I have lost my wife, my child, my parents, my grandparents, my friends, my house burned down with all of my possessions. I lost my ability to code due to burnout and had to spend several years doing nothing.
During my burnout experience I was basically forced to confront the roaring void of existence. I spent time at a monastery and contemplated the futility of it all.
And yet at the end of all of this, I considered what else is there to do with life but to begin anew? And now that I have lost everything, I am no longer naive. I know what is possible to have, and what is possible to lose, and I can act with understanding from past experience. I feel far more capable of success now that I know what it is to fail in the hardest ways I can imagine.