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.

[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.

[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.

[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.

[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.

[jamielee]

Ask for a leave of absence?