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Comment by kirillzubovsky | Hacker News Reader

To be honest, it sucks for the guy, but I do love everything about this title. We hear so much about "changing the world," in the startuplandia, but rarely does anyone talk about living the life, and actually having years and ability to enjoy it.

We need more x-founders and investors, the rare ones with heart and soul, to not only talk about health, but actively promote a healthy lifestyle. You might miss a unicorn or two, but you'd end up with less dead and utterly messed up founders, I think.

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{edit} of course when I said that I loved everything about the title, it referred to the original title posted on HN. now the title says something completely different.

After Kroll's girlfriend received no response when she called him, she asked NYPD to visit his New York City apartment.[8] Kroll was found dead at the age of 34[1] of a drug overdose.[9] Drugs found in his system include fentanyl, fluoroisobutyryl fentanyl, heroin and cocaine, the examiner said.[10]

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He passed away from his battles with addiction, not really from "working too hard".

Sure, but how many founders out there are addicted to various kinds of self-harm, be that drugs, working for 20h/day, lack of healthy eating, not leaving the office for weeks at a time...etc.

Point is, it's incredibly easy to engage in destructive behavior, especially if you've got the mindset of taking things to extremes.

All the things you mention are incerdibly damaging, but not necessarily the same thing. not leaving the office, not exercising, poor diet are all symptoms of things like working 20 hour days. In my mind that's the alternative to drugs, which is an escape from not being able to disengage from your startup.

I think the parent comment is referring to more than just the ‘standard’ recreational drugs — I know lots of founders who abuse amphetamines to maintain the habits you describe.

His addiction could have been a symptom and/or a way to cope with working too hard.

That sounds like an excuse for it. There are countless examples of accomplished people who typically work too much, and who don't engage in recreational drug use.

Adderall abuse is rampant in the 100 hour week set. So is provigil abuse.

DHH the founder of Basecamp, and creator of Rails talks about this constantly on Twitter. He talks about the importance of living a balanced life. Also written many books about work / life balance.

Yup, DHH is pretty good about. He'd been on my podcast to talk about it among other things (https://www.raddadshow.com/episode/david-heinemeier-hansson) and it sounds like he actually took a bit of time and effort to reflect on his own journey to figure out what is important to him, why, and how to make space for those things. He talks a lot about stoic philosophy too, if you want to hear more from DHH. Great guy.

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