“Contentment used to be a virtue. Now it’s a vice.”

I came across this line on Brad Feld’s blog. 

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Brad, he is a successful entrepreneur and early stage VC investor. He cofounded the Foundry Group, Mobius Venture Capital, Intensity Ventures and Techstars, and sold his first company back in 1993. 

But Brad has also struggled with depression over the years and so you’ll find that a number of his blog posts are also quite contemplative.

This particular post – where the above line comes from – is about a societal norm that I am sure many of you can relate to. I know I can. Here’s another snippet from the post:

“We talked for a few minutes about the overall, dominant American culture of achievement. The endless striving. The need to feel busy, important, and successful. The deep cultural norms around ambition.”

Whether it’s because we’re all deeply insecure or because we just need to fulfill our egos, this has become our modus operandi. It has become all about “the hustle” and about “crushing it 24/7.”

Just this evening I was at a friend’s birthday party and I couldn’t tell you how many times I said “busy.”

“Hey Brandon, how are things?”

“Busy!”

This is an absolutely terrible response. I know that. And I’ve started introducing other responses into my small talk repertoire. But busy is so ingrained in our culture. Being busy makes us feel important. It means we are in demand. We do things. We create value.

But is the reverse – not being busy – now a vice?

Regardless of your position on the appropriate balance between contentment (being ok with what you’ve got) and work (striving for more than what you’ve got), I think the first line of this post is an incredibly poignant commentary on the life that many of us live today.

Oscar Wilde once said:

“There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

I’m sure that all of you can think of someone right now who subscribes to the philosophy that any press is good press.

But there is something to be said about exposure. Almost every company on the planet wants it. They pay for it. They fight for it. It’s the lifeblood of business. If nobody knows who you are and what you do, you’re dead.

In my view, one of the best ways to gain exposure today is content marketing. Marketing sometimes has negative connotations, but content marketing is probably the least offensive varietal. It’s a soft, rather than hard, approach. It invites you in and tries to earn your trust, instead of hitting you over the head with an ask.

But at the same time, it’s a more difficult form of marketing. You have to be insightful. You have to be useful. And you have to try and create value for people on a regular basis. That’s easier said than done. I try and do that every day, but I don’t always succeed.

I say all this because we live in a content-driven world. In fact, this blog – despite it being a personal one – is a form of content marketing. I like how Fred Wilson responded on his blog to the criticism that too many entrepreneurs treat venture capital blogs as scripture:

“So how should entrepreneurs use this knowledge that is being imparted by VCs on a regular basis? Well first and foremost, you should see it as content marketing. That is what it is. That doesn’t mean it isn’t useful or insightful. It may well be. But you should understand the business model supporting all of this free content. It is being generated to get you to come visit that VC and offer them to participate in your Seed or Series A round. That blog post that Joe claimed is not scripture in his tweet is actually an advertisement. Kind of the opposite of scripture, right?”

Again, that doesn’t make the content necessarily bad. It’s just the truth. It’s content marketing.

“Contentment used to be a virtue. Now it’s a vice.”

I came across this line on Brad Feld’s blog. 

For those of you who aren’t familiar with Brad, he is a successful entrepreneur and early stage VC investor. He cofounded the Foundry Group, Mobius Venture Capital, Intensity Ventures and Techstars, and sold his first company back in 1993. 

But Brad has also struggled with depression over the years and so you’ll find that a number of his blog posts are also quite contemplative.

This particular post – where the above line comes from – is about a societal norm that I am sure many of you can relate to. I know I can. Here’s another snippet from the post:

“We talked for a few minutes about the overall, dominant American culture of achievement. The endless striving. The need to feel busy, important, and successful. The deep cultural norms around ambition.”

Whether it’s because we’re all deeply insecure or because we just need to fulfill our egos, this has become our modus operandi. It has become all about “the hustle” and about “crushing it 24/7.”

Just this evening I was at a friend’s birthday party and I couldn’t tell you how many times I said “busy.”

“Hey Brandon, how are things?”

“Busy!”

This is an absolutely terrible response. I know that. And I’ve started introducing other responses into my small talk repertoire. But busy is so ingrained in our culture. Being busy makes us feel important. It means we are in demand. We do things. We create value.

But is the reverse – not being busy – now a vice?

Regardless of your position on the appropriate balance between contentment (being ok with what you’ve got) and work (striving for more than what you’ve got), I think the first line of this post is an incredibly poignant commentary on the life that many of us live today.

Oscar Wilde once said:

“There is only one thing in life worse than being talked about, and that is not being talked about.”

I’m sure that all of you can think of someone right now who subscribes to the philosophy that any press is good press.

But there is something to be said about exposure. Almost every company on the planet wants it. They pay for it. They fight for it. It’s the lifeblood of business. If nobody knows who you are and what you do, you’re dead.

In my view, one of the best ways to gain exposure today is content marketing. Marketing sometimes has negative connotations, but content marketing is probably the least offensive varietal. It’s a soft, rather than hard, approach. It invites you in and tries to earn your trust, instead of hitting you over the head with an ask.

But at the same time, it’s a more difficult form of marketing. You have to be insightful. You have to be useful. And you have to try and create value for people on a regular basis. That’s easier said than done. I try and do that every day, but I don’t always succeed.

I say all this because we live in a content-driven world. In fact, this blog – despite it being a personal one – is a form of content marketing. I like how Fred Wilson responded on his blog to the criticism that too many entrepreneurs treat venture capital blogs as scripture:

“So how should entrepreneurs use this knowledge that is being imparted by VCs on a regular basis? Well first and foremost, you should see it as content marketing. That is what it is. That doesn’t mean it isn’t useful or insightful. It may well be. But you should understand the business model supporting all of this free content. It is being generated to get you to come visit that VC and offer them to participate in your Seed or Series A round. That blog post that Joe claimed is not scripture in his tweet is actually an advertisement. Kind of the opposite of scripture, right?”

Again, that doesn’t make the content necessarily bad. It’s just the truth. It’s content marketing.