I don't think I deserve it more. I am totally fine if it doesn't lead anywhere, that's why I am considering it now more than ever given that I finally have enough savings to be effectively financially independent.

I just want a methodology to find a good idea/problem that I could be attempting to solve.

What was/were the issue/s if you don't mind me asking?

Only 30 years. You? Not mean to be as snarky, but this US all or nothing stuff is getting on my nerves just a bit. I came from a simple background, but in a country with free education, so I got a degree in uni, opened a company in high school, all without too much risk. Didn’t need to work myself to death, didn’t have much stress, didn’t need VCs and make more than most here who seem to be dying of stress, lack of proper healthcare, free education etc etc. My clients like I have no funding and that I have enough money yet want to keep working as I like it.

Does that still hold true if you could pull in $5,000/25,000/50,000 per month from running a business you don't love? I'd love to run a business I'm not particularly passionate about if it made me an extra $5,000/month.

HN's obsession/groupthink about "profit is pointless/evil unless you're changing the world and love your job" is scary.

There is a big difference between running a side hustle to make a little money on the side and running a side hustle with the objective to eventually found the next big thing startup.

The former is pretty doable in my experience. I have three friends that run small volume productions of different speciality physical goods in their basements. From what they told me independently most work is packaging and shipping; "Once the CNC runs, it runs...". One of my friends sells art. I rent out property and there is always some work to do but overall it is pretty much doable besides a regular day job, having a family and maintaining work/life balance. I'm sure there are a ton of other examples, the only caveat here is that all that I can think of need at least a little investment.

I feel like this is good advice to some people, but it also requires a business skill-set / interest, which is not everyone's cup of tea.

I offer you 3.5M to start a business, without needing a business model, why wouldn't you take it?

The real question is, how did they were able to raise 3.5M and why haven't they made sure that they had a strong business model.

What were the reasons (that you see), why you should not have started those businesses?

1. Was it worth it? I have moderate success, and I'm still making less than I would if employed.

2. Wouldn't it be faster if you did it with another idea/team? Pivots do some of that, but sometimes it's a structural problem.

Not to mention that many entrepreneurs try it when they're young and just plain don't have the experience necessary. Not sure what would be a good education on that, other than keep burning other people's money for 2-3-5 times.

I raise issue with this assertion.

> I’m the founder of Silktide and possibly the most unashamedly ambitious person you know.

And now you see why he has it. Like the post the other day said, an entrepreneur giving life advice is like someone telling you what numbers they picked to win the lottery.

My own experience in the past few years is that starting a company was a great way to make much less money per year compared to my old job while having lots more worry about taxes, health insurance, bookkeeping, etc. I lost out on a lot of extra money I would have been able to invest in that interim and worked 2-4x as hard as with my old job in science that had a wonderful reliable paycheck every month and no worries ever. Luckily this realization hit after three years and I start a new even cushier science job in two weeks.

Very true. The security but lack of independence that comes with being an employee, vs. the independence and risk of being an entrepreneur (plus the capital requirement).

And on the topic of weighing my options, it's not helped by the fact I'm 3 years into an economics degree, so my head is filled with cost-benefit analysis formulas and me applying it all to my own life (or maybe it's because finals are at hand).

> I wish you luck though and hope you can post some of your experiences here.

Thanks. I have been thinking of starting a blog, maybe it'll happen sometime soon. Just need something to write about (I may start a small-scale business this summer, could be fun).

He could be 10 times more expensive than you. Did you consider that?

Fair enough, I was actually assuming it was basically similar to my wife's pottery business. She has a retail location (studio space) but a good portion of her revenue comes from what would be the equivalent of wholesale sales. She does field trips and after school programs. The two compliment each other, and while you can survive with just a retail location (most of her industry does) ... the fact that all but two of the local pottery shops have shut down in the last three years suggests how difficult that is.

> As with any business you need to do your planning first, prepare for an extended period without profit, etc going in (and have capital investment of your own to make it work).

I'm pretty sure that is the gist of what I was trying to say. The original comment, and the general theme of comments like this, suggests that all you need is enough "balls" to just do it. I'd suggest that most people who actually start businesses to change careers do it because they don't know what they're in for. Anecdotally that seems to be the case from everything I've heard since I first started thinking about running a business. In that context I stand by my assertion that opening a business _simply because_ you're tired of your old career is foolhardy.

