
Ask HN: What will you do when you're 40 and still unsuccessful? - bodegajed
It was my second visit to the doctor this year due to stress-related illness (skin allergy before now ulcer)<p>I turned 31 this year and I have been thinking what will I do when I turn 40 and my business is still nowhere? What would I do when my body is not capable of the intense working hours of a startup?<p>I'll just probably go on trying but not at this rate anymore. I have been working 12hrs/day for the past 4 years. When I'm 40 i'll just probably work for 5hrs/day. 
What would be yours?
======
Vivtek
Speaking as a 45-year-old - your body will be just as capable 15 years from
now. But I would hope that over the course of those 15 years you'd learn that
if you've been working 12 hours a day for four years and haven't gotten done
what you want to do, you're doing it wrong. (Sorry if that sounds too harsh.)
At the risk of going cliché, sometimes you really do have to work smarter, not
harder. Analyze what those 12 hours are, and eliminate or delegate whatever
you can. And get some sleep.

Now excuse me, I have about 15 hours of work ahead of me today, so do as I
say, not as I do.

------
patio11
How about you try doing just the most important 11 hours and letting the last
one slide? Repeat until your life is livable.

Take it from a Japanese salaryman: overwork is a disease, akin to alcoholism
in its destructive potential, and people extolling it do not have your best
interests at heart.

~~~
bodegajed
I know the consequences. It's just that I don't want to get old without
knowing the limits of my potential.

~~~
mechanical_fish
I'm reminded of the old Calvin and Hobbes cartoon in which Calvin asks his dad
how they decide what number to put on those "Weight Limit" signs on bridges.

His dad tells him that they drive heavier and heavier trucks across each
bridge until it falls down. Then they weigh the last truck and rebuild the
bridge.

Perhaps you, unlike these imaginary bridge engineers, should settle for a
well-informed _estimate_ of the limits of your potential, with a generous
margin of safety. It sounds like your health is giving you a lot of hints
about where the margin of safety might lie.

~~~
QuantumGood
I'm definitely going to quote you on that :-)

------
justanother
You're about the age I was when I broke-down (physically and mentally) from
working the same way. I moved to an island and bought a boat (on credit. I
never did get rich). Now I work about 4-6 hours per day on contracts that only
barely pay the bills, and spend the rest of the time sailing and fishing with
my new family. I'm having the time of my life and producing better work than
ever. "The limits of my potential" doesn't always mean what you think it does.

~~~
paisible
Can't tell you how good it made me feel to read this comment.

~~~
marvin
I'm glad OP posted this. I'm actually a bit surprised this sentiment hasn't
been expressed more often, but I guess it's part of the bubble a lot of Valley
entrepeneurs live in. I am just a 25-year old guy working as a regular
employee in a small consulting company with flexible hours and freedom to take
unpaid leave pretty much whenever I feel like it, but I have some pretty
strong opinions on parts of the startup culture.

To be frank, it seems like a lot of startup employees suffer from OCD
(literally). Working really long hours and improving the product, changing the
world etc. is what it's always about. Lots of people seem to lose sight of the
ultimate goal in life, which is being happy. Or maybe they didn't have a goal
in the first place, and working really hard is a substitute for something else
which is missing in their lives.

Unhealthily hard work is a good idea _for a period of time_, if it _seems as
if it's working_, as a means to an end: Making a lot of money in a few years
instead of throughout a lifetime, creating something of your own and leaving
your mark on the world, reaching your true potential, etc. But if you're
working 12 hours a day for _years_ with nothing to show for it, you are on the
wrong track and should take a step back.

I realized this after experiencing burnout at 19, spending two years where I
was capable of doing absolutely nothing traditionlly productive. Therefore,
it's really surprising to me that a lot of supposedly older and wiser do this
rat race for years, losing sight of the goal along the way.

Pushing really hard to achieve something great is a huge risk to your mental
well-being, and this is something you should go into with both eyes open. It's
better to make a tactical retreat if things seem too hard.

You can be perfectly happy not being a Steve Jobs. In fact, if it doesn't come
naturally, you're almost guaranteed to be happier by being a little easier on
yourself.

