The Karl Mehta Interview:
When Loss and Rejection Punched Him, He Punched Back Harder
Karl Mehta is a serial entrepreneur, investor, engineer, and civil servant. He and his son cofounded PlaySpan which was acquired by Visa for $240 million in 2011. The White House invited him to serve as a Presidential Innovation Fellow in the program's inaugural year. He’s also the founder of the non-profit Code for India, and the founder and CEO of EdCast, a social knowledge network that enhances organizations’ ability to collaborate and learn.
This deeply moving interview uncovers the extreme setbacks that Karl endured – starting at age 16 – and how he learned to take a long-term view instead of focusing on short-term rejection. He shares how his belief in his “authentic self” helps him overcome any external circumstance that challenges him.
“When you connect with your authentic self, external problems can't affect you or your self-worth. This helped me jump off from my rock bottom. I decided I would start ignoring the outer failures, but that wouldn't mean that I was worthless.”
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Notable Revelations in the Interview
“Early on in my life I faced a lot of catastrophic setbacks. I started to view the world differently. I had to go deep into thinking about fundamental things about life...why am I here, what is my purpose and what do I really need to focus on?”
“Having felt the pain, it’s easier to feel others’ pain. I would consider myself fortunate to have gone through a lot of setbacks because without that I wouldn’t be who I am today.”
“My father passed away and my mom was not working. There was absolutely no money. I took a long-term view, that if I drop out and don’t go to college, u could start earning money for my family but then I wouldn’t have a long-term future.”
“From the pain of six years in college, lots of loans and jobs, it shaped me to not get consumed by the short-term problems."
“In India we have a poem that says, 'After the darkest night comes the brightest sunshine.'”
“My rock bottom was when everything was falling apart. I was sitting outside the U.S. Embassy in Mumbai, and literally crying. At the age of 23 I considered suicide. Why would I take a train home, when I have nowhere to go?”
“There is an inner self that has a lot of talent and drive, but it’s just that the outside circumstances are so bad that I’m not able to express myself and be successful.”
“When you connect with your authentic self, no amount of external problems can then affect you or your self-worth. This helped me jump off from my rock bottom. From then on I decided I would start ignoring the outer failures, but that wouldn't mean that I was worthless.”
“When Visa acquired my company it was a good moment, but not the proudest moment of my life. Actually, the proudest moment you feel is when you help people going through the same pain that you’ve gone through, because then you’re valuable to society.”
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Notable Revelations in the Interview
“Every entrepreneur feels like an imposter at some point.”
“The Board was having a love affair with me.”
“I kept thinking that with a little more outer success, maybe this hole I felt inside me would catch up. It was very backwards thinking.”
“I had an eating disorder that would come very front forward when I couldn’t manage the pressure.”
“Everybody was in the pretend mode.”
“I was a lone outpost as the CEO. There was a famine of connection and community.”
“Of course I wanted to tell people, but what would they think? I wasn’t in business. I was the business.”
“There was a time when things with the business and my family were great, and I knew if I stopped here I could have a balanced life. But I was too hungry for more. I liken it to a love affair: you know you shouldn’t be doing it, but you’re going to take your chances.”
“When we went into retail, because the franchise business wasn’t going to meet the needs of the venture capitalists, I was in over my head and had to let go of my origin team. I didn’t have the tools to walk away and my eating disorder exacerbated.”
“I was putting everything in front of my family.”
“Never never never did I ever consider being one of the companies that the venture capitalists would write down. Now I knew well that more than half of them did go down, it’s very common. But not on my watch.”
“The rock bottom for me was I had an exercise addiction. I ended up in a Red Cross tent with a beat up body and a beat up mind. I had become a competitive mountain biker and been pulled off the course. It was in that moment that I knew: game over. I was 43, heartbroken and lost.”
“I went off to a treatment center, and three years later I did return. I had no home, no marriage, empty nester, and no job. It was a far cry from the woman peering out at me from the cover of People magazine four years before.”
