I'm 23, An Entrepreneur, and Fucking Terrified. (medium.com) |
I'm 23, An Entrepreneur, and Fucking Terrified. (medium.com) |
Psychologists could have a field day with entrepreneurs.
If there is no business, this article should be titled "I'm 23 and Fucking Terrified of Hard Work."
Oh what wonders could be conjured with a soothing $2500 per month trust fund deposit! How quickly things could move forward, with doubt and existential dread erased!
Sadly, we are just well educated serfs holding the arrogant pretense that we can become lords. We can, but its not going to be easy.
So I feel you, and I read what you wrote carefully and I sympathize so here is my advice.
I would suggest recalibrating your concept of what is old. 23 is incredibly young. Forget about what your friends are doing. Half those guys getting married and having kids young are wishing they were free like you are right now.
This experience will teach you some things, but what doesn't kill you doesn't necessarily make you stronger. More likely it causes burnout and the dwindling of your dendrites.
I wouldn't prolong it for romantic notions.
Consider pivoting towards becoming cowboy auxiliary engineering help for companies that already have revenue. You can retain your freedom and get much needed cash.
This is what I have done, and put my own product visions on hold. It is quite good. I retain my freedom and people send me large sums via paypal. It is a strategic retreat. Sometimes you advance ahead of your supply lines and strategy dictates a pause.
Also, ignore your guilt about not taking your girlfriend out more.
Don't move. I was living in a penthouse studio apartment in Boulder and I thought a move to Austin would be worth it to lower expenses. The time and stress of the move was is no way worth it.
Depending on where you live, sell your car. The faster you do this the better. It is the most expensive non critical thing that you own.
Think of the one thing you can do today to bring in $5000 and do that. Godspeed, you crazy bastard. You're probably just insane enough to pull this heist off and cheat your capitalist oppressors out of the smug satisfaction they have when you stay in your place.
No, in point of fact, he complements your skills perfectly.
To all of the people who say that the best thing to do is get a good job, buy a nice house, and to put the max into a 401k that the company will match:
When I was a young boy
They said you're only gettin' older
But how was I to know then
That they'd be cryin' on my shoulder
Put your money in a big house
Get yourself a pretty wife
She'll collect your life insurance
When she connects you with a knife [1]
Yeah, absolutely. I've tolerated mediocrity for too much of my life, due to a misguided faith in the old saws "patience is a virtue" and "good things come to those who wait", etc.
So now I'm on the cusp of "old", and have a startup that I have a lot of confidence in (but, then again, entrepreneurs almost have to have an irrational level of confidence and optimism!), but the terror of basically having to acknowledge "this is probably my last 'at bat'".
If this doesn't succeed, by the time we fail, I think I'll be too old and too tired to bother trying again. That means I write off all hope of living the life I really want to live. At that point, I doubt I'll see much point in living, so I kinda expect that if it happens, I'll load my car up with booze, and head to Vegas to drink myself to death, ala Nick Cage's character in Leaving Las Vegas.
Can we make it while living modest lifestyles? I think yes. It will be hard, but fuck… it’s going to be hard anyway.
I think so, but, speaking as an "older guy", I'll just say this: be aggressive as fuck about pursuing your dreams. And if you're going to sacrifice a bit and do some element of the "entre-monk" thing, it's probably more tolerable in your 20's than in your 30's, or (worse) your 40's. I'm not saying you have to do the entre-monk thing, mind you. But I am saying that you probably can't afford to coast, and do too much playing around being patient.
I am starting to truly understand why the people that seem to make the best entrepreneurs are empirically unstable. You can’t go into this shit with a sane disposition.
Agreed.
anyhow, great piece. as long as you can live another day, the opportunity is there for something big to happen. i've gone from the lowest of lows to the highest of highs in a matter of a few hours.
perhaps reframing what success really is would help. i know how hard that can be, though. take it easy on yourself. not many people can do what you're doing. measuring yourself to those living a so-called "normal" lifestyle is unfair to yourself. you've chosen a different path, a path that, believe me, many would love but are too scared to make.
