We live in strange times. In an age of unprecedented technological progress, our societies and economies are being decimated by a microscopic, invisible force. For all of our advances, we are still vulnerable to the smallest of organisms, the minuscule increments of infectious disease evolution.
The age of coronavirus has insulated us from our communities, and it’s left me plenty of time to reflect on the past. When the world around me is quiet, my mind fills its own space with noise. Fueled by anxiety, I think about the good, the bad, and past mistakes in particular.
In January of 2018, I founded a social dining startup called Homecooked with my friend, Kevin Zhen, someone who had been like a little brother when we lived in the same dorm in high school. Trying to build something from nothing. Going from 0 to 1. I think about the time we won $50,000, the time when we ran our first meal.
But most of all, I think about our arguments and conflicts. The ones that rose from two foolish youths who lacked the emotional maturity to navigate stressful situations. We tried to build an impactful business without getting our own houses in order. Like my mental health, I had thought that I could work work work and leave that problem to future Hojung.
Two years later, after multiple suicidal depressive episodes and a manic blackout that left a…
