My 2 cents. I'm 35, and I've been coding since I was 7. Straight out of college I got a nice job as a team lead, in a year a VP, in another 2 years a CTO in 300

My 2 cents. I'm 35, and I've been coding since I was 7. Straight out of college I got a nice job as a team lead, in a year a VP, in another 2 years a CTO in 300+ fast growing SME. I quit, moved to another country, and founded my own e-commerce company, in 3 years we hit $10mm in revenue. It felt great, the world was my oyster. Then a financial crisis hit, my partners duped me and sold the business, I was left out with barely enough money to survive (and learned to value a properly drafted shareholders' agreement). I got divorced, my life was in shambles. No savings, no friends. But... it gave me some perspective on what do I want to do next. I decided that my next business will bring a real tangible difference to peoples' lives. I founded another company, burned through what was left of my savings, but it was a failure - some new regulations came out and made the business practically impossible. We pivoted, another failure (late to market). We pivoted again, basically running on fumes, and another failure (no market fit, was so obvious looking back). We pivoted again, and this time we've just launched and people love it. I'm very optimistic and hope to raise a bit of capital soon to move forward. All in all, I don't have any money, but I wouldn't change anything in my life. It was a great ride, and I enjoyed it. Every failure was a precious learning opportunity. A company called Rovio made 50 games. You know any of them? They were all failures. They decided to go all-in and made a 51st game, named Angry Birds. Grit and perseverance — the most important qualities of a founder.