[throwaway8456]

I started, boostrapped and sold a SaaS business.

By most standards, this was a resounding success. I won't have to work again ever if I don't want to. This being my first company, I was obsessed with it. Towards the end, I burnt myself out, I had neglected my wife and kids for years, and I was just so miserable. I used to love programming, but I could not concentrate anymore. I started developing resentment against the entitlement of the software engineers I would hire. My heart was broken every time I would read articles/comments on HN about how working for a start up is a scam that only benefits the founders.

It was time to get out. I was lucky that I sold in 2021, when the multiples were higher than ever. But I have lost my marriage along the way, and I have definitely lost a few years of life expectancy.

I really wonder if it was really all worth it. I know at the end of the day though I had to go through that. I had to see it with my own eyes.

In the end, things worked out for me. I can't even fathom how I would feel if the whole thing had failed. I really came to the conclusion that most of the time, starting a company is for suckers.

[reedf1]

> a start up is a scam that only benefits the founders

I've worked for a few start-ups now from early-stages to IPO and it definitely feels like this. Most opportunities for any amount of valuable equity is complete lies. I have been personally responsible for creating quite a few millionaires - without being one myself.

> I started developing resentment against the entitlement of the software engineers I would hire

You probably know this already - but you are nothing without your engineers and they usually know it. I recently worked for a financial start-up which completely imploded just pre-IPO because the founder thought that they were beyond the point of needing an engineering team (!).

[dlisboa]

I think people today, especially high paid workers, forgot all about class consciousness. People like to think themselves closer to the owners of a company than to the cleaning staff. At the end of the day we're still labour, equity only exists for engineers because we're a high value commodity at this point, but that's not supposed to happen at all. The moment that is no longer true the more we'll look like "regular" workers, with no expectation of a big payout. Just like the line worker at Foxconn isn't getting equity.

[inconceivable]

i also sold in 2021 when the money flowed easy. i'm not set for life but i could easily go 10 years, longer if i sold assets. eventually the burnout faded, my health improved (knock on wood) and the boredom got to me after 1.5 years and i'm working again. working on personal projects "for fun" is not the same as making money, no matter what anyone says.

buying expensive shit is awesome for a while but it gets old. especially if you already have a home you actually like living in and the 'expensive toys and experiences' itch has been scratched for a while because your business was already successful by the time you sold it. i don't want a huge house and i don't need another car or overpriced workstation computer.

it makes me wonder what drives billionaires to keep going. they're probably just bored when they're not working. it really might be as simple as that.

[digging]

> it makes me wonder what drives billionaires to keep going. they're probably just bored when they're not working. it really might be as simple as that.

If we're looking at billionaires, it's a very different situation from the rest of the rich.

Billionaires carve out and control portions of civilization. I mean any business or other venture does this to a degree, but when you're working with billions of USD, you're playing a different game entirely. It is about power.

[orangepurple]

Consider the hypothetical case of a man who can have anything he wants just by wishing for it. Such a man has power, but he will develop serious psychological problems. At first he will have a lot of fun, but by and by he will become acutely bored and demoralized. Eventually he may become clinically depressed. History shows that leisured aristocracies tend to become decadent. This is not true of fighting aristocracies that have to struggle to maintain their power. But leisured, secure aristocracies that have no need to exert themselves usually become bored, hedonistic and demoralized, even though they have power. This shows that power is not enough. One must have goals toward which to exercise one’s power.

Everyone has goals; if nothing else, to obtain the physical necessities of life: food, water and whatever clothing and shelter are made necessary by the climate. But the leisured aristocrat obtains these things without effort. Hence his boredom and demoralization.

Nonattainment of important goals results in death if the goals are physical necessities, and in frustration if nonattainment of the goals is compatible with survival. Consistent failure to attain goals throughout life results in defeatism, low self-esteem or depression.

Thus, in order to avoid serious psychological problems, a human being needs goals whose attainment requires effort, and he must have a reasonable rate of success in attaining his goals.

But not every leisured aristocrat becomes bored and demoralized. For example, the emperor Hirohito, instead of sinking into decadent hedonism, devoted himself to marine biology, a field in which he became distinguished. When people do not have to exert themselves to satisfy their physical needs they often set up artificial goals for themselves. In many cases they then pursue these goals with the same energy and emotional involvement that they otherwise would have put into the search for physical necessities. Thus the aristocrats of the Roman Empire had their literary pretensions; many European aristocrats a few centuries ago invested tremendous time and energy in hunting, though they certainly didn’t need the meat; other aristocracies have competed for status through elaborate displays of wealth; and a few aristocrats, like Hirohito, have turned to science.

Please read paragraphs 33 through 41, or better yet, the full text for context https://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-srv/national/longterm/unab...

[daemoens]

I've never seen anybody cite the Unabomber before.

