Building Terra Incognita Media: Confronting Failure, Self-Sabotage, and Imposter Syndrome

Since starting Terra Incognita Media my life has been a Chumbawamba song. It’s been a journey of killing my ego over and over again, making public and private mistakes, and learning major lessons. Sometimes the lessons required an easy pivot, but more often than not the lessons I have learned have been brutally life-altering, perspective-bursting, and humbling as fuck.

I have lost friendships and gained new ones. I have had countless conversations with various people in the outdoor industry, the publishing, marketing, podcasting, branding industry, etc. I have gone to trainings that have been crucial to my learning, and some that I regret, like the one that put me in the most debt I have ever acquired in my life. It’s not to say I didn’t learn anything because I surely did. I learned where I don’t want to invest my money.

I learned that I need to listen to the deepest gut feelings I have about things. I used to be too easily influenced by what other people thought I should be doing. I was too wrapped up in external validation and what everyone else thought about me. I believed that if I just talked to the right people I could deduce the end-all, be-all answers to my pressing questions about how I should do the work I am here on this Earth to do.

Taking the temperature of the landscape, gathering information, and hearing how other people got to where they are is a necessary aspect of being an entrepreneur. But putting other people’s ideas and opinions on a pedestal, failing to develop and listen to your intuition, and doing things just because everyone else thinks you should, is a sure-fire way to end up in a place that is not meant for you. You will look around and find yourself in debt that took you so far from your truth and you’ll feel overwhelmed and swimming in despair because you don’t know who you are or what you’re doing with your life. The reason why you started your business, company, organization, or project will be buried and you will have gotten yourself lost.

That’s exactly what happened to me. I have gone through seasons of feeling deflated, incapable, and hopeless. No one tells you about the psychological cost of entrepreneurship, the emotional gutting you’ll inevitably experience. I thought I could get along faking it until I made it. But the more honest and transparent we are about our feelings, our process, and our struggle, the more resilient we can be. Hiding behind a facade of confidence just so we can appear to have it all together only keeps us isolated and out of touch.

There are countless setbacks, ups and downs, and uncertainties when it comes to bringing your vision to life. My mental health took a hit and I wasn’t expecting it at all. Add to this that you’re ultimately the only one who sees what you are seeing. You can describe it the best way you can, but when you are creating something out of nothing, for a while, you’re the only one driving everything forward because you’re the only one who can see it. Your friends and family don’t quite know how to support you other than to say, “That’s cool! Keep going!” Or, “Are you still applying to grad school?” And then after a few months go by, “How’s that blog going that you’re working on?”

Terra has seen many past contributors who, at the time, were going to be long-term business partners or team members. When I first started Terra, I sent out a mass email to everyone I knew who might be interested in helping me start a magazine. I rallied all of my friends to meet me at a brewery and everyone who showed up got a title! We’re talking fancy titles like “Editor-in-Chief,” and “Marketing Director.” There were about ten people. I was ecstatic that I could bring together that many people for a cause.

But over time, as is true for any business venture, people dropped off slowly. Some realized they couldn’t commit as much as they originally thought. This happens all the time in business and start-ups, but this was my first memorable lesson about starting something. Not everyone who is with you, in the beginning, is going to be with you in the end. And that’s okay. Starting something can be so exciting and everyone wants to be involved, but the reality is that it’s a lot of grueling, non-glamorous, unpaid labor for a very, very, VERY, long time.

Some of the original people who answered my call for support ended up leaving because my vision changed. It went from a feminist/political climbing journal, as embarrassing as that is to admit, to the feminist response to the outdoor industry that is today. It’s nothing like it was at the beginning because the platform has evolved as I have evolved. I hope in ten years it’s nothing like it is today.

One of the first promotional flyers. *FACEPALM* emoji.

When I started Terra Incognita Media, I was deeply mired in white feminism, but as I grew as a person, and listened to the people who were calling the platform out for being white-centering, I learned, I shifted, I expanded my thinking. As I have grown into a completely different person than I was four years ago, so has Terra Incognita Media as a company.

Nursing a sprained ankle on the traditional territories of the Pueblos and Ute peoples.

I remember the naive thrill I felt when I was on a climbing trip having conversations about feminism around the campfire with people I had no business exerting my energy on. I remember sitting outside the Dragonfly Coffee House in Portland, Oregon and committing to my first blog post on the website I just created called “Terra Incognita.” The platform has gone through many iterations, changes, and passed through so many generous, creative hands. It wouldn’t be what it is today without each person who has contributed to the momentum.

This last year I dedicated my time and energy toward building a stable, solid team. Terra has always been about a collective of voices that bring varying perspectives from across race, class, gender, ability, etc. This is the heart and root of the platform. I thought that a collective team would allow us to go full-force into fundraising, securing non-profit status and that this would be the magic key to sustainable income, so we could all get paid and live happily ever after.

But it’s proven to be more challenging than this and a little less straightforward. Without defined roles, without developed systems and processes, and without a crystal clear vision where everyone is on the same page, we had a group of badass, inspiring, creative people wondering what we are doing and what steps we all need to take next. I thought gathering more hands on deck would mean expansion, more momentum, and input, and that it would skyrocket the platform to success. But it was a move that came too soon.

As the leader and founder of Terra, I had to admit that even though I was thrilled to work with such incredible individuals, the platform just isn’t ready or in a position to bring on a team.

Another important bottom line for me is that through this process I realized Terra is still in an incubating phase. And since that is the case, I couldn’t in good conscious have people commit energy without getting paid. It became clear that sustainable money to pay four team members was not coming anytime soon, so it makes the most sense for us to step back.

This has been the most difficult choice in my time with Terra because gathering a team felt like the ultimate accomplishment. But without a structure in place for that team, it ends up being a milestone without any backbone. I came to this conclusion with the help of my mindset and strategy coach that I recently started working with. No one tells you how to be an entrepreneur when you start your own company, especially someone like me who is a writer starting a creative platform who had never taken a business class in her life until a year into building Terra. Someone like me who despised math class, and would rather think about anything else over finances.

Working with my coach has allowed a lot of my internal struggles to come to the surface. As a leader and founder, I have realized that I have not been as clear and confident within myself as I have needed to be to play my role as effectively as possible. Self-sabotage and imposter syndrome have been running amok. These are things I didn’t realize I was harboring but nevertheless have been showing up in my work, which naturally will impact a team. There’s a difference between what you think you’re clear on, and what’s going on underneath. Eventually, it comes creeping up and into what you’re creating without you even realizing it.

While it may seem like these choices are taking me backward, or that Terra will now lose steam, stepping back will allow the platform to grow. It feels right, grounding, centering, and necessary. This shift will allow me and the platform to be what it is when for so long I have been striving to get it to bigger stages that it’s just not ready to grow into yet. I’m consciously making a return to my initial spark — the feelings and motivations that drove me to create Terra Incognita Media in the first place — because this pressure to be “successful” had me losing the vision for a little bit. I’m also going to temper this with intentional, responsible moves that will serve the larger mission. I am excited to shift and develop as a leader, to show up in my truth, because I know this will allow me to better serve the Terra community.

In this picture I am visiting the traditional territories of the Northern Paiute, Eastern Mono, Western Mono, Southern Sierra Miwok, and Central Sierra Miwok peoples.