There's a comment on a previous post (Risk in Business - Part II) where anonymous asks if not jumping into entrepreneurship due to family obligations is being chicken or making a responsible choice. This is so often the subject of much angst and insomnia that I feel like devoting a post, instead of just 2-liner response, to it.
First, I wouldn't recommend anyone put their startup above their family (but at the same level, hmm...). Check out Guy Kawasaki's position that high housing prices foster startups as cheaper housing encourages young people to buy houses sooner, and have kids, and then all thoughts of startups go bye-bye. Seriously, at the end of the day (the day that comes when you're 80 some years old), if you've done a great startup but mucked up your relationships, you're going to be one sad, lonely old soul wishing you had a do-over. No question there.
Second, not everyone is an entrepreneur, just as not everyone's a doctor or athlete or bagpipe player. For another view, check out this blog post by an entrepreneur who's quite spirited about it. In short, having some entrepreneurial qualities doesn't automatically make you one.
Going back to the chicken question, anonymous mentioned having an idea and the urge, but setting these aside to pay the bills. My response is simple, go back to the fundamentals - having an idea is not enough, you have to be passionate about it. Otherwise, it is just something that you're contemplating on lazy Sunday afternoons, along with exotic vacations and fantasy homes. On the other hand, if the idea has real meaning for you, you'll find you can't just set it aside. If you're passionate about it, you'll figure out fairly soon that you cannot sustain your relationships if you don't indulge your passion, however slightly - it is not an 'either/or' but an 'and'. From there, it is not a big leap to think about how to carve out time to develop your idea while keeping your job, how you can find someone else to work with you on it, etc. etc. As I'd mentioned in a previous post Moonlighting, this is pretty much standard operating procedure for most entrepreneurs when they're just getting started. You may have heard of how Wozniak kept his job for a year or so while getting Apple off the ground, and he's not the only one. I personally know a bunch of people who're developing their ideas while bringing home paychecks from their 'regular' jobs, working to get to the point when they can make the switch. There's one young man who's working on his idea, usually late at night, while maintaining a full time job, and helping his wife get her own business off the ground while managing their young family - and he doesn't consider any of it a chore or an energy drain at all, because he's so excited about it. I don't believe this phenomenon is necessarily limited to youth or high-tech startups. There are a lot of middle-aged, and older, folks who don't have the luxury of quitting their jobs, but have goals that they want to pursue, doing the same thing - they don't park their dreams, they just keep it in low gear, and keep working towards the day when they can kick it up.
In my view, not going after your idea is not a matter of being chicken or making a choice to be responsible. It is a matter of not feeling fired up, just slightly warm, at the thought of it.
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