I started making money online in 10th grade – some lessons about capital

I didn’t even have a bank account. The money went to my father’s account.

A few days later I charged around $70 for a simple website. That was my first encounter with capital.

Not venture capital — just the realization that ideas and effort could turn into money.

Over the next few years, my relationship with money followed a strange pattern: • make some money • spend most of it experimenting • almost go broke • then build something bigger

This cycle repeated multiple times.

Freelance work → nothing Agency → nothing

Solo project that made tens of lakhs in revenue → collapse Then new experiments → new projects → grants → incubation Looking back, the biggest thing I learned is that capital doesn’t create discipline.

It exposes the discipline you already have. Another thing I noticed: when someone invests in you, a subtle psychological shift often happens. Even if they only own equity, they sometimes start behaving as if they own the company.

Advice slowly becomes instruction. This dynamic is dangerous if founders don’t recognize it early.

Something else I’ve realized: investors don’t necessarily fund the best ideas.

They fund the most probable winners. Probability often comes from things like: • institutions (top universities etc.) • networks • previous wins • pattern recognition

It’s not purely meritocratic.

The other big shift happening now is technology itself. With AI tools everywhere, generating prototypes has become trivial. Many people (including investors) believe this means building software is easy.

But prototypes aren’t systems. At the same time, founders also need to accept a reality: technology alone is rarely a moat anymore. Distribution, insight, and iteration speed matter much more.

One rule I would give younger founders now: Let reality validate your company before investors do. Reality means users, traction, usage, ideally revenue. Today it’s easier than ever to build and ship quickly. Use that advantage first.

Let capital come as a consequence of building something real.

I wrote a longer essay reflecting on my experiences with money, experiments, and capital as a young founder.