Jeff Bezos wanted to call Amazon “Cadabra.” Yes. Like Abracadabra. The magic word. The word you say when you want to mak...

Jeff Bezos wanted to call Amazon “Cadabra.”
Yes. Like Abracadabra.
The magic word.
The word you say when you want to make something appear out of thin air.
To Bezos, that was exactly the point.
He wanted customers to feel like their orders appeared—almost magically—at their doorstep.
But then… something happened.
One day, he called his lawyer to discuss the new company name.
On the other end, the lawyer frowned.
He thought Bezos said: “Cadaver.”
Meaning: a dead body.
Bezos froze.
He reasoned,
"If I mentioned 'Cadabra' and my lawyer heard 'Cadaver,' chances are that many more people will hear the same each time it is mentioned."
He realized instantly… a name that could be confused with “corpse” was the fastest way to kill his dream before it even started.
That misheard word changed history.
Bezos went back to the drawing board.
Days later, flipping through a dictionary, he found “Amazon.”
It was the name of the largest river in the world—fast, unstoppable, and massive in scale.
He wanted his store to be the same.
He wanted everything.
From A to Z.
And just like that, a billion-dollar brand was born.
I picked some lessons from there:
Your dreams are fragile in the beginning.
A wrong name, wrong positioning, wrong perception—can kill them quietly before they even see daylight.
But sometimes, the “mistakes” that frustrate you are actually saving you from bigger disasters.
If Bezos had stubbornly kept “Cadabra,” imagine the headlines:
“Cadaver delivers your order in 2 days.”
Not quite the brand you’d bet billions on.
So when life forces you to pivot…
When your “perfect idea” hits an unexpected wall…
Remember:
That wall might just be redirecting you to your Amazon moment.
What’s your “Cadabra” today?
The thing you’re clinging to… that you might need to let go of?
Because the next big thing could be one pivot away.
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Kachi Ogbonna