Ok. So I'm sitting here at my mom's, today, eating good food and reading Sinfest and wondering how the hell to forgive my former business partner and move on with my life.
Generally the story is too long to go into fully. We originally decided that I would focus on development for this game, and that he would handle the business arrangements, so that we could split our resources and maximize use of our time. What's bothering me is that my "partner" incorporated the company we were working for in his own name without asking me about it, then proceeded to shut me out from all the business decisions and make them himself, in a way I felt was moderately to unconditionally incompetent. In the end, we couldn't get the game I was working on sold, and he fired me at that point after I was completely broke, and refused to help me network to find another job in the industry after that (despite that he had forbidden me to have external contact with anyone outside of the company after he'd incorporated, which destroyed my own contact network and left me moderately to completely helpless in terms of finding job openings any way other than the internet).
For my part, the problem was that whenever he'd start to do something that I felt was just really egregiously likely to screw us (and many of these decisions *did* screw us, badly, later), I'd start yelling at him and telling him why he couldn't do that. I do understand that for a "boss", which he became after incorporating in his name only, it's generally considered acceptable to fire an employee who does this. Still, I'm convinced that the decisions he was making were, at *best*, focused on improving his wealth only and were not the kind of decisions that took my own welfare into account - at worst, they were just ridiculously incompetent. In the interest of fairness, another problem was that I failed to estimate my own needs properly, financial and businesswise, and tried to just carry the burden myself instead of telling him what I really needed. This didn't work, and I frequently had to ask him for additional resources (which I don't feel was unreasonable - he was only "paying" me $2,000 BEFORE taxes - but it made him feel like I wasn't doing my job). For his part, I don't think he cared to try to notice that I was hurting, which I feel is generally a characteristic that a decent partner or employer would have.
So, now, he's doing well, recording a new album with his band and generally eating out in expensive restaurants, while I'm living on $1.40 tins of sardines and fielding tremendous numbers of calls from bill collectors every day. I have an investment deal to start up a company on my own, and the funding should be here next week, but these last few days until I get it are getting really tough - I'm just completely out of money. If my mom wasn't helping me out, I'd be applying for general relief at this point.
At this point I'm really not looking for "things I should have done differently". I have a pretty comprehensive list of those. I'm looking for ways to keep my brain from exploding with anger every time I think of his face - ways to move on and get on to where I can devote 100% of my time to my next project. If he were just some random asshole, I wouldn't have a problem with it, but he was one of my best friends right up to the point where he incorporated in his own name.
Advice would be appreciated (though, please please please don't patronize - I'm just not likely to deal with it well right now). Thanks guys!
Generally the story is too long to go into fully. We originally decided that I would focus on development for this game, and that he would handle the business arrangements, so that we could split our resources and maximize use of our time. What's bothering me is that my "partner" incorporated the company we were working for in his own name without asking me about it, then proceeded to shut me out from all the business decisions and make them himself, in a way I felt was moderately to unconditionally incompetent. In the end, we couldn't get the game I was working on sold, and he fired me at that point after I was completely broke, and refused to help me network to find another job in the industry after that (despite that he had forbidden me to have external contact with anyone outside of the company after he'd incorporated, which destroyed my own contact network and left me moderately to completely helpless in terms of finding job openings any way other than the internet).
For my part, the problem was that whenever he'd start to do something that I felt was just really egregiously likely to screw us (and many of these decisions *did* screw us, badly, later), I'd start yelling at him and telling him why he couldn't do that. I do understand that for a "boss", which he became after incorporating in his name only, it's generally considered acceptable to fire an employee who does this. Still, I'm convinced that the decisions he was making were, at *best*, focused on improving his wealth only and were not the kind of decisions that took my own welfare into account - at worst, they were just ridiculously incompetent. In the interest of fairness, another problem was that I failed to estimate my own needs properly, financial and businesswise, and tried to just carry the burden myself instead of telling him what I really needed. This didn't work, and I frequently had to ask him for additional resources (which I don't feel was unreasonable - he was only "paying" me $2,000 BEFORE taxes - but it made him feel like I wasn't doing my job). For his part, I don't think he cared to try to notice that I was hurting, which I feel is generally a characteristic that a decent partner or employer would have.
So, now, he's doing well, recording a new album with his band and generally eating out in expensive restaurants, while I'm living on $1.40 tins of sardines and fielding tremendous numbers of calls from bill collectors every day. I have an investment deal to start up a company on my own, and the funding should be here next week, but these last few days until I get it are getting really tough - I'm just completely out of money. If my mom wasn't helping me out, I'd be applying for general relief at this point.
At this point I'm really not looking for "things I should have done differently". I have a pretty comprehensive list of those. I'm looking for ways to keep my brain from exploding with anger every time I think of his face - ways to move on and get on to where I can devote 100% of my time to my next project. If he were just some random asshole, I wouldn't have a problem with it, but he was one of my best friends right up to the point where he incorporated in his own name.
Advice would be appreciated (though, please please please don't patronize - I'm just not likely to deal with it well right now). Thanks guys!
But, thanks for the concern.