[orangepurple]

Ted's major major mistake was using violence and intimidation to raise awareness

[sph]

'James Q. Wilson, in a 1998 New York Times Op-Ed, wrote: "If it is the work of a madman, then the writings of many political philosophers—Jean Jacques Rousseau, Tom Paine, Karl Marx—are scarcely more sane.'

Thanks to this thread for introducing me to this manifesto. I have heard of it, but I didn't know it was a critique of our industrial world from a "madman" wishing to return to more primitivistic roots. As someone going through the same concerns, without the violence, this essay seems right down my alley.

[acapybara]

A good idea, associated with evil.

[boplicity]

> what drives billionaires to keep going

I don't think it's a mystery; if you want to do a good job, then you'll continue to want to do a good job, even if you're already succeeding at doing a good job.

[hydrok9]

A lot of people who make money love "making money" most of all. I come from a successful entrepreneurial family and it was the big difference between my parents and most of their peers, my parents did not care about money per se, it was just part of the business. But the other businesspeople they knew, they loved making money. Loved it.

[dazc]

'I really wonder if it was really all worth it.'

You concede your marriage suffered and suggest the impact on your health was negative, but both of these things could have happened if you were just surviving in a low paid regular job.

Don't be so hard on yourself and enjoy your success.

[endisneigh]

Though I agree with the sentiment of your post...

> You concede your marriage suffered and suggest the impact on your health was negative, but both of these things could have happened if you were just surviving in a low paid regular job.

This isn't really a good way of thinking. Where will it end? You might as well do anything, since any negative outcome isn't necessarily inclusive of the thing you did.

[qgin]

I think it's more useful for second guessing your past choices.

You're absolutely right that it's worth weighing the chances looking forwards because it can guide your future choices.

But when looking back and thinking "if only I'd done this or that differently, everything would have gone well," that's torturing yourself with a imaginary timeline that never happened and for which there is a non-zero chance could have been worse.

[matart]

While you shouldn’t torture yourself with past choices, you do need to recognize them so you can learn. They were a participant in the past it didn’t only just happen to them.

[pc86]

But they were already a programmer, so "low paid regular job" is extremely unlikely. Probably the "worst" they could have done was mid-level dev at a bank in the middle of nowhere making $65-80k/yr, which is certainly doable as half the household income to have a nice middle class life. The math changes in you're in a big city but the income does too.

It's easy to choose destroying your relationships and risking your health when the alternative is poverty. It's not so easy when the alternative is still making twice what the average American makes working in a cubicle at worst.

[komali2]

> But I have lost my marriage along the way, and I have definitely lost a few years of life expectancy.

> I really wonder if it was really all worth it.

Wait, are you saying you don't think you'd have lost the marriage if you didn't do the startup? Surely it wasn't worth it if so?

[marpstar]

A lost marriage isn't always for the worst.

[itsaquicknote]

And sometimes it is.

[throaway33355]

From throwaway to throwaway: Would you mind sharing some contact details, or reaching out to [e-mail]? Am in similar situation and would love to have a chance to reflect with someone who's been through it.

[saliagato]

“ I have definitely lost a few years of life expectancy “

Why? Genuinely curious. Stress can lower life expectancy?

[vaylian]

Not OP, but you have to keep in mind that your body is always trying to repair any damages that happen. Be it through actual accidents or molecular mishaps. Stress and other factors can cause the body to go into survival mode, where all resources are allocated to solving only the challenge directly ahead at the expense of repairs. And your body always needs repairs, because there is so much stuff going on at the molecular level that wears down the cells. Our bodies are pretty good at repairs but not perfect.

[reedf1]

I worked myself into the dirt for 2 years for a start-up that ended up failing. It felt like I aged 10 years. My hairline receded an inch - my hair started going grey - and I gained 15kg.

I'm undoing the damage now - but I can tell I've been physically aged by the process.

[FlyingSnake]

Our physiology is not built to work under sustained high stress and a constrained environment like fast moving startups can have long term health effects.

1: https://www.goodreads.com/book/show/18693771-the-body-keeps-...

[hmate9]

Stress + neglected diet and exercise definitely puts a strain on your body.

[s1mplicissimus]

if you doubt that, I recommend living under high stress conditions for a couple years and see for yourself

[conradfr]

What about living with no financial stress for the rest of your life, maybe it balances things out?

[digging]

Maybe, but not necessarily. It's all probabilities. A fatal heart attack in 2 years being X% more likely is one thing - actually having it happen and dying young from it is another thing entirely.

[NineStarPoint]

It definitely does, but even a decade of high stress vs not having to worry about money for the rest of your life could be a very fair stress trade.

[badpun]

I'm not so sure. Like of financial worries is also dangerous - it can make people uber-complacent and lazy coach surfers, which will weaken the person long-term. Similar to how lack of gravity in space leads to significant loss of muscle mass.