Jessica Livingston
Support Through Setbacks
Inspired by Jessica Livingston episode
Jessica Livingston on supporting founders through rejection with empathy. Your kid needs the same when they fail—support, not solutions.
Jessica Livingston says the most important thing at YC is supporting founders through setbacks. That's when they actually need you.
Your kid fails at something—face-plants off the monkey bars, bombs the spelling test, gets cut from the team—and your entire body becomes a problem-solving machine. Ice pack? Tutor? Different sport? You're already three steps into the fix before they've finished crying.
But they don't need the fix yet. They need you to just... sit there. In the failure. With them.
"That was really hard. You're upset. I'm here."
That's it. That's the whole thing. You're not fixing, not pivoting, not reframing it as a learning opportunity. You're just present in the suck.
The support in the failure matters way more than the celebration in the success. Anyone can high-five a win. Sitting in a Tuesday afternoon meltdown about fractions without trying to make it better? That's the actual job.
