I went to a hackathon, summarily said I was looking for a job on stage at the end. Instead, someone I already knew came talk to me about their startup idea (which had PoC already live, a solid business plan and good proofs the project could be viable), and I decided to give it a go.

That was 5 years ago, I'm still there, learned a lot, and now we are 12 employees (we started at 2 unpaid founders, and started paying ourselves a minimal salary after a year). While it's not up to SV standard, I do consider it a success that we are still alive, and did not sell our soul doing others people project at any time of the company (which happens a lot here, companies don't die, they become contractors).

Important note: I had the privilege of a nice parental cushion that let me do that instead of absolutely requiring an income. I couldn't have done it otherwise.