“A Doable Sacrifice:” Y Combinator as a Married Man
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My point is you can have a reasonably normal family life and you can build a company. These are not mutually exclusive. Some of the insane stuff people say they have had to do (30 hours of nonstop coding and so on) ... I am not sure all of that is required for success. Hard work, yes, many sacrifices, yes, but we can get a lot done in a 50 hour focused work-week, and we don't have to sacrifice all normal human relationships (parents, spouses, kids, friendships...) to build a company. What would be the point of that?
Yes, of course, if I had set a goal that we had to exit in 4 years it would have been a different story.
Congratulations on building an awesome company and being totally humble about it. I wish stories like yours were told more to put startups, life and what's important into perspective.
Also, I think it is an interesting idea to contrast "youth culture" and "geek culture".
My current goals are just to be as effective a person as possible, work on my entrepreneurial skills, and just hope that when I do have children that I am a good enough entrepreneur to both pay the bills and be able to spend quality time with my family. It worries me that I may not be to that point when the time eventually arrives.
The best lesson for me was watching my co-founder Tony Thomas, who could maintain his Buddha-like calm in the face of trying circumstances. He was the one who taught me it is possible to keep that balance.
Of course, I haven't watched any television in years (for the longest time, I didn't even own a TV set) and I cannot name any recent music band but thanks to the Economist-habit, I can quote the per-capita GDP of most countries within 10-20%
So you have to make judicious choices, but it is possible to achieve that balance between family life and entrepreneurship.
As an entrepreneur with two young children, I know it's hard to keep a balance.
The hard part isn't necessarily the limited number of hours. It's possible to build a successful startup while working 40 hours a week, provided you're really focused and not goofing around during those hours.
What's hard is many startups have a youth culture that glorifies in working all the time, though much of that time is drinking beer and playing foosball. That's great when you're 23. But I (and many others with kids) would much prefer a professional culture of focused, intense work from 10 AM to 6 PM.
This is something I am increasingly concerned about, as I will probably have children in a couple of years.
The thing is, the entrepreneurs with children that I know are vastly more effective than (most of) those without. The additional focus required to successfully do both has made them much more discerning when it comes to how they use their time. But there is definitely a belief among my younger friends that people with children just aren't capable of the kinds of work that lead to awesomeness.
Since many top talent are usually less inclined to work for gray boring enterprises, and prefer startups (Who wouldn't?), then they don't face the problems we "older" developers see every day. no problem to solve, less ideas, less enterprise targeted startups.
I think PG wrote about it somewhere regarding things he looks to fund. (http://ycombinator.com/ideas.html)
Solution? I have no clue... but a VC backed babysitter 2.0 startup might be a step in the right direction
Edit: "do things like YC" should read - "create and run startups", not YC in specific.
If you can figure that part out then nothing should stop you from applying for YC.
But I agree, it's the years after probably, although I believe you can do more in 9 hours of balanced life than in 14 hours of hectic coding (just less reading HN, and writing just "good enough" code and not developing features that users don't really need, and hiring good people, can save a lot of time)
My theory on how to maintain work-life balance after YC is that you have to try to create some semblance of it during YC as well, then turn the volume up afterwards. That can also help avoid the post-Demo Day postpartum crash that comes with pulling a 3 month stint of nothing but work.
So for us, that meant taking Saturdays off, like I mentioned in the article. And it's not just about not working, it's about planning out some kind of epic release and fun time, like going to Monterey for a concert or kayaking around the bay. I have to admit that I wasn't as good about that before YC - I would work until some kind of internal safety valve would blow a gasket and I was flirting with the crispy edges of burnout, then I'd crash uselessly until I could be productive again - and now I'm hoping I've learned a life skill that can power steady productivity for much longer than 3 months.
Most people with kids live on the edge of a precarious childcare cliff. It's a marvel of logistics to allow both parents to keep their jobs as it is--3 months of one parent holing up would push the whole family over the edge of that cliff. What is your spouse going to do, take 3 months off work?
After YC it is not like you can go home and do nothing. If anything things would get much more difficult. Especially if you raise money from investors.
I've just turned 40 and have one kid and another on the way. I guess I'm having a mid-life crisis when it comes to my work life and have decided to try to do something on my own.
Yes, with a pregnant wife and a young kid, it is difficult, but personal motivation and focus has so far kept me going, at least as far as developing the MVP is concerned. But, on the other hand, I did think about a revenue model before starting my project and not as an after thought.
I wish I had had this itch 10-15 years ago, but I cannot change the past, only influence my future.