9-5 by day, startup by night. How do you cope?

[pumpkinattwelve]

Here I am working on a startup at nights and am close to launch but my day job is eating most of my time and energy. The feeling as it is so close to release is butterflies and excitement but then remember the day job and then it hits me; feelings of stomach churn as I can only dream of how cool it would be if I could work on it full time.

I don't believe that I am the first founder to experience this so I am asking HNers: how do you cope with the emotions at this level of the game?

[2D]

I feel your pain, although here in Asia many work 9-830 and then somehow on the weekend try and do stuff that matters. My experience is that it's good pressure as it forces you early on to be judicious with your time and only do what really needs doing NOW and with some kind of order. It also prepares you slowly for the discipline and loneliness of being a full-time entrepreneur. So try and be positive as sounds like you have reason to be! Lets face it when you grow up its harder to find butterflies:)

[pumpkinattwelve]

9-8:30? that's tough. I guess I shouldn't be complaining.

I can relate to forcing focus on time management. I've got little for everything else but I'm only focused on the long term so I know there is light at the end of the tunnel.

You are completely right. These days and with my hormones completely abnormal, butterflies and raw emotion are non-existent. I almost feel robotic.

[atmosx]

I've been in China, they really work lots of hours but don't have western world work-intensity and stress. That's at least what I've seen in a couple of factories and commercial centers.

[2D]

Yes we love facetime (solidarity or something). Personally don't get it. Think our poll on HK a while back proved that few of us are really effective more than 5 hrs a day. That said in China we have to be in the office which means you can't work on your own thing without feeling compromised, so weekends it is.

[pumpkinattwelve]

Does the work ethic and intensity follow the western world in the technical fields like startups? Or are long hours and cheap labor only for factories?

[nicholas73]

Even migrant factory workers are well paid compared to what they would make at home in the interior. They would actually complain if you cut hours because they would earn less (assuming no other company does the same and let wages go up).

Not to make light of their situation, but I imagine it wouldn't be so unbearable if one worked at Google and is highly compensated, and still had to work on their start up on the side. The crux of the problem is dissatisfaction of the day job, not the amount of work hours.

Generally migrant workers know that they can save money and live better, relatively. Whereas in a dead end day job you know your situation doesn't improve, even if it is in absolute terms better than a migrant's life.

We're made to look forward to something better.

[2D]

Can only speak for my own experience. Everyone works long hours but this is the default culture and people are happy to.

Unless you have a startup in which case it makes the balance difficult. We have offices in 40 countries and measured that China/HK work the longest. (Well over the 10k sample size to make it relevant and excluding factory workers.)

[exelib]

Full time job and start-up project works fine together for me. Things become more complicated since I have a family and studying computer science. I don't touched my project for one month and can't do it for at least one or two next months because of a seminar. I hope, I release my project at decembre-january. Emotions? I don't have time for emotions :D

[mkal_tsr]

I was at this point until I quit my job to go all-in on my start-up. My management technique was pretty much to remind myself that if this fails, I have a full-time job to fall back to. Remember, you may be splitting your time and energy between 2 jobs, but that's also 1 more job that you don't have to worry about failing (for the purposes of financial security). The further you get now, the less distance you'd need to worry about if you wanted to do this full-time. Try to balance the urge to do this full-time with the "safety net" of your full-time job and focus on your health and enjoyment more than the company (you can decide to f-over your health later, but while you're still salaried at another job, there's no reason to).

Above all, enjoy the experience, have fun, and learn about yourself and others. Good luck and keep asking question when you have them, just one easy way to learn more than you knew before!

[pumpkinattwelve]

I am totally enjoying it as the light at the end of the tunnel is almost there and have learned a bunch. But I'm not yet ready to pull the cord and go full time until it has replaced my current income and then some.

[read]

> until it has replaced my current income

The metric to watch isn't how secure it makes you feel. It's growth. A startup is a company designed to grow.