~~~
jyrkesh
> I realized this after experiencing burnout at 19, spending two years where I
> was capable of doing absolutely nothing traditionlly productive. Therefore,
> it's really surprising to me that a lot of supposedly older and wiser do
> this rat race for years, losing sight of the goal along the way.

This hit especially close to home for me. I'm 19 years old, in my second year
of university, and looking to get into the industry within the next couple
years. Even just finishing high school I was left with this emptiness: I had
worked my ass off doing all kinds of crazy stuff--academic and otherwise--to
get into a college of my choice, often getting 4 or 5 hours of sleep a night
for weeks on end, only to start the whole thing over again right after I
graduated.

I still work my ass off, deprive myself of sleep, overwork, etc, but I
definitely see it all in the same context as you. It's short-term craziness
for a benefit I want to see slightly down the road. And if it doesn't work
out, I'm not going to force it. If you're not where you wanted to be at 35 by
the time you're 40, maybe your plan wasn't the right one for you.

So yes, thank you for reminding me the point of all of this.

------
gizmo
From the outside the answer is really obvious: if you're working for 12 hours
a day and it isn't working then you're clearly working on the wrong things.
Business is 90% about knowing what is important and what is a waste of your
time. When you're working 12 hour days and your business isn't becoming
insanely successful it's pretty obvious that most of the hours you work are
wasted. Hours burned and sacrificed with nothing to show for it.

If you've been working on unsuccessful startups it's easy to get into a sort
of rhythm where you keep doing the same things that didn't work in the past,
but only with more vigor. It's complete and utter madness to try to brute-
force your way to success. It _can_ work, of course, but the odds are stacked
against you, and as a business person you should only play when the odds are
highly in your favor.

My guess is that you've probably lost a bit of perspective if you've been
punishing yourself like this for the past 4 years. Stop punishing yourself.
You don't get rewarded for punishing yourself, and you shouldn't feel good
(reward yourself) for working harder than is sustainable or harm your (mental)
health. Reward yourself when you make good decisions, and punish yourself (if
you have to) if you waste time on shit that doesn't matter. Because working on
the wrong things will kill your startup, working 8 hour days does not.

------
philco
Just focus on doing what you love. I'm a FIRM believer in the notion that
working on things you love will help you achieve greater success. If you're
not waking up everyday excited to go to work...you need to switch careers.

If that notion scares you, frame it this way: 30 is young, you have 30 years
to go before you even think of retirement! You have 3x more time ahead of you
than you've worked to date...if you formed a career in the past 10 years, you
could create 3 more careers before you're 60! (or one really really amazing
one if you focus on what you love doing)

Doing what you love gives you the energy to work harder than your peers. Get
up, switch into something that isn't killing you slowly.

------
helen842000
I know first hand how internalising stress can and will do damage to your
immune system & general health.

For me it was money issues after graduating Uni. To be honest I didn't even
know I was "stressed" but my health told me other wise. I had 3 years of
serious illnesses that most people my age (early 20's) would never have had
(pneumonia, severe tonsilitis, kidney issues) especially after having a
relatively illness free child-hood.

The only thing that helped me to feel like I was making progress (and
healthier long term) was working on fixing the problem at the root. Trying to
step away from the frantic scrabbling around & viewing the problem from above.

When you're frantic over a situation you don't just stop being stressed as
soon as you leave work. You may have been working 12 hour days but your body
remains stressed out for all of it, even during sleep. Perhaps your body has
had zero down-time over the last 4 years!

I think you would benefit from some analysis of your working day. What ARE you
working so hard on? Where are the bottlenecks. What can you delegate or
eliminate?

Spend a few days/weeks working ON your business (streamlining) instead of IN
it.

Aim to achieve more with less.

Maybe you could even use the HN community to improve some aspect for you!

------
blender
Have you heard the proverb?:

If I had 8 hours to cut down a tree, I would spend 6 hours sharpening my axe.

Cheers from a 43 year old that is still "unsuccessful".

------
chris_dcosta
I'm more than forty. I have a young family they get me up at 6:30, and I work
full time, come home, do family stuff and then do another 4 hours on my
project until later than 1 am almost every night.

The thing that keeps me going is actually not stressing about being
successful. I've had plenty of good ideas turn up developed by other people
(not connected in any way) and just said, "OK, they did good, move on".

