Work harder on yourself than you do on your startup

http://joel.is/post/22893893905/work-harder-on-yourself-than-you-do-on-your-startup

by joelg87 • 14 years ago

80 16 14 years ago

benfwirtz• 14 years ago

Funnily enough, I listened to Jeff Atkwood from Stack Overflow yesterday who made the same point implicitly - he and Joel Spolsky had a big community around themselves when they created Stack Overflow and got the initial traction that way.

So that's +2 then ;)

candre717• 14 years ago

+1 for exercising.

I've lost 20lbs, and I have never felt more effective.

tomjen3• 14 years ago

Is that because you lost the weight, or because you exercise or (guessing here) because you eat better though?

ams6110• 14 years ago

Anecdotes can be motivational, but they don't mean a whole lot. I've lost over 50 lbs in the past year and a half or so, and I really don't feel any different most of the time. I do have more endurance for things like running, but I don't enjoy exercise so I do it rarely.

aaronasterling2• 14 years ago

Much of the psychological benefit of exercise comes from increased testosterone. This happens by stimulating muscles. Try to develop a regular routine for things likes squats and pullups and see if that doesn't make you feel better.

rmATinnovafy• 14 years ago

Me too. I've lost about a hundred, and now do running events.

My life has improved by a lot. Stress is now mostly gone and manageable. I'm way confident, and feel relaxed. This mostly due to the exercise, but it is just amazing. My skills (in everything) have just sky-rocketed. Where it would take me months to code anything, now I can just do it in days. It is really amazing.

hammock• 14 years ago

All these anecdotes about people losing weight as a good way to improve your life- sort of assume everyone has weight to lose. What if you are healthy and athletic already? Do we miss out on the benefits of "feeling great about myself after losing 20, 50, 100 pounds"?

tommoor• 14 years ago

I guess there are other ways to improve ones self other than exercising :-)

I'm currently learning a second language, it's very rewarding!

pron2• 14 years ago

Self-improvement makes me sick.

jamii• 14 years ago

Maybe you should work on that.

dilap• 14 years ago

Why? Do you mean the striving, self-indulgent attitude self-improvers often have?

pron2• 14 years ago

That, too. But mostly it's making life so goal oriented. I guess it's an American thing.

aaronasterling2• 14 years ago

I would recommend some kind of "zen" type of meditation as well. It doesn't have to be the religious type (i.e. the lowercase Z suffices) but learning to stop thinking and accept the present moment for what it is without preconcieved notions can be incredibly useful for spotting assumptions when one is thinking and, consequently, for improving the quality of ones thoughts. It also helps with planning for the future and analyzing the past. Bad assumptions seem to be at the root of most stupidity and zen style meditation is excellent for learning to cope with them.

zavulon• 14 years ago

Off-topic, but please fix the social button behavior on the iPad. The stay glued to the top and obscure the text, making it difficult to read

joelg87• 14 years ago

Will get onto that, cheers! I reward myself for publishing a blog post by allowing myself to play with my Tumblr theme and these kinds of aspects (I'm more comfortable with code than writing). Thanks for the nudge!

speedmax• 14 years ago

I have been talking about the importance of exercise with joel. You need to be able to operate at peak both mentally and physically if you want to have serious result in your startup.

Work harder on yourself than you do on your startup

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