The 28th of May 2013 was just like any other day, except it wasn’t. In fact, most of the 28th of May 2013 was just like any other normal day. The only part that wasn’t normal was the moment my iPhone pinged with the sound of Elon Musk’s email.

That’s right, Elon Musk.

At the time, I was an 18-year-old school leaver who was soon to be going off to university and should have been slowly working my way through the mountainous reading list that had been set for my first semester.

Except, that day I had been having a heated debate with my parents about whether I could reject the offer I had for a place at the University of Edinburgh to study Business and German, and instead take a gap year to start a startup.

We spent hours and hours going back and forth over the pros and cons of not going to university that year, of starting a company, and of me living back at home after 6 years at boarding school. We spoke about how I had no experience in the world I was trying to break in to, how high the fail rate was for startups and how there was a very good chance mine would fail too (which it did).

This conversation had taken place over months and months, and had finally come to a head. My parents were holding firm, and so was I.

But being entrepreneurially minded, I decided to bargain with my parents to find out what would make them change their mind…

“If I got a job and paid you rent, would you let me reject the offer?”.

“No, your education is more important than you giving us money”.

“What about if I just deferred the offer until next year?”.

“If you can defer the offer, that would be ok”. The university didn’t give me that option.

I kept coming up against brick walls in my negotiations, and as I was rapidly running out of both things to offer and time to notify my university, I became desperate. I wracked my brains to find something that would convince my parents to let me stay at home and try and make it big with my startup.

“What if I emailed the leaders of some of the biggest companies in the world, and some of the most successful people on the planet, and if the majority of those who reply say that I should take the risk, I’ll do it?”

“Sure, you go ahead and email the most important people in the world and let us know what they say to you!”

I should probably say at this point that my parents have been, and will always be, super supportive of me, it was just that they believed that university is such a big factor in someone’s future success that they didn’t want me to miss out on it and become a failure.

Adamant that I wanted to reject the offer and start building my startup full time, I put together a list of people I would contact to ask for advice. The inital list was —

• Josh Kopelman
• Ron Conway
• Reid Hoffman
• Peter Thiel

And Elon Musk.

After drawing up that short list, I started scrambling around the internet to find their email addresses and then blasted out an email to all of them, privately expecting none of them to reply.

But some of them did.

In fact, both Josh Kopelman and Ron Conway replied very soon after my email reached their inboxes, both provided some really heartfelt and honest advice. Josh even took the time to write a rather lengthy email describing how he was in a similar situation and how he made his decision.

Of the 5 people I emailed, the person I least expected to reply was Elon Musk. I mean, the man was running Tesla and Space X and helping out with Solar City, all while looking after a young family, he was pretty busy.

But later that day, my phone binged at my side and I turned it over to reveal a 3 word email from Elon Musk.

Even though it was significantly shorter than the other emails I had received, it was equally as important. Not only was Elon Musk adding to my tally of people in favour of me rejecting my offer, but I actually had an email reply from the man himself.

Some of you may be reading this and thinking “…and?”. But at 18-years-old, Elon was my Elvis or my Beyoncé or my President X or Prime Minister Y. He was someone I looked (and still look) up to.

Having an email from him sealed the deal in my mind, and (along with the other emails I received) actually helped to convince my parents to allow me to reject my offer.

So reject it I did.

What happened after I made the decision? Well, I founded a startup which failed, reapplied to university, studied for a year and simultaneously worked at a great digital agency, and then decided to ‘take the chance’ again and jump into the world of startups and am now building my second company which will launch early next year. Without Elon, Josh, Ron and others taking time out of their day to read and respond to an email from a random 18-year-old boy in England, I likely would have gone to university, put my dreams of starting a startup to bed and led the typical cubical life.

Thankfully, I’m not doing that.

So thank you Elon, thank you Ron, thank you Josh, and thank you everyone else for taking the time to reply to my email or to give me your words of wisdom; your advice was invaluable. Oh, and thank you Mum and Dad for eventually giving in.