23Nov23 | The Merit of Independence

I always believed the happiest man in the world is someone who works on a practice of his own, a practice that is small-scale yet fulfilling. It doesn’t have to impact the whole world, but needs to be just enough to make the man feel good. About what he’s doing, and about what he’s preaching. And makes him appreciate the world he’s being part of a little more everyday. Makes him feel like he’s moving towards something, versus being part of a financial system that is always going to be uncertain.

I'm not going to be the most successful founder.

I'm not going to be the most prolific writer.

I’m also probably not going to make a forbes list.

But I learned that being part of a game much bigger than myself is the quickest way to desperation. That must not be mistaken for ambition. Because ambition is moving towards a place where you feel more confident, more certain, and more whole, not otherwise. And that can’t just come with how most modern success games are scripted.

The game is, for the most part, rigged. No one chasing vanity metrics of the status quo became more confident, certain, or whole in the process. No one! But when a man accepts the limits & implications of his quest, all comes easy. The game then turns from having to cope with pressures & definitions from the outside to: How to maximize happiness & minimize regret over the long run?

In my current world view, a happy life would be that of an utmost freedom, for freedom is so hard to attain – much harder than money. Of course the biggest aspect of being independent is “how you make money”, but it’s not only that! The lack of freedom we’re experiencing is actually not only about money.

We want the same things, go to the same places, wear the same clothes, and generally have very close aspirations and expectations from life, which is extremely dangerous. That in itself should be alarming for the most part. That is not what freedom means.

What freedom means is:

If that entails lots of traveling, then so be it.

If that entails a total break-free from the norm, then so be it.

If that entails instability through the modern lens, then so be it.

By now I’m at least aware that a happy life is one that is as detached as possible.

And that gratitude unlocks the fullness of life & turns what we have into enough.

When you’re independent, you don’t feel the urge to do what everyone is doing or be interested in what everyone’s interested in. When you’re independent, it feels like you’re seeing life from that 10,000-ft view – And lots of things seem like a trap.

I truly believe that it takes some success with money at a young age to get a sense of the overview. When you stack some money early on, you get to know -early on- that money is not it. For example, if you don’t feel fulfilled at your job but your total compensation is through the roof, you’d wake up everyday wishing you could trade with someone that has it reversed.

Because youth is about fulfillment rather than money. If anything, no one expects you to be mad rich at a young age; a privilege I believe everyone should take. At the time I’m supposed to explore several aspects about my life, and also the time I’m supposed to take substantial career risks, optimizing for maximal total compensation is not one of them.

Founders and early employees of tech companies often pay a high personal cost. This is heartbreaking, as most of the people in the tech startup world are in their twenties and early thirties – the prime years of their lives. I only talk about it from my perspective in Tech, but I believe it applies to all industries & domains.

I once saw this video of Michael Seibel of YC talking about how many engineers at google & meta work on products for months -or years- that never see the light of day. Imagine that the compounding of months of work would amount to a “discontinued” project. This is considered waste of life by definition. You’re even being ripped off the false positive high that comes with “Having worked on a product so small at a corporation so big, that turned out to be a success”. From a fulfillment perspective, that is catastrophic.

I’m in a group chat of 500+ brilliant Egyptian Product Managers. There was once this manager who was complaining about the gradual deterioration of her mental health for a product release at the company she works for. Her message said: “I’ve been struggling a little bit with being mentally exhausted and at the same time sort of refusing to rest because it’s such an exciting time and a lot is happening with my product” – The worst part about this is not the deterioration of her mental health; the worst part about this is that it’s not her product. I don’t understand how can anybody not see it.

I mean I’d happily trade hours of sleep or some decline in mental health for a potential upside that possibly might keep benefiting me for the next few years, but it seems that lots of people -including me- often do it for all the wrong reasons. It’s important to note that independence does not necessarily mean entrepreneurship. First thing that comes to mind when you hear “Entrepreneurship” is: material success, status, or even fame. In our view of “independence”, none of these things really matters.

It’s also important to note that I’m not talking about this in a “rich dad poor dad” sense. I can’t advise anyone to leave their job, exit the system, and start a business. And I don’t endorse hustle porn. Quite the the contrary! In fact I’m talking about it from a “Regret Minimization” perspective. I really do think that most people do chase money because in their eyes, they believe they haven’t accumulated enough money. And that is exactly the idea I’m against.

Because this behavior fuels a circular loop of: 1. there won’t be enough money and 2. there won’t be enough “lifestyle upgrades” to go with the money. This loop is so hard to break, and even gets harder as you grow older. That’s why the mix of “unlocking just enough money” + “having plenty of time left” + “being in constant search of fulfillment” reveals lots of the truth.

