Paul Gra­ham, he of Y Com­bi­na­tor fame, offers up some learned and insight­ful advice on how to do what you love.

What you should not do […] is worry about the opin­ion of any­one beyond your friends. You shouldn’t worry about pres­tige. Pres­tige is the opin­ion of the rest of the world. When you can ask the opin­ions of peo­ple whose judge­ment you respect, what does it add to con­sider the opin­ions of peo­ple you don’t even know?

This is easy advice to give. It’s hard to fol­low, espe­cially when you’re young. Pres­tige is like a pow­er­ful mag­net that warps even your beliefs about what you enjoy. It causes you to work not on what you like, but what you’d like to like.

via Link Banana