I was recently discussing with some friends of mine about the prospect of altering my career path and the risks involved with that kind of decision. It was interesting to gauge their responses to that idea. My conservative friends were very risk averse, concerned about the potential downside of a bad decision. My more liberal friends were optimistic about making a change. This contrast made me think that too many people in life are playing the game to not lose, when they should be playing to win.

It’s not their fault either, society teaches us to get a secure job so we can earn a steady salary and comfortably retire in 40-50 years. It worked for our parents, so it should also work for us. However, I am very skeptical of anything that appears to be “one size fits all.” Roads from the 1960’s wouldn’t work very well in today’s world, why should career advice be any more relevant.

The problem with this mindset is that security is a false hope. First off, the world is always changing. The only thing that does not change is change itself. Nothing is stationary. This inherently means that seeking security is a bad idea because you are working against a law of nature. You are hedging that the course of your life will be stable enough for you to not have to anxiously pursue additional skills after a certain age.

“Most people die at 25 but aren’t buried until they are 75.” – Ben Franklin

People stop growing and learning. They begin to contract, away from things that make them uncomfortable, away from things that challenge their beliefs. Nobody can blame them for that, but it limits life experience in a drastic way. But in today’s world, being able to learn, unlearn, and relearn new skills is probably more important than the actual skills themselves.

Inflation drives the value of the dollar down each year, assuming that you will have enough for your basic needs 20 years from now by following the normal path will push you into poverty. Coasting to the finish line is no way to complete a race.

“Life should not be a journey to the grave with the intention of arriving safely in a pretty and well preserved body, but rather to skid in broadside in a cloud of smoke, thoroughly used up, totally worn out, and loudly proclaiming ‘Wow! What a Ride!'” – Hunter S. Thompson

This is where compounding comes into effect. The decisions you make over the course of your life, but especially early on, have drastic effects on how far you can go before your time expires. If you learn skills that are broadly applicable today, you will carry them for the next 50-70 years.

If you eat healthy and exercise, you might be able to squeeze out a few more years, however even the life-hacking tech billionaires of Silicon Valley will eventually die. As the Stoics said, “remember, you are mortal.”

This finite amount of time you have on the planet is for you to use. Only you can decide how best to live your life, but refusing or being too scared to make a decision is a decision in it’s own right.

“If you do what everyone else does, you will have what everyone else gets.” – Stephen Richards

How does one chart their own course in life. Undoubtedly you are, as William Ernest Henley said in his poem Invictus, “the master of your fate, the captain of your soul.”

You have the power to change everything in your life. You need to be willing to deploy that power against the pursuit of your life’s mission with the voracity of an attacking horde. You will have to grind it out as you level up in life. There will be periods where you are forced to pay a high cost so that you can achieve a great gain.

Thanos embodies this quality perfectly, though he is a genocidal villain. He is an example of what your life should become. You have to be willing to play the game no matter the hand you are dealt and sacrifice everything. Otherwise you will spend your life wondering what you could have made of it. It is better to have tried and failed, than to have never attempted.

“Twenty years from now you will be more disappointed by the things you didn’t do than by the ones you did do. So throw off the bowlines. Sail away from the safe harbor. Catch the trade winds in your sails.” – Mark Twain

Don’t stay in the the confines of a safe environment. Don’t wish it were easier. Push yourself to become who you truly are. Play the game of life. Play the game to win.