Instead of watching TV or playing Grand Theft Auto, work on your idea. Instead of going to bed at 10, go to bed at 11. We’re not talking about all-nighters or 16 hour days – we’re talking about squeezing out a few extra hours a week.
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37signals advocating doing your startup on the side, to which I respectfully disagree vehemently. If you love your idea enough, make a damn commitment. Ideas are hard to grow, and if you’ve got an out you are likely to take it. Commitment breeds success, or as paul graham put it, “The startup may have more long-term potential, but you’ll always interrupt working on it to answer calls from people paying you now.” As Paul points out, committing also causes a lot of other good behavior - like getting “ramen profitable” as quicly as possible.
There are certain, very rare individuals, who seem to be able to be parallel entrepreneurs but I am not one of them. Whether the idea was mine or I’m on board with someone else’s idea, I am not smart enough to have figured out a way to be totally committed to more than one thing at a time. And I’m not willing to work on something that I’m not fully committed to.
For me the idea is very simple. Life is short, don’t work on anything if you don’t believe in the vision. And, if you believe in the vision, don’t compromise that vision by cheating on it with other ideas.