“To tell you the truth, my recovery is the proudest moment of my life.”
“About the IPO, you would’ve thought this is the entpreneur’s dream! Fifteen years of devotion and drive, and now I’m in a treatment center. But I assessed inside of me: ah yeah, that would’ve been great to celebrate the IPO with my origin team, but good for Gymboree and good for me that I was able to help grow the company to get to that point. I have no regrets.”
“I am so excited about the next iteration of my life.”
“I hope that viewers are in the side car with me. The idea that we all have inversions, blind curves, skillful decisions we’ve made, and more trouble, will help us realize that we all are really the same.”
“I have found that it is in our vulnerability that we become connected to one another.”
The Karl Mehta Interview:
When Loss and Rejection Punched Him, He Punched Back Harder
Karl Mehta is a serial entrepreneur, investor, engineer, and civil servant. He and his son cofounded PlaySpan which was acquired by Visa for $240 million in 2011. The White House invited him to serve as a Presidential Innovation Fellow in the program's inaugural year. He’s also the founder of the non-profit Code for India, and the founder and CEO of EdCast, a social knowledge network that enhances organizations’ ability to collaborate and learn.
This deeply moving interview uncovers the extreme setbacks that Karl endured – starting at age 16 – and how he learned to take a long-term view instead of focusing on short-term rejection. He shares how his belief in his “authentic self” helps him overcome any external circumstance that challenges him.
Notable Revelations in the Interview
“Early on in my life I faced a lot of catastrophic setbacks. I started to view the world differently. I had to go deep into thinking about fundamental things about life...why am I here, what is my purpose and what do I really need to focus on?”
“Having felt the pain, it’s easier to feel others’ pain. I would consider myself fortunate to have gone through a lot of setbacks because without that I wouldn’t be who I am today.”
“My father passed away and my mom was not working. There was absolutely no money. I took a long-term view, that if I drop out and don’t go to college, u could start earning money for my family but then I wouldn’t have a long-term future.”
“From the pain of six years in college, lots of loans and jobs, it shaped me to not get consumed by the short-term problems."
“In India we have a poem that says, 'After the darkest night comes the brightest sunshine.'”
“My rock bottom was when everything was falling apart. I was sitting outside the U.S. Embassy in Mumbai, and literally crying. At the age of 23 I considered suicide. Why would I take a train home, when I have nowhere to go?”
“There is an inner self that has a lot of talent and drive, but it’s just that the outside circumstances are so bad that I’m not able to express myself and be successful.”
“When you connect with your authentic self, no amount of external problems can then affect you or your self-worth. This helped me jump off from my rock bottom. From then on I decided I would start ignoring the outer failures, but that wouldn't mean that I was worthless.”
“I took it on like a fight. If the circumstances were punching me hard in the face, then I had to get up and punch back harder.”
“Given how I grew up, I started to expect failure. Once you expect failure, coping with it is easy.”
“After going to so many venture capitalists who said no, I said to myself, ‘They cannot see in the business what I can see. But that doesn’t make me wrong and that doesn’t make my idea wrong.’ It gave me more fuel to prove them because they’re not yet believing me.”
“I said to myself, 'As long as I continue to do what I’m doing and if I can show results, then ultimately they’ll come around. Because no one can deny the data. It’s just a matter of time and iteration before I get funding.’ So I kept going.”
“Selling my company to Visa was a good moment, but not the proudest moment of my life. Actually, the proudest moment you feel is when you help people going through the same pain that you’ve gone through, because then you’re valuable to society.”
“When I’m not challenged to the max, I feel I’m not fighting. The more I challenge myself, the more I find that I amaze myself. There are a lot of hidden things that God has given us and they only get uncovered during challenging times. When I’m not challenged, then I’m not finding the core strengths that I’ve been given.”
“Every one of us has a personal struggle. The deeper the struggle, the stronger you are as a character.”