"To all of the people who say that the best thing to do is get a good job, buy a nice house, and to put the max into a 401k that the company will match: Fuck you. It’s not what I want. Mediocrity is worse than failure."
Mediocrity is not worse than failure. Try being homeless. Except when you say 'failure' you mean "maybe I'll have to move back in with my parents". You have an enormous safety net allowing you to be so disdainful of "mediocrity", don't take it for granted.
Stop romanticising driving yourself into the ground. Stop thinking you are better than your peers that have "sold out" by taking (gasp) jobs. It sounds like you've lived life very much on your own terms until now, but life doesn't work that way indefinitely. At some point you have to make compromises in order to achieve what you want. Deal with it.
Take a job as a developer. You'll make good money. Make sure it isn't for a demanding startup. Something that guarantees exiting the office at 5pm every day. Then go home and work on your startup. Plough your free time into your startup, and when you have enough of a ramp you can quit your day job and transition to the startup full time.
You are not a unique butterfly that is owed the opportunity to only ever do exactly what you want.
Entrepreneurship isn't a lifestyle I suggest to anyone, however, it is a great tool/means to fulfil something you want. Approaching it from the view of avoiding mediocrity is not only gonna put you in the difficult 'lifestyle' column, but it will also not be a very useful perspective for your entrepreneurial goals either. If you're really committed to living the entrepreneurial lifestyle, the best way to view it is as a journey to greatness: aspire to be with the best, not to avoid the 'average'. The former gives you hope and encouragement, while the latter is insulting to the those around you. If you're using entrepreneurship as a means to an end (like I am), it'll still be hard, but once you have that perspective it becomes easier to lay out a path for yourself regardless of the circumstances.
I've been snuffed out of jobs by friends I helped hire, I've had relationships fall apart to the point of becoming suicidal, I have no medical insurance and have endured multiple visits to the ER, I've had my apartment robbed and then got promptly kicked out because new roommates decided to get overly rowdy while I was gone, I've been shot at in broad daylight, I've unintentionally contracted with shady characters that fled the country and left me empty handed with silly lawsuits and court dates that I had to go out of my way to forfeit, I've been identity thefted losing all my money just as rent was due along with some of those ER bills, I haven't had more than 4 figures in my bank account for about half a year, my credit cards are maxed, I've had most of my belongings locked up in a storage unit for over 2 years because of these fiascos, and I'm now back to living with my parents because I couldn't afford to continue living on my own after quitting a job at a startup that required an overly-long commute that took a toll on my health to the point where I developed muscle spasms and began getting panic-attacks in the middle of the workday.
But you know what? It's all good. All that stuff might have been hell and made me nearly hysterical at points, but I know what my end goal is, and I know entrepreneurship is the only way I'll ever achieve it. If shit gets in my way, oh well, I'll just come up with a new plan to adjust for it (and I already have). I don't care about 'mediocrity', I just care that I achieve what I set out to do, because that's what makes me happy, and the only way I'll ever fail is if I give up pursuing it.
Your startup is statistically all but guaranteed to fail. Your life will be "mediocre" yet it will continue to be the kind of life that millions of people aspire to and are unable to reach. When looked at objectively, your life will be "pretty damn nice", no matter how much inner turmoil you feel about it.
I'll toss in the counterpoint that having kids that are thrilled to see you, even if you live in a tiny apartment, is anything but mediocre.
The OP seems to have a lot of priorities out of whack.
It sounds like he's getting his very first dose of reality, and it's putting him into a state of shock.
I have not worked in a developer shop yet, so this may not translate over, but in any of my other jobs (which were stable and not for startups) the idea of leaving the office at 5pm was ridiculous most of the time. Even if I did manage it, nothing stopped a 8pm email from giving me 2 more hours of work. Same with going on vacation, especially if you're the only one in a company who has a certain skill.
