Independence & Risk Taking

2 minutes reading.  

The task must be made difficult, for only the difficult inspires the noble-hearted.
— The journals of Kierkegaard

Last night I realized I'd stopped thinking like a builder and started thinking like an employee. Here's how it happened.

Risk taking, or rather, the spirit of risk taking moves parallel to feelings of self-reliance and autonomy. Whereas the spirit of settling for a job, corporate or otherwise, with minimal risk or minimal uncertainty on behalf of the individual, moves parallel to feelings of dependency and self-doubt.

When I dedicated over 3 years to learning investing and active trading — living on a $25 government subsidy and my mother's support — I mostly planned and visualized what I would build, how I would recruit, how I would diversify my wealth, how I would explore countries...

However, in recent months after landing a job in 2023, though I still develop myself and invest portions of my income and am no longer reliant on subsidies, I can notice my attention leaning more on: How I am perceived by colleagues, how I could get promoted to this or that role, how I could polish my CV for a higher paying job, how I could meet some employer who'll be impressed by my work.

It's crucially important to recognize something here — and I've tried to write about this before in Bruised but Not Broken:

"The universe is so designed that we humans and animals alike must get acquainted with the fact that life has guaranteed challenges.."

When I was unemployed, I had other challenges, which were as uncomfortable, but not greater: I worried about rent, food, and losing large invested capital. Now employed, I have other challenges which are as uncomfortable, but not greater: now I worry about colleagues' and bosses' impressions, ruminating over saying the wrong thing in a meeting, and losing out on promotions & bonuses. 

Likewise, there are benefits. But here, there are serious differences and one is greater.

Now I can pay the rent, have monthly income, and my corporate skills are being sharpened. But the spirit hovering over me is dependency and a quiet erosion of self-reliance.

Before, I couldn't pay rent and I didn't have monthly income — but I had autonomy over my time, I was sharpening self-sustaining skills, I was focused on building my empire. And the spirit, now looking back, that hovered over me was self-reliance and independence.

"Independence in thought, philosophy, morals, and culture are as important as financial independence", writes Morgan Housel in an article: Pure Independence

Kierkegaard was right: I was noble-hearted when the task was difficult and mine. Now the task is easy and someone else's.

In closing, I value and appreciate my job for the sustenance and privileges it has exposed me to — but I recognize where it is leading. And frankly speaking, I highly doubt the dots will "connect" and somehow find myself in my once envisioned empire where I called the shots. Most likely to happen is just a wasting away of years, with the flicker of fire in me getting dimmer and dimmer. And my corporate camouflage getting larger and larger — the mask of someone who's grateful just to be here, who's learned to stop wanting what he wanted.

But awareness restores choice. The moment you see the drift, you can steer again.

Do not let your fire go out, spark by irreplaceable spark, in the comfortable swamps of good-enough, the almost, the not-yet, the never-will-be. The world you desired can be won. It exists, it is real, it is possible, it is yours.
— Ayn Rand, Atlas Shrugged

Sam Madlala

• Notes: Unemployed = material anxiety but spiritual freedom. Employed = material security but spiritual captivity. 
• Other reads:
• Bruised But Not Broken 
• The Sovereign Individual - Summaries 1997