“Recently I’ve been thinking a lot about failure. At the end of 2022, I shut down Proteau, the nonalcoholic drinks company I started. I had dedicated the past five years of my life to it, and for just three of those years saw my bottles in the market. I can’t escape the feeling that I’ve failed, and I’d be lying if I said that seeing other, similar brands in the marketplace did not elicit a jittery tinge of envy, as if others’ success was paid for with my defeat. But I’ve also come to realize that it’s easy for us to see our efforts in a binary success-or-failure model — and that framing is completely inadequate for our lives and the projects we pursue.”