There's a Japanese saying: There are two kinds of fools — Those who have never climbed Mount Fuji, and those who have climbed it more than once.
By that measure, I'm probably the second kind. Given the chance, I'd do it again tomorrow.
I think about that climb often. Not because it was one of the hardest things I've ever done but because of what it taught me about who I am, and about the kind of work I want to spend my life doing.
Dear Era, Wish You Were Here
I had never climbed a mountain in my life when I decided to climb Mount Fuji.
I was living in Tokyo at the time, working out of Google's office there, and the mountain was always on the horizon — a perfect volcanic cone, visible from the city on clear days. Sooner or later, it felt inevitable.
I started my journey to the summit at one of the mountain-climbing stations, approximately 7,500 feet above sea level. From there, it was a long day of step after tiring step until I arrived at the last station before the peak. I rested for a few hours before setting off just after midnight for the summit. In the middle hours of the climb, with darkness all around you, the mountain gives you every reason to stop. The air thins, the trail steepens, and some part of your mind starts auditing every decision that brought you there.
Then, somewhere past the worst of it, something shifts. The climb evolves from a grueling physical challenge into an opportunity for reflection.
One of the best things about Mount Fuji is that there is a post office on the summit. It's a tradition for climbers to send mail from the top, and I had brought a stack of postcards with me, intending to write them along the way. So, I did. At rest stops, by the light of my headlamp at the last camp before the summit, I wrote to my parents, to close friends, whatever I was feeling in that exact moment. Then I wrote one to myself.
I made it to the top just in time to see the sun rise over a sea of clouds, the world stretching out 12,388 feet below me. It was even more beautiful than I had imagined it would be. I felt accomplishment, but also a kind of clarity. On top of the mountain, with that little oxygen and that much sky around me, what mattered became obvious. I thought of all the people I love.
I mailed the postcards from the summit. The one I had written to myself eventually made its way back. I still have it.
A Greater Purpose
Meanwhile, the insights from my climb found their way into other areas of my life. I spent seven exceptional years at Google, reaching new heights in my career. I built AI for Google Search, including early work on the large language models that started taking shape inside the company around 2018. I was solving genuinely hard problems alongside some of the sharpest engineers in the world.
But the longer I worked, the more I noticed that I was only interacting with a piece of the puzzle. I was building the technology, but I never met the people whose lives the technology was supposed to improve. I wanted to see the whole climb, not just one section of the trail. I knew that I needed to be doing something that was more challenging, rewarding, and had a greater purpose.
That pull eventually became a company.
After graduating from Harvard Business School, I reconnected with a former colleague who would become my co-founder. In 2024, we founded Zeplyn.
Zeplyn builds AI agents for the wealth management industry. We work with advisors who spend their days in deeply consequential client meetings, then return to admin workflows that consume hours that should belong to clients. We want to streamline manual work across the client lifecycle to help advisors spend less time on the back office and more time doing the work that actually builds trust.
What I love most about building Zeplyn is that the climb is no longer abstract. The people we serve, the problems we solve, the difference our work makes — all of it is right in front of me, every day.
The Mileposts of a Founder
It’s been a steep, demanding ascent, but becoming a Founder is the most alive I have ever felt.
The skill that matters most is persistence: The willingness to make a decision without perfect information and to keep moving. The discipline to look at a new obstacle and ask, “What's the next step?” rather than stopping to catalog what's hard. On difficult days, I think about the postcard. It's a reminder that I have stood at the edge of something that felt impossible, kept going, and came out on the other side.
The wealth management industry is in the middle of its own significant climb right now. AI is reshaping what's possible — not to replace the relationships at the heart of this business, but to protect the time and attention that make those relationships real. The advisors building something durable in this environment are the persistent ones: the ones who move through change without losing sight of why they started.
One day I'll write another postcard from another summit. For now, I'm enjoying the climb.
All third parties mentioned and TradePMR are unaffiliated companies.