No single business is so precious, that you have to die trying. For me the
most important is to make sure that you can fight another day, because your
_next_ task might just be the one...

------
tristan_louis
First, I would say take a break and get a little perspective.

What is the cause of your stress? Is it the work? Is it the lack of traction
for your product or company? Is it cash flow? Is it physical exhaustion?

Assess the source of that stress and start figuring out why it stresses you
out. Then do something about fixing the "being stressed out" part by changing
your perspective on the problem.

Second, realize that number of hours work is not necessarily the best
approach. Figure out if you are spending the time efficiently. Figure out what
could be done by someone else. Compute the cost of doing some of those other
tasks and if the task is non-essential to your business and the cost of the
task is higher than what you would pay yourself on an hourly basis, then
outsource the sucker.

Third, remember that YOU ARE NOT THE PRODUCT. The product is the product and
it may need fixing but it's not you, as a person. Get that perspective and
start looking at it as something that you put in customer hands, not something
that you are. This should greatly alleviate the stress.

Now go on to 40 (and beyond) with those concepts in mind. It took me until a
second stay in the hospital at age 39 to realize that I was doing it wrong. I
had burned myself out a few times (12 hours? pfft... try 18!) and after a
near-death experience, realized that I could do a better job by refocusing. My
new company, as a result, is moving along nicely and I believe it will succeed
but I also realize there will be bumps in the road along the way and those are
part of the natural course of things when growing a business.

------
moffatbrian
There's a great article in the October 17th, 2011, issue of Fortune entitled
"Collins on Chaos" that is an excerpt of the book "Great by Choice". It seems
quite relevant to this discussion.

The authors compare the leadership at companies that consistently outperformed
their competitors during good times and bad, with the leadership at the
nominally-performing companies.

The outperforming leaders set a benchmark defining "consistent progress", e.g.
profitable every year (Southwest Airlines), 20% growth per year (Stryker),
etc. They then fought to achieve that benchmark even during the toughest years
(perhaps obvious), but they also restrained themselves so as to not exceed (by
much) their benchmark during the "boom" years. Even though it might seem
counter-intuitive, these "restrained" companies performed better over the long
run than those companies which grew quickly during the good times.

The point is perhaps that you might achieve more by both committing to, and
limiting yourself to, some more reasonable number of hours per week.

------
adaptives
From someone who has actually been there and is getting close to 40, first
define what success means to you.

I too burned myself out around when I was 30, got ulcers and Chrohns disease
(still have it but it's manageable now), and kept on see-sawing between
falling ill and working like crazy.

My experience is that too much stress makes the body susceptible to many ills,
and is just not worth it.

What does success mean to you?

\- Is is accumulation of wealth ? \- Is it a social projection (people
perceiving you as successful) ? \- Is it the satisfaction of having lived a
positive, constructive and happy life ?

I cannot say for everyone, but I feel that wealth is important to a certain
extent, but beyond a threshold it does not matter a whole lot. Same goes for
social projection, but to an even lesser degree. On the other hand if you
figure out what truly makes you happy, and what gifts you have, which you can
use to lead a positive and constructive life, then success and happiness is in
the fact that you are doing what you really want to do.

Just my 2 cents...

------
LarryMade
Many a career has been started by folks well into their 50s and 60s... what
you may lack in energy and agility then is made up by experience, insight, and
skill. Try never thinking you have done the greatest thing you will ever do,
that just cuts your opportunities short.

------
JanezStupar
Dietrich Mateschitz (Red Bull Founder) has been age 39 and washed up when he
started out on a venture that would become RB.

I guess he might feel all kind of issues when he was 45. But I guess he was
too busy to rally think how he didn't accomplish anything.

~~~
gujk
Without any Red Bull at the time, where did he find the energy to create Red
Bull?

------
kylemaxwell
Maybe you're not defining "success" the right way. It's not just about the
money.

