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Comment by pototo666 | Hacker News Reader

I used to be one of them. I got money, but failed. The process and failure took me hard, both mentally and bodily.

Before my startup, I read a lot about startup. I knew that it would be hard. But knowing is so different from experiencing.

On hindsight, all the stories have successful ending, or the author of the book are successful. Among all the hardship described in the book, the overall tone is optimism.

We should read more about failure, than success.

Now I am on my second startup journey, fulling understand what is awaiting me.

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>Now I am on my second startup journey, fulling understand what is awaiting me.

I'd be genuinely curious if your response to the same impending hardship makes a difference in the outcome.

Like, does KNOWING about suffering make it easier to go through it?

Can't say anything about entrepreneurship but when I learned to ski between ages 28 and 32, then yes it helps a lot. I could categorise the type of painful falls I'd make and how serious they were. I had whole failure models built on not breaking but falling into the snow.

It took 5 years to ski, especially the first 3 years were a painful process.

(on avg. 1 week per year)

Not sure how much this resembles entrepreneurship.

The second time is much easier because you can put the hardship in perspective. The first time around there is a lot of uncertainty and self-doubt -- you've never had to deal with the issues before -- and you tend to imagine the bad parts being far worse than they actually are. While it is still hard, the certainty of "been there, done that" greatly reduces the psychological stress in my experience.

Also, being able to anticipate the hardship in concrete terms also allows you to get in front of it and mitigate the adverse effects. You make fewer mistakes, so less of the hardship is self-inflicted.

Entrepreneurship is very difficult even in the best of circumstances, but it is also a skill and experience makes the job significantly easier.

Yes it is easier.

Some setbacks may hurt my confidence in my first startup journey. Now I would just drink a cup of coffee and keep working.

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