This is an extremely valuable point that that I think most entrepreneurs don't appreciate enough. If you think about any large project you know - say a busines

This is an extremely valuable point that that I think most entrepreneurs don't appreciate enough. If you think about any large project you know - say a business - they are highly networked systems. They have partnerships and vendors and customers and employees and investors and external deadlines and internal deadlines. In other words, they become deeply embedded in a "fabric" of connections. Once you become part of the ecosystem - and people rely on you - it becomes harder to just quit. I have always thought that if you want to build a business, build a network (and not just one of people). Integrate with as many entities as possible. Have them share a vested interested in your success; have them depend on you and vice versa. The more you dig into the system, the harder you are to get out. This prevents startups from dying. The idea here is to create a complex adaptive system - it adapts no matter what you throw at it. These are established by creating a highly networked systems (ie. creating relationships) with other adaptive entities who are aligned with your goals. The more of these you create, the harder it will be to get rid of you (this is true even if your startup is not particularly good). Again, the goal here is to become embedded in the network. I've written about this topic (more abstractly) here: https://alexpetralia.github.io/2018/06/11/NL-2018-06-11.html https://alexpetralia.github.io/2018/06/11/NL-2018-06-11.html