as I want on topics related to my legal practice. I also write for Rolling Stone Culture Council, but more from the perspective of a cannabis operator. Writing, on whatever topic, has been cathartic. But, writing on this topic? Well, that’s another level of vulnerability I’m just not sure about. As we all know with these things, there is much that must be left unsaid. And, I’m still somewhere in the “stages of grief” with respect to closing DJ.

In my life, I have had many failures, both big and small. With time, I’ve come to realize that the most painful failures were necessary because they led me down a better path. I hope that will be the case with respect to DJ; but right now, I’m struggling to see it. Yes, I learned more in the last 2.5 years than maybe any other time in my life. Yes, I expect that will help me as I move forward in my career (after all, how many big law attorneys can say they have been licensed cannabis operators?). But, I poured significant personal funds into DJ and received no pay for running the company (while also practicing law on my own for some income). And, I nearly killed myself trying to make it work at the expense of my husband, kids, extended family, friends, and my financial/physical/mental health.

All I can think about now is the money that friends and family invested in DJ, expecting a return that DJ cannot give them. And, when I say friends and family, I mean everyone from family members, to former colleagues and bosses, to legal clients, to close friends, to parents of kids’ at our school, to cannabis industry peers, and to women wanting to support women. What do I say about this when we see each other? What do they think of me now?

When I have shared these feelings, I’m told that (i) everyone understands that investing in any new business, let alone a cannabis business, is very risky; (ii) no one invested an amount that, if lost, would dramatically change their life; and (iii) most entrepreneurs do not spend as much time thinking about the loss to investors as I do (which I found shocking, honestly).

These people could be right, but it does not make me feel any better.

Maybe that’s the point, though. I don’t get to feel better right now; maybe not ever. DJ failed, and I feel all the emotions: sadness, anger, embarrassment, guilt, shame, anxiety, fear, and a whole lot of “what ifs.” What if I had done this; what if I hadn’t done that. Hindsight is usually 20/20, but not in cannabis where regularly pivoting is the name of the game. There really is no way to know whether different choices would have led the company to success, but that doesn’t mean I won’t torture myself thinking about it just the same.

I’m guessing this may not be the article you thought you were going to read; the one where I get into the details about why and how DJ failed, and what I learned along the way. Perhaps I will write that article someday. For now, I’ll just say that even without everything else that went wrong, we had two disastrous harvests (with different sets of growers) that together, were company-ending events.?

For now, what I’m capable of writing about is the raw emotions that come from having birthed and nurtured a business that did not succeed. I know that most entrepreneurs had failures before success, and perhaps that will be the case for me too. If it is, I hope to be able to share that success with the people who put their faith in DJ, and ultimately in me. For now, however, I need to focus on managing all these emotions and finding stability in my life again with my new position at Benesch, my family, and (because I'm still an entrepreneur at heart) my next project.