Hm. I'm not sure how to take that. I'm ok with you starting companies without having experience but to hire yourself out as a contractor without experience is a bad thing in my opinion. It does explain why I get to clean up the occasional mess of contractors that over-reach their abilities but that doesn't mean that you are doing anybody a favor with that. Maybe it is indeed luck that you succeeded and it really shouldn't depend on luck, it should depend on your expertise.

Since I'm also German, I would like offer a different reason. I frequently observe people on HN talking about their "side projects", where they build a simple app or website in their spare time, and people are willing to pay a dollar a month or so, which (when summed over maybe 1000 users) makes for a decent secondary income.

When I consider such a model for myself (just as exploratory thought because I don't have a nice side project idea ATM) it quickly devolves into a nightmare where I spend all my free time filling out tax report forms so that the Finanzamt can collect taxes on my maybe 100 euros per month.

Maybe that's a misconception and it's much easier to operate a side business as a one-man show, but that's the mental image in my head, and that's also the main reason why I would be quite reluctant to even consider just a side project.

This is my preferred method of doing business. I start a company with the intention of selling it to someone else in the end. I do this because it fits my personality the best -- once I have solved a technical problem, I lose interest in it and want to move on to the next thing.

However, there's a right way and a wrong way to do business with this sort of goal, and your comment here puts the finger on the difference:

> Build something to last and generate value for a long time.

This is an essential part of what I need to do in order to sell. It's not time to sell my company until the company is already profitable and set to work over the long term. That's where the real value proposition is for buyers -- I'm not selling a technology or piece of software, I'm selling an established business.

In my opinion, people who start businesses with the intent to dump them at the soonest opportunity are really just doing the same thing as people who make money flipping stocks. There's nothing wrong with that (it's just not for me), but it's a completely different sort of thing. It's money-spinning without the intention to build anything of lasting value.

Honestly, I don't think it's any harder now than it has been before (in my adult life, anyway). It's always been very hard. Same with running a business post-startup.

I’m not sure how to even begin evaluating opportunity cost.

I started a business, and had a successful exit, and I’m still considering the MBA for the next time. The reasons include: as an engineering founder I undervalued marketing dramatically and don’t know how to do it well, and I had a hard time speaking the language of investors. I want to add skills to my quiver that I found missing when I needed them.

How would you suggest thinking about opportunity cost, especially if you lack experience in one or both options? In order to make starting a business more valuable than school, I feel like you have to either be much luckier or know what you’re doing and execute perfectly, which is incredibly hard to do the first time. The things I spent time on as a first time founder are things I think I would have learned not to do in business school. It worked out for me only because I got lucky, but I did burn a few years and a lot of money. After having chosen to start a business instead of school, I feel like it might have been more efficient to go to school.

John - this is for sure not true. I've known a lot of business owners that work a straight 9-5 and have done VERY well. Not Facebook, but $300,000-$400,000 per year, that's top 1% earners.

I know a LOT of business owners that come in one day per week to check on how their team is doing.

This whole "24/7 work" is just a load of nonsense. Do some? Sure. But we all have a choice, and I know as an actual fact so many people that are successful do not do that. For a fact. And, I know people in the exact same industry, don't pretty much the exact same thing, that work 18 hours per day. Usually the one working 8 hours per day is wealthier, because generally, the person who works 8 hours per day is organized and prioritized, and the person working 18 hours a day is unorganized, doesn't know what they are doing, can't prioritize, etc.

So, John, it is just not true. I urge you, if you are starting to run your own business, not to fall for that false god of working 8 days a week, 48 hours per day. I don't care what Elon Musk or anyone else says.

So again, if I were you, I would say to work 9-5 and then when you are done, leave the business at your office, come home and do other things. It's ok, really.

Starting a business does NOT entail what you think it entails. Heck, even someone building a nuclear power plant, all the workers and CEO don't work 18 hours per day.

>This is very different from some sort of bland "do what you love" thing.

I don't think so. Do what you love is at the root of all of the whole work 18 hours a day thing.

>This is recognizing the human truth of what starting a business entails.

I know what starting a business entails. I've started many. A lot of what people say is just simply not true. I've read the same exact things as you have, about how one has to work 24/7 and live and breath it every day. No. I know this is not the case, I've seen it personally. Reality is what you make it. If you say reality is working 18 hours a day, that's what you're going to do. If you say it is 8 hours a day, that is what it will be. And both can succeed, have succeeded. I've seen it, in person.