I’m not totally into the original article. Things are not so easy, usually. And yes, ending up poor or starving are actually options.

However you’ll be surprised by how you can succeed in sports even if you’re “old” for the average.

Climbing is a sport where by 8 years old you may reach almost peak performances.

However there are stories of people who started climbing by their 30 and achieved memorable results. With memorable I mean no Noble prize or gold medals, but coverage on magazine such as Outside or Rock and Ice. I mean, just dreaming of it.

I would say, for sure time is a given element of the equation “passion = success” but i think the meaning is: start anyway and don’t give yourself limits. You might be surprised of the results.

(then of course such debates are pretty common on Medium and i think most of the articles don’t add significant values to the debate)

You can read further on: http://stephdavis.co/blog/climbing-and-age-limits/