I finished grad school 14 years ago. Since then, I worked hard to earn money.
I woke up every day with a fresh start. At that time I also had student debt so I had a long way to go.
My goal was always to become a millionaire. It’s something our society has always considered a marker of financial success. If you have a million bucks, you’ve made it.
We all know that’s no longer true because society has changed a lot over the past decade. We’re living in the age of decadence. People just want to live luxurious lives, which requires a lot of money. But that’s the topic for another essay.
What I’ve realized recently is that my pursuit of financial success was more fulfilling than simply acquiring money.
As I’m typing this, I feel it’s not a deep realization at all. Because if you look around you, the platitudes about this concept are everywhere.
“It’s not about the destination, it’s about the journey.”
As a skeptical (and sometimes cynical) person, I have an allergy to motivational quotes and sayings.
Saying that life is about the journey just doesn’t mean anything when you’re stuck in the day-to-day grind of life.
You’re too focused on either surviving, providing, or improving your situation. First, you want to earn some money, get yourself a house, buy a car, and make sure you don’t have to worry about putting food on the table.
You want to be independent. And to be independent, you need income.
When life forces you to focus on certain things, you don’t appreciate it
In a way, life forces us to focus on becoming independent human beings.
That’s what we spend most of our time trying to accomplish. Most of us dedicate our entire lives to getting there.
But here’s the ironic part: When life pushes you into focusing on something specific, you rarely appreciate it at the moment. You think, “I can’t wait until I have enough money. I can’t wait until I have more freedom. I can’t wait until I don’t have to worry about bills anymore.”
Yet, when you finally reach that point, something strange happens. You lose a clear goal to strive toward.
Without that forced focus, life gets boring pretty fast. And boredom isn’t just annoying—it can lead to deeper problems. When you have nothing meaningful to pursue, you start asking yourself existential questions.
“What’s the point of all this? Why am I even here?”
Friedrich Nietzsche captured this perfectly when he said:
“He who has a why to live can bear almost any how.”
Similarly, Viktor Frankl wrote in his famous book on purpose, Man’s Search for Meaning:
“Life is never made unbearable by circumstances, but only by lack of meaning and purpose.”
Without friction, without some form of struggle, we fall into existential boredom or even depression.
We often complain about the constant demands that life puts on us without realizing that these very things keep us alive.
It’s the friction that sharpens our minds, teaches us resilience, and prepares us for greater and more significant challenges. Without it, we drift into complacency.
Complacency might feel comforting temporarily, but it quickly shows its emptiness.
Life, I learned, is about continuously setting meaningful challenges that pull you forward.
You need to constantly renew your purpose, find new puzzles to solve, and new mountains to climb. It’s this ongoing pursuit that fills life with genuine joy and excitement.
What I love doing
I love the challenge of creating products, positioning them, and seeing whether people respond to them. It’s no longer about the money. I just love the process. I love it so much that I want to keep doing this indefinitely.
Because I don’t function well without a clear purpose, especially in terms of my career.
Sure, my personal life gives me a great deal of satisfaction and meaning. I’m very close to my family. I have a few good friends. My wife is pregnant, and that’s something I’m incredibly happy about. It gives my life depth and emotional fulfillment.
But I also need intellectual stimulation. I need a meaningful challenge, problems to solve, and some friction. It’s crucial for me to wake up each morning knowing I need to solve a challenge.
Whether it’s launching a new course, fine-tuning a book, or exploring innovative business strategies, the anticipation of the unknown and the potential to fail or succeed energizes me.
That’s what keeps me energized on all fronts. The act of constantly creating something new, pushing myself intellectually, and facing challenges—that’s my personal formula for a fulfilling life.
