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idw 20 seconds ago [-]
The saying goes: it takes ten years to become an overnight success.
As for the stick or twist question, if your only goal is to make money then twisting whenever it seems to make that more likely makes sense. Most people thrive on doing work they care about enough to stick with when it is hard, and my guess is that gets better results over time.
One bit of practical advice: celebrate the little successes on the way to whatever you may think a big success looks like. Wherever the journey ends up, it's important to enjoy it as much as possible.
e9 33 seconds ago [-]
Founding engineer 8 times. 5 exits(2 sold shares back to investors, 2 acquihires, 1 acquisition). Never really made any significant money. I would make 10x more if I spent same time at big tech. Milage may vary but my 2 cents if you want to be entrepreneur or work for a startup:
1. Enjoy the process (You can push harder and longer if you enjoy what you do and at the end it won't matter if money doesn't come because any time spent enjoying what you do is already a win)
2. Work with people you like (For founders: don't be single founder, 90% of the times single founders either don't know how to share or no one wants to work with them)
thiagoperes 19 minutes ago [-]
People usually think of "making it" as a single point in time that's binary. Granted, there's some truth to that: most people will feel fully comfortable with a few millions in their bank account.
But in reality, success can be savored a lot more pleasantly if you allow yourself to be conscientious of milestones and include having a great process of getting there as the definition of success.
I've met so many people (myself included) that burned themselves by thinking they will spend only a few years grinding to reach a certain milestone, and get frustrated when the narrow definition of success they've created for themselves isn't met.
I've also met a few others that have realized the above, usually with burnout then self-discovery, many which also "made it" by the standard definition, but have a strong sense of fulfillment.
Naturally the question is how. For myself, what worked is a mix of taking more risks (becoming a founder at 35+), experimentation and using various techniques (therapy, meditation, the usual suspects) to find what can drive me to work hard but with purpose or joy.
wewewedxfgdf 1 hours ago [-]
You have to define succeed.
I have had small business success in that it gave me and a small number of other people a really good ordinary income for 20 years.
I have never had a breakout success that accelerates to something much bigger than that, despite trying for a very long time.
syntax-sailor 47 minutes ago [-]
I am a middle aged man who lives on a sailing boat. A decade in early stage / founding without an exit that's closer to a car crash. Still trying, I don't have the temperament for consulting or corporate.
cultofmetatron 29 minutes ago [-]
> I am a middle aged man who lives on a sailing boat.
literally my goal. hopefully we can meet up on the strait of malaca at some point
cromka 32 minutes ago [-]
Unironically, living on a boat and working on my own thing is my dream right now.
sublinear 25 minutes ago [-]
There's gotta be a ton of people in their 20s working remotely and living on a boat right now. They don't have to bust their ass like an entrepreneur either. They're just normal employees.
What is it with boats anyway?
Shitty-kitty 40 minutes ago [-]
It's very important to know when to call it quits. If you are at the point where it feels like there is nothing more than you can do other than wait for a lucky-break, give yourself a hard deadline for an exit and stick with it.
cj 28 minutes ago [-]
This is what scares me about people raising insanely large $10 million seed rounds. It's too much runway. Takes too long to fail.
It took me 4 years of working on 3 different startups, with 2 different set of cofounders, before I landed on the idea/business that finally became successful.
Two of those failed companies were part of YC. Thank god every investor turned us down. It allowed us to shut down and move on to the next idea way faster.
Edit: If you're a founder sitting on a giant bank account with a startup that you're losing faith in... remember you aren't obligated to spend all that money. Investors will respect you for returning the money and admitting it's time to try something else.
jason_zig 21 minutes ago [-]
You should almost always stick with an idea for longer than you think. I've had 3 successful projects (one making over 100K MRR[0]) IMO the main differentiator between winning and losing is how fast you are iterating based on customer feedback.
I think about it like throwing a dart at the dartboard. You might hit the bullseye in one shot but usually you'll just hit somewhere random then it's up to you to iterate and find the version of your idea that the market will actually pay for. This is the feedback part of the equation and giving up and throwing random darts may never pay off.
were your projects in spaces you were familiar with? I feel like that makes the dart less random. Also I feel like it's hard to get customers/users on calls
bckr 1 hours ago [-]
Still haven’t succeeded! I’m on my 8th business since being a teenager. I have lost quite a bit of money. I’ve earned some through consulting. I think for those of use for whom it doesn’t come easy or natural (and maybe, for everyone) you have to identify as an entrepreneur—wanting and even trying isn’t enough. Then let go of all outcomes. Then just move forward every day.
But I haven’t succeeded yet, so I might not be giving the best advice!
mlitwiniuk 11 minutes ago [-]
Define "to succeed".
Had one business (dev shop) that was successfully aqui-hired - but it took my 10 years to build it.
For last two years working on a startup, pivotel last year to GRC / compliance management. Finally with profit and growing number of paying customers, but still waiting to pay myself a decent salary. Moments of doubt are hiting more often recently, but I still think it's worth it.
asdev 6 minutes ago [-]
To succeed, I mean product market fit, or the business being healthy enough from the founders perspective with minimal(always non zero) doubts.
Did you have experience in that space? Are you a solo founder?
mlitwiniuk 56 seconds ago [-]
Had experience with compliance before, now building on it and learning a ton. Growing number of customers suggest I’m onto something, so doubts are minimal
And yes, solo founder.
c0nrad 51 minutes ago [-]
First company was csper.io (2019), took maybe 3 months till I had my first customer, and then around month 6 I started getting ~1 customer/week, and continued scaling after that. Felt pretty comfortable with the idea and didn't need to pivot/drop.
