Sam Altman on the importance of momentum and why burnout doesn’t come from working too hard

I was told, and I thought for a long time that you get burned out from working too hard, at least in my own experience. What I found is that burnout actually comes from failing and things not working. Momentum is really energizing. The lack of momentum is super draining. And I find that I have infinite energy to work on things that I find interesting and that are working and almost none to work on things that I either don't find interesting or aren't working. And so I think you see a lot of founders try something and fail and assume that they just can't work hard enough or don't have enough energy or passion or whatever. And that's actually not true. It's just that that thing didn't work. And what you should do is shut that company down, go on vacation, and try again. And many people then find that, oh, actually, when I'm doing this thing that I like and that is working, I have a huge amount of energy and I can get a lot of stuff done. And so when you look at really successful people and say, how do they get all those things done? It's. They have the benefit of momentum, and momentum is energizing.