Our Journey Onward: A Company Update

Startup. Entrepreneurship. Accelerator. OKRs. Business plan. Investors. Bootstrap. LTV. MVP. Pain point. Trough of despair. Pivot. Pivot. And pivot.

These are just some buzzwords that have consumed our lives for the last four and a half years. Two words, though, have been circulating in my head for the past few months that outweigh them all:

Journey and onward.

There are no other words that truly capture our time with Cascadin.

Journey

When we started Cascadin, we knew it wouldn’t be easy. While we had a destination, a goal, in mind, we knew that it would take time. We dabbled with the idea of seeking outside investment, which could have sped up the journey, or rather the goal. But that outside investment would have come with strings.

So, our journey has been slow. Sometimes steady. Sometimes chaotic. Always doing our best, giving it what we could, and knowing that not everything was in our control. Just like every journey.

There are highs and lows, twists and turns, of every journey. For us, the lows were tempered by our amazingly supportive family and friends. The twists and turns brought a chance to learn and grow. The highs induced joy and laughter.

Most entrepreneurial endeavors don’t go the way the founders expect. One of the images that stuck with us over the years is this one:

We’ve always laughed at this graphic. We related to it so much. We still relate to it.

It’s been a journey. A really good journey.

Onward

We started using onward pretty early on. I don’t remember how or why or when. But it became the word we used to sign off on emails and more. And it came to encapsulate our attitude on this journey.

We didn’t always know where the journey was taking us. But we were always moving forward. Onward was our mantra. Is our mantra.

It’s held us steady. It’s kept us moving. Our journey onward.

By now, you’ve probably guessed where I’m going with this.

Our journey is changing.

If there is a third word I’d add to our time with Cascadin it would be traction. The thing you really need to keep a business going. And something we’ve struggled with.

It’s why, a few months ago, Jake and I decided to shift our priorities. Since then, we’ve laid low and imagining what the future of Cascadin will look like.

We’re biased, obviously, and we also know Cascadin is a great tool. Hell, it helped Jake track his applications throughout his job search.

Jake started his new job last week. It’s a great company doing interesting things and he is excited about this new challenge.

This is part of our shifting priorities. His job means there won’t be any new development on Cascadin for the time being.

Beyond that, we’re not entirely sure what the future of Cascadin will be.

I’ll be prioritizing other things for a while, like my writing. I also hope to continue building workshops and presentations to help people and teams better address burnout and reduce toxic productivity in their lives. (Like my presentation at the Bozeman Business and Professional Women’s luncheon on Jan. 18!)

Cascadin as a tool isn’t going anywhere. That is something we do know. It’s too good of a tool (I wrote the draft of this message in a Note in Cascadin). We don’t want to take it away from anyone getting value out of it. And, we’ve put too much into it to let it go.

When you have questions about Cascadin or run into a bug or anything, you’ll still get a response from me. We may not be able to fix the issue immediately, but we will fix it as soon as possible.

Finally, there is one other word I’ll add to our list. And it’s really the only one that matters.

Gratitude.

Jake and I have so much gratitude for you, our community. We have unending gratitude to our friends who’ve cheered us on from the beginning. And we have a deep, deep gratitude to our family. Without you all, we wouldn’t have made it this far. We wouldn’t be the people we are today.

Without you all, this journey would have ended before it even began.

From the bottom of our hearts, thank you.

Onward we go,

Alyson and Jake