[fredrivett]

Hey Andrew, appreciate your perspective here.

I agree bootstrapping itself wasn't the problem. The problem was that I felt my focus on building a business on the side of my day job limiting to what I could do next. At the start of the year I decided the healthiest thing for me to do was to start from a clean slate and bed down somewhere. I wasn't sure where, but London is where I ended up.

I realise there are much more sane ways to live our lives than a startup, bootstrapped or funded. I agree it takes a lot of personal sacrifice too, mentally more than anything.

I realise my path looks strange, going from "I need more time to focus on things outside of work" to "I'm starting a startup", and it was never my plan when I came back. It was only 4 months after returning that the opportunity came up and it was the best fit for me at the time.

I may be too naive, but both myself and my co-founder believe that working excessive hours isn't a necessity to make a startup succeed. Sure there are times when you need to work longer in short periods to get something over the line, but the idea that being on the brink of burnout gives the best odds of success goes against what I've read about how the human mind works, and my experience too.

Maybe in a year or two I'll do a follow up post.