Second/current one, dmarcdefender.io (2025), took maybe 6 months till I had my first customer, but now it's growing much slower. There's a lot more competition and still trying to figure out where I fit in / how to market it among all the competition. I was originally positioned as a security focused product, but now pivoting to more of a marketing/deliverability product. But to be honest not really sure where it's going, but still fighting the fight.
nubb 7 minutes ago [-]
i decided i’ve succeeded, took myself out of the rat race, spend my days golfing and day trading.
maybe you’ve already succeeded and don’t know it
d--b 23 minutes ago [-]
It took about 2 years to succeed in letting go of that business idea.
45 minutes ago [-]
guybedo 38 minutes ago [-]
i'll tell you if it ever happens
Cider9986 58 minutes ago [-]
I'm not an Entrepreneur, but I will probably become fairly well-off, slowly by following the Bogleheads strategy.
downbad_ 41 minutes ago [-]
Which is?
Cider9986 30 minutes ago [-]
Here[1], you can learn about it. It's simple, but not easy.
For me, it means buying Fidelity 0 funds in a Roth IRA and not selling them.
Autoinvest diversely and don't sell. Minimize transactions. Never invest based on the news.
fellowniusmonk 1 hours ago [-]
Overnight with a really solid idea with good timing where I understood the space.
The same idea with bad timing (rentry after a fantastic exit that I juiced with a condition to not renter the space for 3 years and a subsequent launch just prior to covid), never, because I'm not going to spend my own money on getting it off the ground again post covid.
I've got 3 things working now that are 10 years in the making if they ever succeed.
I tinker. Ideas aren't actually worthless like so many people say but the devil is in the time/space/implementation details.
I think the slowdown with ycombinator successea is exactly because they went hard in choosing teams over ideas when the ideas and their framing are in fact reflective of the teams.
As for the stick or twist question, if your only goal is to make money then twisting whenever it seems to make that more likely makes sense. Most people thrive on doing work they care about enough to stick with when it is hard, and my guess is that gets better results over time.
One bit of practical advice: celebrate the little successes on the way to whatever you may think a big success looks like. Wherever the journey ends up, it's important to enjoy it as much as possible.
1. Enjoy the process (You can push harder and longer if you enjoy what you do and at the end it won't matter if money doesn't come because any time spent enjoying what you do is already a win)
2. Work with people you like (For founders: don't be single founder, 90% of the times single founders either don't know how to share or no one wants to work with them)
But in reality, success can be savored a lot more pleasantly if you allow yourself to be conscientious of milestones and include having a great process of getting there as the definition of success.
I've met so many people (myself included) that burned themselves by thinking they will spend only a few years grinding to reach a certain milestone, and get frustrated when the narrow definition of success they've created for themselves isn't met.
I've also met a few others that have realized the above, usually with burnout then self-discovery, many which also "made it" by the standard definition, but have a strong sense of fulfillment.
Naturally the question is how. For myself, what worked is a mix of taking more risks (becoming a founder at 35+), experimentation and using various techniques (therapy, meditation, the usual suspects) to find what can drive me to work hard but with purpose or joy.
I have had small business success in that it gave me and a small number of other people a really good ordinary income for 20 years.
I have never had a breakout success that accelerates to something much bigger than that, despite trying for a very long time.
literally my goal. hopefully we can meet up on the strait of malaca at some point
What is it with boats anyway?
It took me 4 years of working on 3 different startups, with 2 different set of cofounders, before I landed on the idea/business that finally became successful.
Two of those failed companies were part of YC. Thank god every investor turned us down. It allowed us to shut down and move on to the next idea way faster.
Edit: If you're a founder sitting on a giant bank account with a startup that you're losing faith in... remember you aren't obligated to spend all that money. Investors will respect you for returning the money and admitting it's time to try something else.
I think about it like throwing a dart at the dartboard. You might hit the bullseye in one shot but usually you'll just hit somewhere random then it's up to you to iterate and find the version of your idea that the market will actually pay for. This is the feedback part of the equation and giving up and throwing random darts may never pay off.
[0]https://www.zigpoll.com
But I haven’t succeeded yet, so I might not be giving the best advice!
Had one business (dev shop) that was successfully aqui-hired - but it took my 10 years to build it.
For last two years working on a startup, pivotel last year to GRC / compliance management. Finally with profit and growing number of paying customers, but still waiting to pay myself a decent salary. Moments of doubt are hiting more often recently, but I still think it's worth it.
Did you have experience in that space? Are you a solo founder?
And yes, solo founder.
Second/current one, dmarcdefender.io (2025), took maybe 6 months till I had my first customer, but now it's growing much slower. There's a lot more competition and still trying to figure out where I fit in / how to market it among all the competition. I was originally positioned as a security focused product, but now pivoting to more of a marketing/deliverability product. But to be honest not really sure where it's going, but still fighting the fight.
maybe you’ve already succeeded and don’t know it
For me, it means buying Fidelity 0 funds in a Roth IRA and not selling them.
[1]https://www.bogleheads.org/wiki/Bogleheads%C2%AE_investment_...
The same idea with bad timing (rentry after a fantastic exit that I juiced with a condition to not renter the space for 3 years and a subsequent launch just prior to covid), never, because I'm not going to spend my own money on getting it off the ground again post covid.
I've got 3 things working now that are 10 years in the making if they ever succeed.
I tinker. Ideas aren't actually worthless like so many people say but the devil is in the time/space/implementation details.
I think the slowdown with ycombinator successea is exactly because they went hard in choosing teams over ideas when the ideas and their framing are in fact reflective of the teams.