Andrea Nagar
I strongly believe in bootstrapping your business and getting to the point where you can turn a profit which is the best validation that what you have built is serving a real need.
I'm a software engineer and started programming since I was 11. I've never seen myself working for other companies and I've always wanted to build my own thing.
PhraseExpander took quite a few years before I could do it full time but I finally reached that important goal in 2012.