I've had several opportunities to found/join very early stage startups. I've taken three of them, including a weird hybrid nonprofit startup. * The nonprofit w

I've had several opportunities to found/join very early stage startups. I've taken three of them, including a weird hybrid nonprofit startup. * The nonprofit was a nice experience but burnt me out more than once. At some point, you need to have some time off. Being in an early stage startup discourages you from ever taking a break. Being in a nonprofit discourages you from ever taking a break. Being in both... well, eventually, I had to leave to preserve my sanity. * One startup turned out to largely be a con against VCs and one of the founders pulled the rug, vanishing on his cofounder and all the employees. Needless to say... that was a disappointment. * The last one burnt me out pretty deeply. 15 years later, I still can't use the technology stack we were using at the time, despite the fact that I was one of the most notable names in that community. Since then, I've said no to such offers. That is, I'm happy to join a startup, but I will not be a very early employee. I will keep myself in a position where I can afford to take a break if I feel a burnout coming, something I could not do as a cofounder. So yeah, I very much understand why not everybody creates a startup. That and the fact that once you have created the startup, you need to work on so many things that are not what you wanted to do in the first place, from gathering fundings to paying taxes to securing parking spaces for your employees. YMMV