In my previous startup journey, one thing I feel like was a good decision was to make a conscious effort to hang out more with other startup entrepreneurs, especially as a family.
We were living in the Silicon Valley, and most of our family friends worked at big tech companies — the Googles and the Oracles.
When our families got together, the conversation topics were usually about things that were so removed from the startup world:
“Someone got promoted to a director at Apple”
“Someone just bought a new house in Palo Alto”
“We should start planning for our Hawaii trip for the kids’ winter vacation (and we’re having this conversation in September!)”
After those conversations I often felt like we were falling behind. The pressure to keep up with the Kim’s and Lee’s was real.
But I couldn’t blame them. Turned out, big company employees often lacked the sense of mission and found their life as stable but boring. So they often took more interest in material things in life. Their agenda was not wrong, it was just different.
Meanwhile, as a startup family, we had a unique set of challenges. Startup is a hard journey mentally, physically, and financially – especially for young families.
So I made a conscious effort to network more with other startup founders and their family. The result was great. We built a deep sense of connection sharing similar challenges inlife. The spouses were often giving each other a shoulder to cry on. Every get-together was a healing session.
So I recommend founders hang out with other founder friends, especially when they have a spouse or a family. You don’t have to shut out non-founder friends, but be aware their interest areas will probably be very different from yours, and make sure their different agenda doesn’t impact you and your family in any negative way.