I'm 23, An Entrepreneur, and Fucking Terrified.

More to the point, most 'wantrepreneurs' rely on customers being in the middle class or higher, and having discretionary incomes from their stuffed 401ks to spend on their product/service/Saas/etc. To call that lifestyle 'mediocrity' and insult the very people that you need to grow your business is beyond the pale.

Just wait until he starts hiring people. He'll need those people who are satisfied when their work life is 'mediocre' by his terms.

Silicon Valley startup porn is harmful to many people, and I think the OP might be one of the harmed.

Still takes about 5 seconds for me to see anything render other than the "M" in the corner.

Where is the mention of his business? I don't have any clue what he is actually trying to build.

If there is no business, this article should be titled "I'm 23 and Fucking Terrified of Hard Work."

Good stuff. I'm with you Zach. Except I'm 40, so I feel slightly different forms of terror than you do. And I don't have the beautiful, intelligent girlfriend. Or a motorcycle.

To all of the people who say that the best thing to do is get a good job, buy a nice house, and to put the max into a 401k that the company will match:

    When I was a young boy 
    They said you're only gettin' older 
    But how was I to know then 
    That they'd be cryin' on my shoulder 
    Put your money in a big house 
    Get yourself a pretty wife 
    She'll collect your life insurance 
    When she connects you with a knife [1]

Fuck you. It’s not what I want. Mediocrity is worse than failure.

Yeah, absolutely. I've tolerated mediocrity for too much of my life, due to a misguided faith in the old saws "patience is a virtue" and "good things come to those who wait", etc.

So now I'm on the cusp of "old", and have a startup that I have a lot of confidence in (but, then again, entrepreneurs almost have to have an irrational level of confidence and optimism!), but the terror of basically having to acknowledge "this is probably my last 'at bat'".

If this doesn't succeed, by the time we fail, I think I'll be too old and too tired to bother trying again. That means I write off all hope of living the life I really want to live. At that point, I doubt I'll see much point in living, so I kinda expect that if it happens, I'll load my car up with booze, and head to Vegas to drink myself to death, ala Nick Cage's character in Leaving Las Vegas.

Can we make it while living modest lifestyles? I think yes. It will be hard, but fuck… it’s going to be hard anyway.

I think so, but, speaking as an "older guy", I'll just say this: be aggressive as fuck about pursuing your dreams. And if you're going to sacrifice a bit and do some element of the "entre-monk" thing, it's probably more tolerable in your 20's than in your 30's, or (worse) your 40's. I'm not saying you have to do the entre-monk thing, mind you. But I am saying that you probably can't afford to coast, and do too much playing around being patient.

I am starting to truly understand why the people that seem to make the best entrepreneurs are empirically unstable. You can’t go into this shit with a sane disposition.

Agreed.

[1]: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=LUkqBRC1zUA

I'm 24 and I agree with you 100%.

Entrepreneurship isn't a lifestyle I suggest to anyone, however, it is a great tool/means to fulfil something you want. Approaching it from the view of avoiding mediocrity is not only gonna put you in the difficult 'lifestyle' column, but it will also not be a very useful perspective for your entrepreneurial goals either. If you're really committed to living the entrepreneurial lifestyle, the best way to view it is as a journey to greatness: aspire to be with the best, not to avoid the 'average'. The former gives you hope and encouragement, while the latter is insulting to the those around you. If you're using entrepreneurship as a means to an end (like I am), it'll still be hard, but once you have that perspective it becomes easier to lay out a path for yourself regardless of the circumstances.

I've been snuffed out of jobs by friends I helped hire, I've had relationships fall apart to the point of becoming suicidal, I have no medical insurance and have endured multiple visits to the ER, I've had my apartment robbed and then got promptly kicked out because new roommates decided to get overly rowdy while I was gone, I've been shot at in broad daylight, I've unintentionally contracted with shady characters that fled the country and left me empty handed with silly lawsuits and court dates that I had to go out of my way to forfeit, I've been identity thefted losing all my money just as rent was due along with some of those ER bills, I haven't had more than 4 figures in my bank account for about half a year, my credit cards are maxed, I've had most of my belongings locked up in a storage unit for over 2 years because of these fiascos, and I'm now back to living with my parents because I couldn't afford to continue living on my own after quitting a job at a startup that required an overly-long commute that took a toll on my health to the point where I developed muscle spasms and began getting panic-attacks in the middle of the workday.

But you know what? It's all good. All that stuff might have been hell and made me nearly hysterical at points, but I know what my end goal is, and I know entrepreneurship is the only way I'll ever achieve it. If shit gets in my way, oh well, I'll just come up with a new plan to adjust for it (and I already have). I don't care about 'mediocrity', I just care that I achieve what I set out to do, because that's what makes me happy, and the only way I'll ever fail is if I give up pursuing it.