One advantage a full time job offers is you can afford to take the risk of building something daring that takes more time to identify. A funded startup pressured for growth might otherwise miss this part.

The constraint of having little free time makes you work only on what's important. Which incidentally is how some of the best skunkworks projects produced results. Constraint is an advantage in creativity.

As for coping with the emotions, launch sooner rather than later so you know how far off you are from something useful. One of the worst emotions is launching late and realizing you could have stayed in a mode of building without feedback nearly infinitely. The launch is good training for the emotions because you'll realize how unreliable they can be in the absence of data. And always have at least one active user.

And exercise, and grow disciplined with sleep, preferably starting the day hacking because not only does it awake your mind but you give more of the benefit of new ideas to your startup rather than the day job.

[pumpkinattwelve]

Unfortunately I can't pay the mortgage based on revenue projections :)

I have noticed that by being constrained on my time that I have not touched frivolous features. The core product is quiet lean but is working great so far as an MVP.

Thanks for the great comments.

[read]

You can pay it based on revenue: launch and get users.

The fear of putting something out in the world isn't only an inevitable part of creation but also a necessary one.

http://blog.redbubble.com/2014/04/daily-inspiration-agnes-ma...

http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2014/03/31/agnes-mart...

[aviral]

If you can take Some Risk: Take admission in college, quit the job and work on your startup.

If not: The only key word is "Determination","Where there's a will, there's a way"

Still I have some tips for you:

1) Increase your physical activities(Imp), go to job and in night work on startup.

2) "Time is money", Move near to your work place.. etc

3) Live with your co-founders (or Girlfriend or Love ones)

4) Keep some spare time to meet your loved one, it keeps you motivated.

5) Focus on correct things, 80-20 Rule. 20% Task get your 80% work done.

6) Work with a velocity that you can control. One should know his/her limits.

7) There are points in time where things don't seem to be going well, in such times its only you who can help yourself. Be determined

:) Cheers & Best of Luck !!!Eat good Food :)

[pumpkinattwelve]

College is probably the wrong place for me right now. But apart from that your advice is very much welcomed and appreciated. Unfortunately loved ones and physical activities have had little attention lately. I'll keep myself in check here.

[Cerridwen]

Suggestion 1: try to steal time from your day job to work on your dream.

Suggestion 2: be creative and think of alternative ways of financing your startup work that are less demanding of your time. For example, find a job that pays better so you can save more for later when you want to start your enterprise.

[pumpkinattwelve]

1) I'm not even going to entertain that one. I'm doing this the right way.

2) That's a good point. I have considered looking at the funding route but with being so close to launch it feels like I'm wasting equity when all I need to do is just temporarily put aside these emotions and keep on trucking.

[collyw]

For point 1) I don't think they necessarily have to be mutually exclusive. If there is a new tech that would be useful to learn for both work and side project, then try to get a chance to learn it on work time.

[staunch]

#18 http://paulgraham.com/startupmistakes.html

"Statistically, if you want to avoid failure, it would seem like the most important thing is to quit your day job. Most founders of failed startups don't quit their day jobs, and most founders of successful ones do. If startup failure were a disease, the CDC would be issuing bulletins warning people to avoid day jobs."

[digita88]

I was in a similar situation some years back, I ended up burning out big time and completely pivoted my whole career outlook. It ended up turning out for the better and now diving back into a similar game but with some lessons learned. Only advice is to tread cautiously, you don't want to be completely burned out.

[kinj28]

I feel you are probably not giving your 100% to any. If you believe in your idea, dream...live it thoroughly.

[pumpkinattwelve]

Unfortunately I can't pay the mortgage by hopes and dreams.

[shopinterest]

Coffee is your friend. Lack of sleep is probably messing with your emotional status (too high, too low). Besides, you are doing it right. Don't jump off the plane until you finish the Parachute. Good luck and let HN now when your baby is ready to be ripped apart in pieces here.

