Life is filled with challenges that have no easy solutions. Kanye West captured this idea by saying "This the real world, homie, school finished. They done stole your dreams, you dunno who did it." Self-help books try to provide recipes for success, but the hard things in life have no simple formulas. Laying people off, getting teams to communicate, recovering when dreams become nightmares - these situations require wisdom and experience, not step-by-step instructions.

Having faced many hard things as an entrepreneur, CEO and venture capitalist, Ben Horowitz shares his story not as a formula, but as an attempt to provide clues and inspiration. Through his blog posts, backstories and lessons learned, as well as insights from hip-hop artists who see themselves as entrepreneurs overcoming challenges, he aims to help others struggling to build something great out of nothing. Life will bring setbacks, but with perseverance and the right mindset, progress can still be made. There are no recipes, but learning from experience can guide us through the hard things.