Hacker News Reader

Comment by shaaaaawn | Hacker News Reader

I just read this moments after giving in, allowing my dad to take a 401k loan in exchange for the title to my car (I insisted) to help me pay rent and keep my startup dreams afloat a cpl more months. Humility doesn't come easy for some of us. Thank you for sharing Will. I really needed to read this today.

View on HN

With all due respect - what is going to change about your startup in the next few months? Things like retirement account loans from your parents are to get you over a rare and unexpected setback in an otherwise exciting curve. Otherwise, you're just borrowing other people's money who need it (i.e. these are not wealthy individuals taking a risk with money they can afford to lose).

Bahahah. Let me clarify, I've been managing peons like yourself since high school. I've already climbed the six figure ladder. The view wasn't to my liking. See I decided to quit & build products designed for social good, hence why I turned down a CIO role at a bank last week & turned down $125k work-from-home contract at Wells Fargo today. I can make money anytime I return a headhunters voicemail. Maybe that's why my parents are cool with the risk. Go ahead Google me, my resume speaks for itself.

Your attitude isn't very appealing.

You should consider finding other ways to express yourself.

Usually I dance

Yikes.

I tried to. I did not find anything. And even if I did, you are easily the biggest tool I've seen on HN yet.

What's up with http://daft.ws/ ?

Your attitude speaks for itself too.

I'm so sorry for your father.

Why would you assume I'm a peon? Or that I haven't climbed the six figure ladder? In fact, you don't know anything about me, why would you react this way?

One of the things you learn as you get a little more maturity is that: a) it never pays to be rude or uncivil to anyone you don't personally know, b) no matter how much of a hot shit you think you are, you will look like a giant douchebag when you try to pull it on other people, c) there's always the possibility that you are wildly wrong.

You actually hit on all three of those points in this particular situation. Good luck with your startup.

Glad you read it and got something out of it. Do whatever you can to keep it going. Awesome that you have people to help you .

"Do whatever you can to keep it going" only applies inasmuch as you're not taking advantage of other people to make it happen. The upthread poster taking money from his parents' retirement account to get "a few more months" on his startup and pay rent is not ideal.

I hadn't thought of it that way, but you raise a good point. At what point are people enabling you and at what point are you just being prideful (if you take it or not). Obviously you have to have some discretion, but I've always struggled with that line.

It's kind of like the hippocratic oath - "first, do no harm". You shouldn't be borrowing money from your parents' retirement account to get a few more months on your startup, unless it's a very specific situation.

Agreed. If this is a "I have a signed contract that will give me $Xk next month, if I can just make it to then" situation, sure, go for it. Otherwise, it's (almost definitely) just pissing away someone's money. There's always another way: get a job or freelance for a while and work on the startup on the side, take on funding, whatever.

This makes sense, but I can definitely see how I could get caught up thinking that with just "a few more" months I could get something to happen. By default, don't you have to ignore some data in a startup that says your failing and push on?

Otherwise you'd stop at square 0. I know there is a continuum of bullshitting yourself involved there, but it's certainly a grey area.

Seems like a mentor would be helpful in this kind of situation. I'm envisioning someone who's gone through success and failure, who isn't so emotionally connected with your project, who you can trust with the details even if they aren't flattering or optimistic, and who can help you make some of those judgement calls that get cloudy when you're right in the middle of something. A person like that is hard to find, but I think it's worth looking for.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com