I feel like I'm almost reading my own writing here. I have very similar experiences. > Its an aspect of startups people rarely talk about or warn you about. I

I feel like I'm almost reading my own writing here. I have very similar experiences. > Its an aspect of startups people rarely talk about or warn you about. I agree, and it should be talked about more. The same is true for other high performance jobs (e.g. investment banking or consulting), where high performance means working a lot of hours. I also think Ycombinator could improve on this as I remember Sam Altman saying during a Startup School lecture (paraphrased): if you get a burnout, fix it. I felt like he implied to just make it work somehow, it doesn't matter how. In fairness, most of these people aren't mental health professionals and somehow had to deal with these things themselves as well and they are simply sharing their views on how they dealt with it. What I wonder is if they reflect on the idea that some people that this as advice and moreover take it to heart. Taking a personal strategy of someone else to heart seems quite dangerous to me.