At Buck’s, I asked the owner’s son the secret to his success. His answer was perfect: “It’s a lifestyle, not a job.”

And just after he said this, he went and got a napkin to stop our table from rocking.

I hadn’t even noticed the rocking.

In the VC lifestyle, you can also get a napkin to stop the table from rocking, metaphorically. You can spend time each day thinking about someone specific and what they need. I do this. Then you can connect them with the best resource you can find for whatever they need.

Here’s how I visualize the VC lifestyle, as a virtuous cycle or flywheel with 3 parts:

Having deal flow means you’re able to find out about new companies, and get the opportunity to talk to them.

Once you have deal flow, you can make your decisions about which founders to support.

Once you’ve made those decisions, you need to delight those people. When you do that, it’s like karma; your good reputation compounds, and you end up with more deal flow.

Pops made this lifestyle look effortless. It was second nature to him. He didn’t just believe in the idea of delighting founders. He embodied his values.

For example, many times, someone would ask him a question during a meeting, and he’d say: “Oh, you have to talk to Jon Johnson about that!”

Right there in the meeting, he’d call Jon Johnson on the phone and say, “Hey Jon, I got this guy here who you should meet. Do you have a minute?”

Then, he’d hand over the phone, let the person ask Jon the question, and forge that connection quickly. This is just a habit of his. I’ve done this a few times, but our generation doesn’t have quite the same attitude toward phone calls. I often write intro emails for people during meetings, in the same spirit.

Of course, this only works if you’re doing the work of building trust with all those people in your network all the time. That’s how you can help people get what they’re asking for (including funds from other VCs in your network).

You can’t control whether that other investor will say yes, but you can stack the deck in a founder’s favor by being a trustworthy filter.

The soul of venture is a desire to help people get to where they want to go. Those people could be startups, LPs, other VCs... they can also just be humans you encounter along the way. Finding energy in giving that assistance will power your battery through this job.

The job becomes a lifestyle once you’ve chosen to make it part of your identity. Personally, I often say “I’m a deal junkie.” That’s just who I am. I always want to make deals with people.

I try to identify the most important things and people, and make deals happen around those things and those people. This matters because when people make good deals, everyone’s better off. Think of how many deals Amazon facilitates each day and how much better off we all are because of it!

A decade into this lifestyle, I’m still learning every day.