~~~
ed209
Exactly. Barry Schwartz has taught us that the secret to happiness is low
expectations :)

~~~
ed209
It might sound like a joke but it's a serious point. Please watch the TED talk
for more information
[http://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_on_the_paradox_of_ch...](http://www.ted.com/talks/barry_schwartz_on_the_paradox_of_choice.html)

------
ryandvm
Try to imagine what you're going to be thinking on your deathbed some day. If
it's "I wish I had put in more 12 hour days", then keep it up. Otherwise,
figure out what actually makes you happy - and do it.

------
delwin
When I am 40, if I'm in no good spot to be running a business, my plan is
simple:

Immigrate to Nicaragua, grow vegetables and herbs, and start a bakery. Live on
American tourists' dollars and spend the rest of my life surrounded by happy
people.

Of course, most people aren't so ready to pick up and leave. In that case,
find something you love. If you truly love running a startup — REALLY — you'll
get somewhere. Make sure it's your passion above everything else before
declaring the limits of your potential, though.

------
jt11508
"Do what you love and you'll never work a day in your life" or so they say. As
a mid-40's veteran of multiple startups, I say do what you have a passion to
do. If that's fishing, live to fish and do what you want to support that
passion. If it's whatever you're working on, then you're good.

In your case, perhaps your drive and your passion are not aligned at this
time. Once that's fixed, life becomes much better.

------
vital101
I've wanted more than anything to get a business going, live the startup life,
and be my own boss. But I try to put it all in to perspective: I work to live,
not live to work. For me, success is being able to provide for my family and
enjoy the work that I do. YMMV.

~~~
gbeeson
Very well put and at the 'wrong' side of 40 years of age, your statement
describes were I am at as well. I had not defined that for me as of yet and
you just sped that process up. For that, I thank you.

------
danpat
Note that most ulcers are caused by a bacterial infection, not stress (read up
on the 2005 Nobel prize for medicine:
<http://www.wsws.org/articles/2006/mar2006/nobe-m06.shtml>)

Edit: the point I was going for was not to blame stress on everything, which
itself can be stressful. Sometimes, finding a simple cause to an otherwise
stressful problem can lead to big reductions in stress levels (and thus, the
other symptoms others have pointed out). The _most likely_ cause of an ulcer
is a bacterial infection, not the _only_ cause.

~~~
gte910h
Stress increases cortisol levels which increases infections (when elevated for
long periods of time).

"Chronic subtle hypercortisolism" is one term for the bevy of effects longterm
stress can cause.,

------
sirwitti
maybe the 4hour work week (tim ferris) is the right thing for you. (i'm not
related to him, nor get provisions :)

working harder and longer does not necessarily make you achieve more. try to
stop investing time in actions that make you very little money or have very
little benefits for you. focus on the top customers.

maybe you can start by evaluating what consumes so much of your time.

hope that helps a bit, martin

------
tonetheman
"You pick up your GD leg and keep running..." that is what you do. (reference
to a great ted video with Aimee Mullins)

------
diminium
Two words "Colonel Sanders". Look him up if the name doesn't get to you. See
when he figured out success.

~~~
Mz
Not bad: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Colonel_Sanders>

Also makes me think of: <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Grandma_Moses>

------
Maven911
How can stress induce a skin allergy?

~~~
AndrewDucker
Stress increases cortisol levels. Cortisol levels influence immune response.
Allergies are an immune response.

~~~
Maven911
Thanks for the response - also to the other commentors, it`s not like I have
not heard that stress induces other problems-diseases, it is just that it is
something that I find very hard to prove that an illness can be directly
attributed to stress, considering that many of us have stress in our daily
lives.

~~~
AndrewDucker
That usually requires a bit of experience - if your allergies go away when you
take a few days off work then they're either stress related or there's
something in your office that triggers them...

------
gte910h
Why not work 5/day now?

I find I do more in 3 30 hour weeks than I do in 3 60 hour weeks.

------
blackiron
success is doing what you love, unless its partying in ibiza with the most
expensive sluts, you can be succesful right now.

~~~
gujk
Prostitutes are expensive. Sluts are free spirited.

------
maximusprime
Find something you enjoy doing (love), and do it. Take a step back and asses -
Do you really really love working 12 hours a day? If not, then stop doing it.

If you're working 12 hours a day in the hope that some day it'll all pay off
and you'll _then_ be able to do things you love, then that's utter bullshit
and you're probably deluding yourself.

Find things you love doing, and do them. Now.

