Scale Your True Self

Why the most important startup you’ll ever build is You.

A few weeks ago, I stood in front of a room of students at the Munich University of Digital Technologies & Applied Sciences.

Since I invested a bit of effort into the presentation and the script, I decided to share it on Substack as well.

Ritavan, thanks again for the invite, asked me to talk about my 10 years of experience building startups in front of his class.

He also asked me to:

“Inspire my students to think big and reach for the stars.”

And that’s where the trouble starts.

Because I didn’t come to tell anyone they should build a unicorn.
Or that Europe needs to dream bigger, take risks, or catch up to the US.

We hear that stuff on loop.

I wanted to talk about something else, something quieter but far more important, the foundation of everything:

How to build a life that feels meaningful.
How to develop the skills that matter.
How to reach for the stars, but only the ones that are actually yours.

This isn’t a talk about building a great company.
It’s about building yourself like a startup.
And maybe you’ll build a meaningful or big business as a by-product.

Let’s start with the story.

1. The Story We Tell, and the One We Don’t

Here’s the media friendly version of my career.

I grew up middle class. Parents are doctors.
Studied at respected universities. Tried consulting. Hated it.

Luckily, a mentor told me:
“If you didn’t like it the first time, try something different.”

That nudge pulled me into startups.

I joined Foodora as a very early stage intern. Then became part of the founding team at Kaia Health, a digital therapy platform for chronic back pain.
We raised $40M while I was still operationally involved, then another $75M during COVID when digital health went insane in the US.

After four years, I co-founded Alaiko, a logistics and fulfillment company for e-commerce brands.
We raised 30M at the peak of the 2021 bubble.
Scaled fast.
Merged with Zenfulfillment last-year.
Became a European leader.

That’s the official story.

But the “behind-the-scenes”?

A lot of nights asking myself:

What am I doing?
Why am I doing this?

We nearly went bankrupt, multiple times, across multiple companies.
I ran at 150 percent for years.
Suppressing emotions with overdrive, not substances.
Because when the company is on the edge, you don’t get to fall apart.

From the outside: success.
On the inside: survival mixed with highs of success in an endless loop.

2. Lesson One: Find Your Definition of Meaning

The most important skill in your career isn’t technical.

It’s emotional mastery.

Staying grounded when everything shakes.
Not letting your fears run the meeting.
Not letting someone else’s expectations become your blueprint.

So ask yourself:

Why are you here?

Not in the cosmic sense, although go there if you want,
but why are you here, in this class, in this moment of your life?

To make money?
To build something?
To explore?
To belong?
To create?
To figure yourself out?

You don’t need the answers.
But you do need the question.

Because the biggest danger in your twenties isn’t failure.
It’s living by someone else’s definition of success.

Before you reach for the stars, make sure they’re yours.

3. Lesson Two: Optimize Learning Over Commitment

In your early career, flexibility is an asset.
Treat it like one.

Try things.
Lots of them.

Not because it looks good on a resume, but because it’s the only way to find what lights you up.

Commitment is powerful. But premature commitment is a trap.

As Sam Altman says in his famous essay “How to be successful”:

“I like to take as much time as possible between startup opportunities.
But when I commit, I want it to make the rest of my career look like a footnote.

Most people get bogged down in linear opportunities. Be willing to let small opportunities go to focus on potential step changes.”

That’s thinking big. But not from urgency. From moving with full consciousness.

Float lightly until you find something that matters deeply.
Then go all in.
Stop chasing side quests and start building the main storyline.

Most people flip that order.
And spend a decade undoing it.

4. Lesson Three: Mind the Dip

Everything meaningful has a Dip.

Seth Godin named it perfectly,
the phase where early excitement evaporates and real progress slows to a crawl.

You start with momentum, quick wins, rapid learning,
and then one day, nothing moves.

Not the metrics.
Not the team.
Not your own motivation.

That’s the Dip.

Most people panic.
They think the Dip means they chose wrong.

It doesn’t.

The Dip is the tax you pay for doing anything worthwhile.

The only question is whether the reward on the other side is worth the suffering in the middle.

If it is, push through.
Relentlessly.
Bang your head against the wall until the wall gives way,
because it usually does.

Money follows obsession.
Obsession follows clarity.
Clarity comes from doing hard things that matter.

Mind the dip.

5. A Simple Compass

Whenever you’re unsure whether you’re still on the right path, ask three questions:

Am I learning?
Am I enjoying the act of creating?
Is this meaningful to me?

If at least one answer is yes, keep going.
You’re still in the game.

If all three are no, you already know what to do.

6. Execution, The Only Thing That Works

Let’s talk about t

he part most people avoid.

Execution.

There’s a meme you’ve all seen, Shia LaBeouf screaming “Just do it!”

Back then: comedy.
Today: therapy.

Look at the comments from 2015.
Then at the comments from 2021.
It’s a timeline of people growing up.

Because at some point you realize:

The gap between dreamers and builders
isn’t intelligence
or luck
or education.

It’s action.

Not strategic plans.
Not Notion roadmaps.
Not manifesting.

Action.

That’s it.
It’s almost annoyingly simple.

7. Closing: Scale Your True Self

I hope I sparked something.

Not the become a founder or you’re wasting your life kind of spark.
But the quieter, more important one:

The world doesn’t need another person trying to be someone else.
It needs you, scaling the most honest version of yourself.

Some days people will laugh.
Some days they’ll cheer.

Both are noise.

Do the thing you can’t not do.
Follow the path that keeps calling you back.
Build the skills, the life, the work that feel like they’re yours.

Because your life is the most important startup you’ll ever build.

Make it count.
Scale your true self.