Hey Brooklyn! I'm home.
I'm so happy to be home.
Is Brooklyn here?
Okay,
okay.
Yes,
I was made in Brooklyn.
Fort Greene.
Just like a ten minute walk from here.
Myrtle Ave.
And I want to talk to you about some stuff today.
I realized I don't have my clicker up here.
Could you guys hit the next slide?
I only have three,
so I've got that going for me.
Thank you.
So I want to talk to you.
I've never really talked about this stuff.
Not really publicly.
Certainly not on a stage.
So bear with me.
We'll get through this.
But it's a little bit about really the theme of this conference,
which I think will be helpful for all of you in
whatever life or your startup might give you.
It's the story of Reddit,
but told through a pretty personal lens of the world.
Of what happened.
A story that not a lot of folks know.
So like I said, I was made here in Brooklyn.
Very,
very excited about that.
Very, very grateful to be back.
I was
the son of two people.
I guess that's not too surprising.
My father's family all came to New York
when they fled the Armenian genocide.
Back then they were just Syrian refugees.
But I was grateful.
I was grateful
that they were able to find solace in this great country.
My mother actually immigrated from Germany when she was 23.
She came as an au pair.
Pretty typical route for folks coming to the States.
And she fell in love with my dad.
Her visa expired and she stuck around.
So if you're paying attention,
my mom was undocumented for almost a year.
Before my dad put a ring on it.
And they got married.
Now I'm very grateful
for the fact that she didn't get deported.
I feel like I shouldn't have to bring that up.
But these days, I think it bears repeating.
I'm grateful for the opportunity that I got.
There certainly wouldn't be a Reddit.
Which would make my life a lot less interesting.
And probably a lot of yours.
But in this story was laid the foundation
that has given me so much perspective.
And so much that I'm grateful for.
That I want to share with you.
So like I said.
They met.
Fell in love.
It was amazing.
And I got this opportunity to start a
company with my best friend in college.
Steve Huffman.
Who you all heard from earlier this morning.
Wasn't that a great talk?
Yes.
So
we lived on the hall together freshman year.
We played a lot of video games.
We thought maybe
one day we would turn this into a viable company.
We did not expect this.
We did not expect that Reddit would come
to be the place where culture is created.
And accelerated for the English speaking world online.
Because back then we were just trying to
not look foolish in front of our families.
Really.
And you know one of the things that weirdly
had popped into my head as a kid.
When I was sitting there teaching myself HTML.
Thanks to strangers on the internet.
Was this.
Which I put on the wall of my bedroom.
If any of you played video games back when they were hard.
You remember that you would like run out of a finite number of lives.
And then either have to give money.
Or start over.
And I always found that on that last life.
I was really.
I played my best.
I really.
I gave it everything I had.
Because there was no more lives after that.
And for whatever reason this was on the wall of my room.
For all of my adolescence.
And all my childhood.
And it didn't really resonate with me until a few months into Reddit.
So we had just graduated from UVA.
We took a $12,000 check from Y Combinator.
Which felt life changing.
And we started working in a small rented apartment in Medford,
Massachusetts.
On this idea.
This link sharing website.
Just the two of us.
This little apartment.
And about a month into it.
We had just put the site live.
We were starting to work.
We were faking all of our early users.
You've probably heard that story.
And I got this phone call.
And this phone call was from the mother of my then girlfriend.
Who said that she had this accident.
She was studying abroad.
And she was in a coma.
I got my passport.
Flew out there.
And saw first hand.
Just how fragile life was.
I was 21.
22.
I don't know.
And you feel so invulnerable.
You feel so, I don't know.
Special.
Unique.
That this thing can't really ever happen.
And then it does.
And it's this amazing dose of perspective.
It's this jolt of reality.
And she very gratefully survived.
And actually made a remarkable recovery.
And that happened over the next
six months.
Eight months.
But a month after that.
We're now getting ready to raise.
We're now getting ready to pitch for demo day.
At Y Combinator.
This is the first ever Y Combinator.
Mind you.
None of us really knew what to expect.
And I got another phone call.
I really should have stopped answering my phone at this point.
But.
And it was my mom.
And she called to tell me that our dog had died.
And this is starting to sound like a country music song.
I know.
But.
You know.
This was tough.
But.
I just got to.
Okay.
This thing.
This is the beauty of life.
Is the fact that it is fleeting.
And so I thought.
All right.
Okay.
We'll get through this.
Like my mom took it way worse than I did.
Because frankly.
I was an only child.
Once I was out of the house.
The dog was effectively the son.
She took it really poorly actually.
To the point where.
She was later that day in a dressing room.
At a store.
And had a seizure.
Which was very uncommon.
As you never had one before.
And so.
They took her to the hospital.
And.
My dad called me later that day.
And said.
Your mom had a seizure.
And.
They.
They're pretty sure it's a tumor.
So I got on the first plane.
Back to Maryland.
Met with her.
And they basically said.
That she had a stage four.
Glioblastoma multiforme.
Which is an ugly, ugly name.
For an awful, awful cancer.
A terminal brain cancer.
And my dad told me this.
You know.
Before we went in to meet with her.
And.
Leave it to her.
The first words out of her mouth to me.
Were I'm sorry.
Because she felt.
This is the kind of woman she was.
She felt like this was.
Just one more awful thing.
To have happened.
In a string of awful things.
And in a moment.
When she should have been thinking about herself.
She was thinking about someone else.
And that's the kind of person she was.
And there at 22.
My whole life had been turned upside down.
And I realized.
In this very, very special moment.
That my worst day.
As a founder.
Was still not going to be nearly as bad.
As hers.
Or my father's.
So I hope.
For all of you.