This is exactly what the system wants you to do. You don't want to be rich. You just want to live comfortably and have stuff that you deserve since you work so hard, but society was built in a way to make men believe they need millions asap to be happy and so they become yet other cogs in the same system.

I also believe that, if I supposedly retired tomorrow morning, and provided I don’t need to care about money ever again, there’s practically an infinite number of ways to live the rest of my days as fulfilled, and as happy as possible. It’s actually absurd that sitting in a cubicle for the major part of a life INSTEAD OF doing these things IS the norm.

The fact that burning one third of a life in hope to enjoy another third is normalized, is extremely absurd in my opinion. And it begs the question why isn’t it the case that everyone is trying to spend money for time instead of spending time for money?

If you do the math, an average graduate AIMS to spend the next 60 years like this:

This is the AIM, meaning this actually happens under the most ideal circumstances. Lots of times, they either work more, or sleep less, or both. Isn’t that supposed to be concerning? Even once in a while?

On the other hand, glorified entrepreneurship aims to spend potentially even more of those years working for another set of vanity metrics: status, recognition, ego, and of course money. But not freedom. At least most of the times it is the case. Freedom is seldom the end goal. A proof of this can be clearly seen towards the end of the spectrum of success by our modern lens: Huge companies -or startups- with billions in valuation usually eat their owners alive. It’s so clear that the upside from starting a business that has the potential to get so huge could turn into many things, but freedom is not one of them.

Now in between these two extremities, emerge The Independent. Those are people who:

Growing up, I consistently found that those are people who can easily gain my respect, and people I could look up to. Not mega-successful entrepreneurs that put theatricals over integrity. If a restaurant is putting too much sauce on your burger, it’s mostly bad meat. Same with people.

Last year when I joined this startup accelerator -supposed to be one of the best in the region-, I don’t remember a high that’s close to that I had when I first knew we got accepted. Over the course of 4 months, I learned everything there was to learn about theatrics to compete in the rigged game, and I learned zero things about what it means to develop actual value for my customers. The dreaded level of work ethic, composure, and integrity I saw from some of the people I interacted with was horrible, and beyond description. This shall give you an idea about the places you’re supposed to go to to formally learn how to be successful in this game.

Again they might be a perfect match for someone who’s ready to be part of that culture. But it quickly felt like this wasn’t me. I wasn’t ready to compromise my views for my future for the need to go as fast as possible. Afterwards, it hit me that the reason I got involved in the first place could be because up to this point my approach to work was totally wrong. Because ultimately, the right approach is one that prioritizes independence, flexibility, and fulfillment, rather than maximizing financial gain.

A few months later, I wrote a series of small posts that would eventually contribute to my vision of Independence and the switch I’m trying to make:

Last month, I met with a dear friend, whom I hadn’t met in a long while. He is one good example of people trying to achieve “an independent practice” through their work. Told me about how his small startup was being rejected from the same accelerator BECAUSE IT WAS PROFITABLE. They don’t want you to be profitable, they want you to be scalable. It’s like this one big joke everyone is trying to participate in. That’s why 90%+ of startups that join accelerators fail because accelerators are only playing the 10x game. They’re hoping one in a 100-startup pool would 10x. Meanwhile for a developing country like Egypt with a modest track record for such moonshots, what do you think the game we should be playing here? The very same game they play at YC aiming for $1B-startups? Of course the economic climate now is trash, but what do you think it was or will be the case EVEN WHEN the climate is good? Wouldn’t it make more sense if we aim for medium-sized businesses that achieve profitability in the near future, but have lots of them such that we can actually achieve a better record? Wouldn’t these be better odds?

No one formally talks about this stuff. But I admire anyone who’s lowkey. My friend went on to talk about how he & his cofounder are tackling their market, and we exchanged some views on building small saas products. Told me he’s experimenting with some ideas, engaging in discussions with customers in his domain, and carrying on plans to expand on his interests. To me, this sounds like the right way to think of building a startup.

I believe that riches is always going to be bound by demographics. When someone is rich, there’s a huge chance this status could change with one of the following:

So age & location are direct factors in whether we’re going to call someone “rich”. But this doesn’t apply for “wealthy”. If someone is wealthy, there’s a greater chance his status can withstand demographics because it doesn’t necessarily imply “lots of money”.

Money as a concept is so fragile. Wealth implies independence; and for someone who’s independent, it doesn’t really matter if they changed cities. Thus independence is a clear factor in wealth. Independence puts foremost a set of values about an individual. Tells a lot without even having to ask. You can’t say the same about someone who is just rich. That’s why for The Independent, riches could be just a bonus, and in fact that is how it always should be.

– About Baruch Spinoza, from the book: A Little History of Philosophy

Thanks for reading!