Most Important Lifestyle Habits Of Successful Founders

Dalton Caldwell and Michael Seibel discuss the best approaches to developing a healthy lifestyle that ultimately helps you run and grow a successful startup. Take care of yourselves out there.

00:00 - Introduction
00:35 - Plan for the punches
01:50 - Adulting harder
03:07 - Audit how you live
04:05 - Good & Bad Habits
07:23 - Information diet
09:22 - Salary bump
12:51 - Hard conversations
16:37 - Expectation setting
18:00 - Fight or flight
21:08 - Good R&R
24:59 - Healthcare
26:50 - Fatal punches

[ycombinator]

What good habits are important to staying healthy as a founder?

[saraeissa]

Really relevant advice for me right now. Checking out a private office at 2pm today because my home environment is where I’m the least productive

[sakurira]

"Salary is for living. Equity is for upside". I like that

[DiddleDangle]

For me, quitting alcohol was the best thing I ever did as far as my career and being able to do the things my friends couldn't.

[thrilos]

I wish this information was available 10 years ago.. my mindset assured failure. The grey areas are truly difficult to deal with when you’re going through something alone.. it’s amazing how well these guys articulated the importance of “it depends”.

Thank you for sharing your gift of knowledge. I wish you both all the very best.

[neuroklyde]

This video was super helpful. I live in Lesotho, a country inside South Africa, this is the coldest country in Africa, but our house heating infrastructure is so poor. I have limited coding hours because it gets very cold some times, But viewing these video made me realize that it is up to me to find a better working space which can increase my productivity.

[liammclaughlin]

These videos between Michael and Dalton are so helpful. Really appreciate the work you guys are putting into this and the valuable advice.

[waymanharris]

big time!!❤ I never could have calculated how much home (family) would affect my ability to be productive! Just got a small office, my launch is delayed, but I'm in heaven!!💯

[duncanmacmillan]

I'm so grateful to you two guys for sharing your conversations. This is really valuable to me.

[johnstalkernet]

Thanks guys as always. Would love to hear tips on 30/40/50+ year old software founders, juggling primary/secondary incomes with families, while still making steady startup progress. Have you seen this work, and if so, what is specifically critical for this type of approach?

[AnshMehraa]

I work as a Designer at one of the YC startups and these videos teach me SO MUCH. I am so thankful. But I TOTALLY love Michael's laughs. They are so genuine and so sweet haha, it just cheers me up!

[chapterme]

Chapters (Powered by ChapterMe) -
00:00 - Introduction
00:35 - Preventative - Plan for the punches
01:50 - Adulting harder
03:07 - Audit how you live
04:05 - Early good habits - 80-20 solution
07:23 - Information diet - Social media
09:22 - Salary bump
12:51 - Hard conversations
15:48 - Dealing with conflict
16:37 - Expectation setting
18:00 - Treatment - Do I have to do anything right now?
18:15 - Do I have to do anything right now?
19:54 - What if we do nothing?
21:08 - Taking a day off
22:35 - Hanging out with the right people
24:59 - Mental healthcare
26:50 - Fatal punches
30:20 - Non-technical founders

[dlysele]

One of the habits that I found from people is that they don't commit. They do not commit to what they promise and burn with only 3 minutes of energy. I was in a startup where a co-founder was as enthusiastic as I was, and I burned the midnight oil to get the MVP going. After 3 months, the co-founder had his attention elsewhere and just can't be arsed with anything about the project any more. He was like "yea, I like the idea a lot." But I was like, "Ok, and...?" Then he just couldn't say anything else.

[jerryoverton]

For me, this was the most helpful discussions yet. It's hard to find people willing to talk about the emotional issues of startup. It's even harder to find conversations with actionable recommendations. I found myself pausing the video to write down a number of to-do items.

I'll have to watch this one a few times. You have no idea how helpful these are.

[zzzzzzz]

"Your startup failed, but that doesn't mean you failed" This hit. I have heard of this but had to really understand it when mine failed. Now I'm onto my next.
I've had people around me, who were close to me, who thought of me as failure, because I've put all my life to work on something that ultimately failed.
To some people, they can only see binary results "Yes" or "No", in other words did you hit a home run or not.
However, in reality, you know these things are cumulative. They need trials and errors. They will have ups and downs.
If you have failed before, don't worry. Pick yourself back up. Learn from your experience. External voices sometimes don't matter as much, if you've carefully examined the facts of your own situation. Keep trying.

[chuhaoliu]

6:30 "What if it (your startup) works? Are you set up for this to not work or are you set up for this to work" What a punchline for builing good lifestyle habits for founders!

[rudhisundar]

Really wanted to say both of you thanks and give 2 hugs. This talk was designed for me, thank you from the Bottom of my heart, thank you from India.

[stephaneessomba]

Thank you guys for this amazing series, I watch you from Cameroon 🇨🇲, a country of central Africa. Your tips and advice are clear and very useful for me as a newbies in tech and entrepreneurship

[CELLPHONETECH]

Say no more my life has been adjusted. Company over everything ❤

[VANCOUVERHOUSEFINDER]

I am always looking for technical people and I post on craigslist in my area. I got someone today who just ripped my post and started calling me names. I really don’t get it, I don’t know this person. My day didn’t start out great, but I kept going after watching this . Thanks you gentlemen.