[pumpkinattwelve]

Trust me. Coffee is my best friend but I do know that my body has completely undergone hormonal swings. Even my partner says that my lack of sleep and increase in coffee and Red Bull has changed me.

[atmosx]

IMHO sleep + physical exercise can get you way further: Will make you work smarter, healthier and better thinker.

I'd say try to adjust your schedule to allow (at least) 7 hour good quality sleep[1] and at least 45-75 minutes of exercise daily.

You'll have 15:30 hours free :-)

[1] Getting a good sleep involves a good bed, freshly oxygenated room, right temperature, no room, no iphones/ipads/e-devices, no video-games, no-movies etc.

[pumpkinattwelve]

I meditate for about 30 minutes each night before sleeping and it does make up in multiples in lack of sleep. Without any scientific evidence but at least I feel more rested the next day.

7 hours of sleep with a full time job, a startup, kids and exercise? Is this even possible! One great life-hack we have is to sleep with the windows open and with thinner sheets. We both feel more refreshed the next day. And apart from the alarm clock, there are no devices :)

[atmosx]

Sorry mate, I didn't take "kids" into account :-)

Whatever works for you!!! Meditation it is!!! (will try also!).

[thenomad]

From experience, I'd say that good quality exercise is almost always a net time-gain over no exercise. The increased energy pays itself back.

Have you looked into High Intensity Training? That allows you to pack solid, proven exercise techniques into very short spaces of time.

[kinj28]

i did this 8 years ago. for us it went a bit beyond. 9-5 by day & startup otherwise (including weekends). It definitely gets very tiring & exhaustive.

Some of the things we practiced were: a. keep aggressive but realistic goals for every week. b. utilize weekends to achieve 70% of the goals c. in our 9-5 day, we had atleast an hour or two of opportunity where we could have done some additional work to meet our weekly goals. for eg - talking to freelancers & reviewing their work just after lunch, talking to prospective clients during some coffee breaks, etc. d. do give yourself a couple of lighter days to relax & look forward to the thrill of your excitement.

Cheers buddy & good luck.

[d0m]

I'm surprised nobody suggested to raise money. You can then pay yourself a good salary AND work on your startup.

A MVP with some traction and a solid business model is all you need.

[CmonDev]

It is basically borrowing your health while you are in your twenties in a hope to win big when you will be in your thirties. There is no magic trick to get around this.

[pumpkinattwelve]

Twenties? Try mid thirties :)

I am glad that I waited to work on a startup now because my knowledge and experience have given me confidence that I can pull it off. Earlier on in life and I would have been running on pure hubris.

[pl3as3]

Single or do you also have family obligations?

[pumpkinattwelve]

Partner and three children. Life isn't quite balanced right now but my partner and I agree that my startup is the right thing to do at this stage in our lives. The unbalanced lifestyle is hopefully only temporary.

[dirktheman]

A word of warning here. When I grew up my parents weren't around much because of their business. They did allright businesswise, but my brother and I grew up very independent. Not neccessarily a bad thing, but we don't have a strong bond. This is something I didn't realize until I met my wife, and her amazing family.

What I'm trying to say is: if you don't make sure your work/life balance is balanced right now, it probably won't be balanced in the future. And it probably will leave a mark on the bond between you, your spouse and your children. Realize that you can never get back the time watching your children grow up.

We're in the same situation. I'm also in my mid-30's, two kids, a job and a mortgage. I spend my commuting time on my startup, and all the time I can get when everyone's asleep. It was hard at first, but now I have developed a routine that works for me. I may not be able to work as many hours on my startup as someone with less obligations, but the hours I do have I spend incredibly productive and efficient. I love working on my startup, but until it makes enough money for me to quit my job, it's family first, startup second.

[pumpkinattwelve]

Damn this one hit hard. I am giving myself another month to get it out of the gates then I'll regroup and give my family a big "forgive me" hug. Thanks for reminding me of this.

[jamielee]

Ask for a leave of absence?