When good is near you, when you have life in yourself, it is not by any known or accustomed way; you shall not discern the foot-prints of any other; you shall not see the face of man; you shall not hear any name;—— the way, the thought, the good, shall be wholly strange and new. – Ralph Waldo Emerson
Can you remember a moment in your life when you had life in yourself and it was wholly strange and new? Can you remember the moment when you stopped walking a path of someone else, and started cutting your own?
Write about that moment. And if you haven’t experienced it yet, let the miracle play out in your mind’s eye and write about that moment in your future.
(Author: Bridget Pilloud)
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May 15. Sunday. We were sitting around the tall, wooden square table. The 6 of us, eating Ted’s always delicious homemade vegan breakfast and bouncing off ideas for a company name. We brainstormed for months on our own, together, online and off, for a moniker that resonated, that would stick.
I read an article about entrepreneurs and legacy. I brought it up and asked Ted if he’d name the truck something like “Chef Ted’s” or “Zoe and Gen’s” (after the girls). Trang said Ted is too modest and wouldn’t name it after himself. But would be open to naming it after their daughters. Then we played with the initials — Z and G. Then someone said “Zing”. And someone said “Zing Foods” and someone said “Zing Eats.” Ted hopped on the Web and looked up the zingfoods.com and zingeats.com domains. Neither were taken. He bought both. We’d decide later which one to keep.
Since then, we’ve had our doubts, second-guessed ourselves after coming across other Zing businesses. Trang saw a Ziing Restaurant in Fullerton. Online I found other foreign and domestic restaurants, catering services, even a utensil (meant to pitch food for food fights) with “Zing” in the name. We pondered totally different names. Ted had such a vivid dream about the name “Twisted Chopstix” and thus, bought that domain, too.
I then talked to other people who started businesses and asked if we need to trademark the name right away. If we should pay for the TM now. Their advice: Just start using it. Do DBA first. Need to establish business is running before TM can approved, any way. And I saw that Zing Eats and Zing Foods were not trademarked (yet), according to the Trademark Electronic Search System (TESS). So we’re sticking with Zing Eats/Foods. Maybe use Zing Eats for the food truck, and Zing Foods for the food empire!
But back to why I wrote about this moment as “wholly strange and new” to me. That Sunday, after we decided upon the names, I felt a palpable moment of calm. An instant clarity, a synchronicity. Imagine: After months of wracking our brains and hundreds of name combinations — Wok This Way, Give Peas a Chance, Like a Vegan, etc. — we came up with and decided upon a name (or two) in a matter of minutes. A name with a story behind it. Over breakfast. Over a shared meal. Over food. #Trust30
Jots & Thoughts 