The 9-5 itself is dead and competition mandates working hard. Not startup hard, but not 1960's stereotype clock punching easy. When you look at it that way, why not put a year or four into playing a lottery that you can actually influence the outcome of?
>> You are not a unique butterfly that is owed the opportunity to only ever do exactly what you want.
Plenty agreed, and while I legitimately appreciate the snark/slight Fight Club reference, where did he say he is owed the opportunity? I believe he stated that whether given or earned he has the opportunity. There was no normative judgement on how he came about it other than guilt for it not being more austere.
Edit: grammar.
Working more than 40 hours as a developer is not doing you or the company any favors, it's perpetuating a myth that overwork is virtuous. It will not make you more productive or make your company any more money. At the end of it all, you'll just be tired.
Cool. Then if/when you want to retire and have no savings, don't go dipping into my 401k. I'm 100% for you making your decisions and wish you nothing but the best. But when it's time to pay the piper, your kids are getting ready for college and you have to tell them you can't afford to help them at all, you live with that.
Obviously there's a case where you hit the jackpot and become insanely wealthy. I wish this for you, but reality is that it probably won't happen.
Live with your decisions, for better or worse. But in 15 years, let's not be having a conversation where you're whining about not being able to afford a house, or not being able to pay for your kids' college, etc. And when you go to retire, please don't vote for taxes being raised on my 401k to pay for your retirement.
You're not really saying anything. You're describing your emotional state, but that's it. You say you're afraid, but you're not actually getting to the root of your fear. Sure, you don't want mediocrity. Who does, anyway? (Rhetorical question.)
Is this just a pep-talk? If so, all the best to you, live long and prosper, focus, work hard, all that good stuff. But I have a feeling that you have something you want to be addressing, but you're not actually doing it.
I'm 23 too. I'm married to my childhood sweetheart and we have a home. I have a great job doing marketing in a tech firm. Her heart's desire is to travel. I'd like to take her around the world, and write novels and essays about whatever MY heart desires. But I too have bills to pay (and my job's awesome, anyway, so what's my problem?) And I too am afraid that my ambitions and vision for myself and reality might not be easy to swallow, and/or that I might hurt people along the way. I've already cut ties with some of my closest friends.
Here's a guess that's going to sound a little pessimistic, but it's just a guess and I could be totally wrong, and it's more about me than it is about you- but I think you're going to find yourself returning to this exact same position several times.
Not sure why I'm writing this, being messy and jumbled and all, but it's probably the same reason why you wrote your post. So, uh, here it is.
Life's crazy. You're crazy. I'm crazy. Cheers to that. Once you're done analysing and reviewing your emotional state, though, don't forget to get around to doing the work- because that's what actually matters, and that's what people will actually want to read about, pay you for, etc. That's the real legacy you'll build.
This rant includes all kinds of stuff about "me", "my life", "my philosphies", "my problems", "my future", "my", "my", "my"...
Where's mention of others, their problems, and the solutions?
OP may call himself "An Entrepreneur", but supplies no data to support that claim. Sadly, an all-too-often recurring theme these days.
To give up is not defeat; it's rallying. Maybe at Accenture you'll learn your future customers, find something to enhance, or exploit. You don't know. But above all you have to be honest with yourself and why you wanted this: are you the driver and the company the car, or are you the car and the company the driver?*
*In other words, is the company what is trying to be delivered and you're just taking it there, or do you want to go somewhere and the company is the means to do that.
An entrepreneur must have heart and passion. If you have time to think about these things your not busy enough. Focus on your business and the problems your business faces. YOU are the business. you life should be the business. Your personal problems don't matter. run and don't look back. Do not compare yourself to anyone but your competitors. Be strong, live on.