That your worst days.
As a founder.
Are your worst days.
As a person.
I hope.
I hope.
I hope.
I hope.
I would not wish this on anyone.
I know there are people in this audience.
Who are dealing with this.
Have dealt with this.
And you know exactly what I'm talking about.
But we often talk about startups.
As life and death.
They are not.
That's hyperbole.
Those are metaphors.
What we have is an opportunity.
Because we're all sitting in this room.
Because of a lot of other hard work.
A lot of other people did.
Before us.
And help us out.
Is a chance to work on something.
We're genuinely passionate about.
Which is a gift.
It is absolutely.
A gift.
And when you think about the stuff.
That you want to accomplish.
I mean literally write down a list.
Of the things you want to accomplish.
For the rest of your life.
Look at that list.
When you do.
Underline all the things on that list.
That involve people.
Or experiences.
Because nothing else is going to matter.
When you're confronted with your own mortality.
The two things.
The greatest privilege I could have gotten.
At 22 years old.
Was the little bit of perspective.
On what people actually care about.
When they look back.
And reflect upon their lives.
And if you're lucky enough.
To have that chance.
To look back.
And think about the things that actually mattered.
When you've got no more lives remaining.
The experiences.
And the people you have had in your lives.
Are the only
things that will matter.
The only things.
And.
Between now.
And whenever the end game is.
To optimize for those things.
The better.
I swear.
And happier you will be.
And so I had this tremendous gift.
Like I said.
And I think we as an industry.
Have.
We have a.
We have an obsession with hustle porn.
You all know what I'm talking about?
Hustle porn.
Can't do enough.
The hustle.
The grind.
The need to.
You can't sleep.
Hustle all the time.
And we glamorize it.
We fetishize it.
To the point where we stop actually thinking.
About our own health and well-being.
I didn't have a conversation with anyone.
About this.
For almost a decade.
And it was terrible.
Right?
Depression.
Is a real thing.
It's an awful thing.
And it's something we as an industry.
And I think generally as a society.
But let's say specifically as an industry.
Do a really terrible job addressing.
We are so busy posturing.
And hustling.
And grinding.
And all this bullshit.
In order to make it look like.
We're taking over the world.
And I wish.
I wish.
Someone had sat me down.
And said dude.
Talk to someone.
It is okay to deal with this.
To talk about this with your co-founder.
With a therapist.
With an executive coach.
With a church.
With a rabbi.
With a priest.
With an imam.
I don't care.
But talk to someone about it.
And deal with it. And you
know I've
gotten a lot of clarity.
And I've been so grateful for the opportunity she gave to me.
And I know that the best phone call of my life.
Was when I got to tell her that we sold Reddit.
People always ask me.
Did you sell it too early?
Do you have regrets?
No.
No.
Not for a fucking second.
Because I got to make that phone call.
To let her know that 20 plus years of self-sacrifice.
Of unflagging love and support.
Really meant something tangible.
Something real.
Something that we could point to and say you did that.
You did that mom.
So no I don't regret it.
And I was grateful.
Because during that entire process.
I had a co-founder in Steve.
Who I trusted and loved with as much support and love.
As you could hope for in a co-founder.
And so think about the people with whom you were doing
these companies.
You're doing these ventures.
Because they,
they are, they're going to be your everything.
At a time especially when maybe friends and
family just can't really relate to this weird
thing we do with our lives.
And if you are a solo founder.
Kudos.
Have a network of other founders with whom you can share and talk to.
Whether it's about work.
Or whether it's just about how shitty your day has been.
And try to maintain that perspective.
Please.
And talk to people when you need it.
And be okay when saying that it's just too fucking hard.
So
the thing that I,
I,
I keep coming back to is that
like I said.
We as an industry are,
we're incredibly fortunate with the things we get to work on.
Right.
We actually by and large are here because right.
We're working on our passion.
Working on a dream.
We're trying to work on something special.
Um.
And so.
Take care of yourselves.
And one another.
As you're doing this.
It's not about who is working the hardest.
Who is punishing themselves more.
And please keep perspective on what a privilege
it is to be able to work on the things that
we work on.
And really, really know the why that drives you.
Know the things on that list
that you underlined.
Because they're related to the people and
experiences that are actually going to matter
when you're looking back and considering
what the hell did I do with my life.
Those are the things that above all will matter.
Those are the things that will get you
through it when you get punched in the face
with startups.
Because even to this day,
my worst day
in business is still not that bad.
It's not that bad.
And that perspective,
even with all the pressure,
even with all the stress has been invaluable.
And if I can give you a bit of that perspective
without having you to go through that experience,
I consider that a pretty worthwhile investment.
My
mom would have been 63 today.
Today is her birthday.
And so that's the reason why I decided,
you know what,
fuck it.
This is in Brooklyn.
I was made a few blocks away from here.
This city represents all of the best of America.
And I wouldn't be here if it weren't for
my mother, for my father, and for everything
that they did.
And I have one more slide which is her.
Thanks.
And so like I said,
please, please, please, please
hang on
to the people
and the experiences in your life
that are going to be the things that actually matter.
And know, and know
that even your worst day as a founder,
even your worst day as a business leader
is still
not
that bad.
And that there are people you can talk to.
There are paths of support.
And it is okay to need to take time off.
It is okay
to tell people that you're depressed.
It's okay to tell people that you are struggling
because that will make you, your companies,
your life so much stronger.
Thank you.
Thank you.
Thank you so much.
That was really, really good.
So
that was our last talk for the day.
But the day has not ended yet.
So Boris, what did you think of today?
I had a great time.
Did you enjoy yourselves?
Yeah.
So that last talk,
I thought we came full circle, sort of.
