Love of the Game: Be foolish enough to believe your startup will make it.

This is an excellent article until it applies one final twist that perverts the entire message into something loathesome.

He's working hard. Great! He's keeping his expenses low. Awesome! Who needs to be weighed down with that stuff? He gave up on useless egotism about his status. Perfect! Other people's opinions don't matter. He rejected job offers. Excellent! That's because they provide a way of life he doesn't want.

So far so good.

He can do all that without lying to himself. Lie to yourself and you'll lie to others, which makes you an untrustworthy con man. That's what gives entrepreneurs a reputation like televangelists.

Just give up the ego-trip of success, and accept the fact that what you are doing may not succeed. Why do you need it to succeed? Your ego. Just fail, start again, fail, start again, fail, start again. So long as you can keep yourself fed, you can keep it up forever. Your validation is not some future goal-- this is the life you want. Right here. Right now. Otherwise, don't do it.