Reading the first paragraph I think, "Here's a spoiled brat complaining"
When I read, "We move higher, we fly faster, we get meaner." I start to lose sympathy. It's another of "Woe unto me, the underappreciated superstar from the country club."
It's heaven. I have 3 jobs right now, one of which is a full time salaried gig with benefits, and the other two are moderate contract positions that I work in my spare time.
There is no stagnation here. I code on easy stuff at work all day, then go home and explore technologies that a BigCo will never use. Down the road when looking for another job, there just won't be big roadblocks, just a massive list of code and projects completed.
Now I do 9 to 5, and write after work. Life is good for me and I am happy because I love my work and after-work.
The purist obsession that you need to be 100% devoted to something is beyond me, but like I said, I am happy and know that I am happy because I knew this would make me happy.
The OP has a different opinion of happiness, and it's his happiness, and I don't find it offensive.
Really? Maybe to aspiring entrepreneurs in their teens and very early twenties, that sounds romantic. To everyone else, that likely sounds awful.
You're 23. You don't really know anything yet. Maybe a little, but not much. You're parents aren't in charge now, you're out of school, and now you're going to learn about life. And you're arriving at the same realizations that most people do around that age. You're figuring out that living your dream has real costs. You're figuring out that your adult relationships will suffer, hard. You'll see your peers move up the corporate ladder, and it'll feel like you're just watching from the sidelines. And if you go the 9-5 (let's be honest, more likely an 8-6), they're going to be your boss someday.
But you're also 23. You're incredibly young, and you still have time to mess up. And you'll have the rest of your life to run the rat race, if that's what you one day choose.
So stop stressing, but do get your priorities straight. You'll need to work within the constraints set by your priorities.
The biggest constraint might be your relationship. It's normal that your girlfriend doesn't share in your dream of ramen noodles and Three Buck Chuck. And it doesn't get easier, especially if she wants kids. If you're in a promising relationship, maybe you're realizing that it matters more to you than your work. On the other hand, relationships come and go, often unpredictably. You have to figure out how to handle that for yourself.
Good luck!
I have a startup because lack of choice (here in Brazil programmers are very badly paid, and I don't figured yet how to move... most countries has some weird requeriment or another that I cannot meet).
It is not romantic at all, it suck.
5 years ago my dream was have a 9-5 job, a house, a wife and kids. This proved kinda impossible here...
Now my dream is become absurdly rich and own a farm... And I have that dream because since I was forced into a risky situation, I plan in failing, or having great rewards... I had no choice in having a risk, but since I have lots of risk, at least I can choose to really go for it...
But I am sure, that if I could have a 9-5 job, house and wife, I would be perfectly happy.
You have to learn when to fold them, my dude. Better to say here ran a coward than here died the brave.
@zhamilton89:
You've written a lot where you identify as being an entrepreneur, but I can't find anything you've written on what you're working on. Your other pieces for medium seem to avoid answering this question. What is your project's goal?
https://medium.com/p/8f186a4dde94
"I’m Modeling My Company After The Taliban."
Hey, man, if that's not what you want, that's cool and all, but I'm just going to defend myself and my buddies with good jobs and stuffed 401(k)s: There are other things besides Business that matter to people. For instance, I'd rather be a middling-to-decent family-man than a wildly successful entrepreneur, any day of the week.
There's a lot to give up in pursuit of your dreams, whether that dream is family or success or artistic fulfillment or travel... Sometimes you can choose to have some of column A and some of column B at the expense of being "mediocre" (or at least not-99.999th-percentile) at both - but maybe sometimes that leaves you a better person overall.
Anyway. Whatever floats your boat; just don't be too down on the rest of the world's strategies or anything
I am 45, and I am having a hard time. I am flat broke, disabled, and 100K in medical debt. No startups want to hire me, nobody wants to help me, and I did a great job when I was working and did two startups of my own.
http://www.greatdox.com/documentaries/ I want to do documentaries on various topics because I faced a lot of stuff in my life and I don't want to see others suffer as I have, as I have seen many others suffer. Know that you are not alone. I have software I want to develop as well. http://www.greatdox.com/software/
What I am trying to do is side-projects on my own. If you think I can better do that by joining a startup and getting work, I can change my status. But I had tried for over a decade and got nothing, before I put that status up.
