Accomplishments should serve self-esteem. I want to be proud of what I did. You really only need one endeavor, and it doesn’t need to make money. It matters not

Accomplishments should serve self-esteem. I want to be proud of what I did. You really only need one endeavor, and it doesn’t need to make money. It matters not whether your accomplishments are numerous or lucrative, but that your accomplishments make you feel good about yourself. Where people lose their way is playing games they can’t win, or that they aren’t proud of. A common example is a career doing work you’re not proud of, that you get no respect for. You may “win” but you don’t feel any better. Or you spread yourself too thin preventing any meaningful accomplishment. When I was a 9-5 software engineer I had low self-esteem. I was making great money, had a good job, but we weren’t creating software I was proud of. Meanwhile, I fell in love with and mastered a sport outside of work. The pride of mastering something I and others cared about and respected made me feel better than I ever did at my job. I realized then I should be chasing accomplishments that I can be proud of. That I should focus on doing less, and only doing what I derive my self-esteem from. I realized I didn’t need a fancy career or lots of money, I needed to do something I was a proud of. I think a lot of people are doing something they really don’t care about, and justifying it to themselves because it’s lucrative, or a “good” job, or other people tell them to be proud of it but they personally aren’t.