Is Wanting My Own Life Selfish?

My last startup didn’t quite work.

After that, fear had a fairly sensible suggestion: do something safer. Something more predictable.

So I chose the sensible-looking option.

On paper, I could make a very convincing case for it.

Then I had to live the life that came with it.

I didn’t want it.

That was the inconvenient bit.

But being unhappy wasn’t enough; I needed to prove the strategy, opportunity, or path was wrong.

Otherwise, what was I saying?

That it could work, and I still didn’t want to do it?

Apparently that needed defending.

I think I’m tired of having to turn what I want into something morally impressive before I’m allowed to want it.

What’s actually driving me?

Fun. Aliveness. Curiosity. Making things and seeing what happens.

Those are fairly strong feelings. But put them next to security and responsibility, and suddenly they sound like a child interrupting a meeting.

At 32, there’s a whole picture waiting. House, mortgage, children, family, responsibility.

And I feel this heaviness.

Is this all that life is?

Most people do it. Fine. But most people doing something doesn’t tell me whether I want to spend my life doing it.

I can understand the path without wanting the whole thing.

Then comes selfish.

Is it selfish to say I want something else?

Honestly, I think everyone is selfish to some degree. Even being selfless can give you something. Feeling good. Being needed. Being a good person. A reward in this life or the hypothetical next one.

Keep asking why and it gets quite messy.

That doesn’t mean there’s no good in people. There is.

But I don’t think I need to get to the bottom of human motivation before I can set a boundary.

“I don’t want this” shouldn’t require a philosophy degree.

I do want to live with integrity.

If I make a commitment, that matters. If my choice creates a problem for someone, I don’t get to pretend the problem disappears because I’m following my aliveness.

But why do I keep treating wanting my own life as though it’s already a failure of integrity?

I can say what I want. Someone else can say what they want. Then we can deal with what’s actually there.

That seems more honest than agreeing because it sounds responsible, resenting it, and spending months trying to produce an airtight explanation for why I’m miserable.

I’m learning to be okay being a bit eccentric.

Different. Not needing to prove anything.

And even that doesn’t need to become a grand thing. I don’t need to turn my life into an experiment for the benefit of humanity so that the experiment is allowed.

Let’s just see what this human being does.

Explore. Make something. Find out whether I like it.

It’s going to end one day.

I’d rather spend some of it doing things I want to do than explaining why I’m allowed to want them.