As an entrepreneur I often have people (who are 9-5'rs) saying to me "that's awesome you're doing it on your own. I'm so envious". Yet, they have no idea the sacrifices that are required to make it on your own. The reality is that they are scared shitless to do it themselves. Take pride in knowing you are doing something 95% of the "comfortable" population in the world are scared as hell to do themselves.
Feel free to get in touch (contact in profile) if you wanna talk things through over Skype.
Source: I'm 23 too, but I don't pretend to be awesome. I'm just a stubborn kid looking to achieve something and getting by however necessary.
There's still some truth here. I'm 28, and doing ok now. I'm financially stable, and have 2K a month in recurring revenue + what I earn from short term engagements.
My peers now think what I'm doing is cool, and my parents now appear to accept that I'm not a hobo.
But, for the first year and a half, it was very tough emotionally. I was doing fine materially, but earning far less than I would have from a job.
I knew that what I was working on had potential. In fact, my short term (6-12 month) predictions were pretty spot on.
But that was based on my understanding of my niche. Others couldn't see inside my head. It was very, very hard for my parents to see that what I was doing would be worthwhile.
Now that I have externally verifiable metrics of success, it is much easier to convince people that what I'm doing is a good idea.
That in turn makes my work easier. I always felt that what I was doing was worthwhile. But it's a lot easier to work on something when your peers agree with your assessment.
You did say that living your well-off lifestyle costs very little.
"I want to give the same unwavering devotion to my children as my parents gave to me, but I want to do it in a way that does not lead to living paycheck to paycheck."
You wouldn't be living paycheck to paycheck if you accepted a job. I'm a pharmacist. It's OK money - I'm sure software developers can get more. You can build up savings and investments for a few years while developing some projects on the side. This gives you breathing room. It seems like you're walking a tightrope right now - with fear of losing what you already have (girlfriend, material stuff) and fear of this idea you call "mediocrity" pushing you along.
At this point no one's going to write an epic poem about my life. I'm arrogant enough to hate "mediocrity" as well, but it's a small price to pay for peace of mind.
Any decent entrepreneur, however, is not going to lose that drive and desire. I know I haven't, and I've yet to achieve what this kid has. Even if he fails, he tried. He'll learn a ton and will be better-equipped for the next go-round.
If the OP wants to be free, it comes with a cost. Plain and simple. Don't want to be like your friends who have 9-5, a wife, a kid ? Thats fine. But be willing to pay the price for it as well.
I only want to say this "There is a cost and price for everything you do/want in your life". You decide what is worth to you.
My advice is to lower your expectation a little. A mediocrity is better than a total failure. Consider achieving mediocrity the failure, which you would be willing to take before aiming for the big thing, again. Try living homeless for a week, and you'll know.
We're young and sometimes the balance between the ideal and the real can be stammering to hold.
I'm finding this an interesting position to be in now, because I completely relate to OP, but I also... don't. It's like hearing a teenage boy telling you how much he's well and truly in love with a girl he met that afternoon. You don't want to falsely encourage him, but you don't want to cruelly discourage him either... just trying to be helpful in some way, if that's in any way possible. Cause I think I could've used some help then.
Just wait until he starts hiring people. He'll need those people who are satisfied when their work life is 'mediocre' by his terms.
Silicon Valley startup porn is harmful to many people, and I think the OP might be one of the harmed.
FWIW, I think "mediocre" is relative and very personal. A stable job, a modest house, a 401(k) with some money in it, etc., would be mediocre for me, because that just isn't what I want. But I would never argue that it's mediocre in any universal or objective sense. Whether someone's life is mediocre or not is entirely relative to their ambitions, goals, and priorities.
