Jeff Bezos, now worth $357 billion, once faced a tough decision: leave his stable job at a New York hedge fund to start Amazon. The turning point came when he applied what he called a regret minimization framework. By imagining himself at age 80, he realized he would regret not trying to build Amazon more than he would regret failing.
Bezos’s then-wife, MacKenzie Scott, supported him, but he struggled with short-term temptations like leaving behind an annual bonus. His long-term perspective ultimately made the choice clear. He knew that not trying would haunt him, even if failure didn’t.
During his cross-country drive to Seattle, Bezos drafted a 30-page plan for Amazon. He acknowledged that the business plan wouldn’t survive its first encounter with reality, but the process helped him think through key issues. The company’s name even went through a change, from “Cadabra” to “Amazon”, after he realized the initial choice sounded too much like “cadaver.”
Bezos emphasized that timing and luck play crucial roles in a startup’s success. He advised young entrepreneurs to gain experience before launching a company, citing his own journey of graduating from Princeton and working in finance before starting Amazon at age 30. He believes that extra decade of experience improved Amazon’s chances of success.
Ultimately, Bezos encouraged balancing enjoyment of the present with decisions that will lead to satisfaction in old age. He urged people to plan for the future while living in the moment.