To Be the Best, You Have to Go Through the Worst

The article is a nice bit of wishful thinking—I wish you all the best. You should always strive to be better and do great things.

But I disagree with the basic premise in the title. I went through hell in my first startup because I believed this, and thought I had to push through my broken partnership and disagreements because starting a startup was always going to be difficult.

Now I'm working with fundamentally better people; wholly great people, in fact, and I've learned that everything I was told about startups and difficulty and "overcoming adversity" was just flat out wrong. I now truly believe that I didn't have to go through that hell to become the best. It was a lie. I only started becoming better once I was in a positive situation with a set of positive people doing work I believed in. The improvement in my life and work was exponential.

Moral of the story: trust your gut. If it doesn't feel right, it might not be. Maybe it's just hard, but maybe it's also too hard. Of course you have to work your ass off, and of course you'll learn a lot, but it shouldn't drive you into the ground. Keep your head screwed on.

Advice I wish I had heard earlier; or from the right people, maybe.

This isn't really necessarily true, and it definitely seems like he isn't making it easier on himself. Girl dumps him after a week (breaking his heart) and four years later they're back together, he's working on forgiving her, and they've co-founded a start-up?

Any personal issues you may have with someone are going to compound under the stress of a start-up (although 20 hours a week is about the same as many other college kids with part-time jobs), try to avoid crossing the streams.