You built something from nothing. You saw what others missed, bet everything on your instincts, and proved the doubters wrong. That clarity of vision made your company possible.

But here's the uncomfortable truth: the same conviction that created your business may now be strangling it. The founder's curse isn't about losing your edge—it's about gripping so tightly to what worked that you can't see what's needed next. Understanding this trap is the first step toward escaping it.

Founders don't just start companies—they become them. After years of sacrifice, sleepless nights, and betting your reputation on every decision, the line between personal identity and business identity dissolves completely. When someone criticizes the company, it feels like a personal attack. When the business succeeds, you succeed. When it struggles, you feel like a failure.

This fusion was essential early on. Your total commitment signaled credibility to investors, inspired employees, and pushed you through moments when quitting made perfect sense. But fusion has a dark side. You start defending business decisions like you're defending your character. Changing strategy feels like admitting you were wrong about who you are.

Watch for the warning signs. Do you dismiss market feedback because it contradicts your original thesis? Do you struggle to delegate because no one cares as much as you do? Do you find yourself saying 'we've always done it this way' more often than 'what should we try next'? These aren't signs of commitment—they're symptoms of identity fusion limiting your ability to adapt.

Takeaway

Your greatest strength as a founder—total commitment to your vision—becomes your greatest liability when that vision needs to evolve. The business isn't you, and you aren't the business.

Every successful company is built on a handful of core assumptions. Maybe you believed customers would pay premium prices for quality. Or that avoiding debt would create resilience. Or that hiring only senior people would accelerate growth. These assumptions guided early decisions and shaped your culture.

The problem is that circumstances change faster than assumptions do. What made you successful in year one becomes an anchor in year five. But by then, these assumptions have hardened into dogma. No one questions them—partly because they worked, and partly because questioning them feels disloyal to the founding story. New employees learn that certain topics are simply off-limits.

Peter Drucker called these 'theory of the business' problems. Companies fail not because their theory was wrong, but because it stopped being right and no one noticed. Kodak understood photography. Blockbuster understood entertainment. BlackBerry understood mobile communication. Each company's sacred assumptions blinded them to shifts that outsiders saw clearly. The founders' vision became a filter that screened out inconvenient truths.

Takeaway

The assumptions that built your success deserve respect but not reverence. Schedule regular reviews of your founding beliefs—what was true then may be limiting you now.

The solution isn't abandoning your vision—it's distinguishing between core purpose and current methods. Jim Collins described this as 'preserve the core, stimulate progress.' Your purpose is why you exist. Your methods are how you've chosen to fulfill that purpose so far. Most founders confuse the two, treating temporary tactics as permanent truths.

Consider Amazon. Jeff Bezos never wavered from customer obsession, but he constantly reinvented delivery methods, product categories, and business models. The core purpose remained fixed while everything else stayed flexible. That's the difference between visionary leadership and stubborn attachment. Vision says 'here's where we're going.' Attachment says 'here's exactly how we'll get there—forever.'

Build evolution into your operating rhythm. Create a 'sacred and open' document that explicitly names your non-negotiable principles and your negotiable practices. Invite trusted outsiders to challenge your assumptions quarterly. Hire leaders who share your purpose but bring fresh perspectives on methods. The goal isn't to change who you are—it's to keep becoming who you need to be.

Takeaway

Separate your unchanging purpose from your ever-changing tactics. Purpose deserves permanence. Everything else deserves regular questioning.

The founder's curse is real, but it's not inevitable. Your vision created something valuable—that insight hasn't disappeared. What's disappeared is the uncertainty that once kept you humble and searching.

The best founders learn to hold their vision loosely enough to let it grow. They stay obsessed with purpose while staying curious about methods. That's not betraying your original dream. That's giving it room to become something even greater.