I'm Maura Aronsmeli, and this is The Anxious Achiever. We look at stories from business leaders who have dealt with anxiety, depression, or other mental health challenges, how they fell down, how they pick themselves up, and how they hope workplaces can change in the future.

You know, this episode is really exciting for me, because not only do I get to ask really personal questions of the president of one of the world's most successful tech

companies, this

episode marks the very first time that a rich, powerful leader of a publicly traded company

flat out says to me, on air, I'm an anxious achiever. I heard the name of your show and I thought,

that's me. And this was thrilling to me because even now, powerful

people in business are often loath to admit that they have anxiety. This episode focuses on how

anxiety can drive ambition, your creativity, and success as an entrepreneur. Don't worry. We don't

sugarcoat things. But if you too are an anxious

achiever, you know that living with anxiety and ambition is not simply good or bad. It's complex.

My guest, Harley Finkelstein, is president of Shopify, one of the biggest and most profitable e-commerce

companies in the world with a market cap of $141.3 billion.

Shopify saw an enormous surge in success during the pandemic, and now it's second only

to Amazon as the largest e-commerce retailer.

So we were kind of joking on Twitter before, but you call yourself, or I guess Tim Ferriss called you a power extrovert.

And I'm a pretty outspoken introvert. So are we,

are we mortal enemies? Can we get along? I actually think we would be best of friends. I mean that.

I think that the whole extrovert versus introvert thing first of all, I think, has completely been,

it's gone too far. I think that what it really means is where people derive energy of all, I think, has completely been, it's gone too far. I think that

what it really means is where people derive energy from. And I think historically, I have derived

energy from being around people. I like reading. I like being by myself, but I really love,

and I feel totally recharge when I'm with people, particular people that I like. And my wife's an

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