So if you ever hear me describe that kind of life as mediocre, know that that only means it isn't the kind of life I aspire to.
In fact, I go home sometimes to visit my best friend... he works as an over the road truck driver, doesn't make a ton of money, has a modest home, etc., but has a great wife and three kids. I would never call his life mediocre, and I'm even jealous in certain regards at times. I'll even be the first to say that he has accomplished more than I have in a lot of ways, while I'm off chasing entrepreneurial dreams and big ambitions.
Silicon Valley startup porn is harmful to many people
No doubt. But for some of us, it's not just "I want to be rich". I mean, I joke about a lot of things (search for my old posts here mentioning the word 'Maserati' for example), but the real driver for me is the need to be free. I want to run my own company and have plenty of money, just for the degree of freedom that entails. I can't stand the idea of having a "boss" in the traditional sense, somebody who can come in and order me around and keep me under his thumb. I want "FU money" because I want the freedom to say "FU" and go do what I want to do. But that's just a reflection of my self-centered, radical individualist, libertarian nature.
I think this is the best point brought up so far. He doesnt realize that others have different ideas about what success in life is. You cant be at the top looking down on your employees as just people who work for you and who are happy with mediocrity. It's a team effort, some have more responsibility than others.
b) Isn't the 40 hour work week pretty much a relic of industrial development? What about 40 means "virtuous"?
But you definitely don't need more.
There are plenty of ways you could be 'free' without owning a company. We all need FU money, but if 'freedom' is the ultimate goal, you could reduce your wants and probably have FU money after a year or so at a decent job, then move to some asian island and live decently off the interest.
That's not the 'freedom' most of us aspire to though. :)
Oh yeah, no doubt. That's the problem with engaging in too much reductionism in conversations like this. Human motivation is always more complex than just one or two things. I want to build a startup for other reasons than just financial independence, for sure. I guess the way I'd put it is:
"Founding a startup and growing a successful, profitable company seems - to me - to be the best path to satisfying a large number of my goals and ambitions and priorities, to an adequate degree, without compromising any of my fundamental principles".
Or think of it as an optimization problem... my calculations optimize the system of equations best by starting a company, based on what I know right now.
We should get together again sometime soon, and do lunch or drinks or something. Shoot me an email or give me a call and let's see what we can line up.
When you come from the country club life (first paragraph) it is indeed mediocre.
I would consider that mediocre as well, and I grew up about as far from "country club" life as you can get. As in, dirt-poor, below-the-poverty-line, white-trash from rural southeastern NC.
Of course, some of that is that we constantly raise the bar for ourselves (well, I do anyway). Maybe the scenario above would have sounded like heaven to me when I was 20, but it doesn't now. Just the "job" part gives me the creeps. I, for one, don't want a traditional "job" at all. My standard of the line between mediocre life and successful life involves a big element of being able to control my own fate to a greater degree, and some ability to call my own shots. Translated, that means running a company I own, not working for somebody else.
The OP seems to have a lot of priorities out of whack.
Meh. Who are we to judge? A person's priorities are their priorities... there is no "right" or "wrong" on this.
Absolutely. But, personally, I would find that preferable. There's a big difference from having to be accountable and responsive to "the market" in the aggregate (and especially when you consider that you can "fire" a bad customer) and having a "boss" - one individual who has you under his/her thumb and can unilaterally order you around.
Hands up everyone who had their priorities in life sorted by the of 23? (Mine is down).
So when I go home and visit my friends, and watch them playing with their kids and kissing their wives, etc., there's always a pang of regret that says "you could have gone this route instead". But, of course, as they say "the grass is always greener on the other side of the fence", blah, blah.
But I never wanted to start a family until I was in a position to give them the kind of life that I would want them to have.
Anyway, getting married and doing all that is potentially still in the cards. Time will tell, I suppose.