I remember thinking I was pretty successful when I got my first 6 figure bonus until I realized that my peers had been getting these kinds of bonuses for the past 8 years and the bonus was small potatoes compared to seeing your portfolio growing by 35 percent each year.
Great post. Media coverage in silicon valley is slanted towards great financial success. It can aggravate the envy in any of us.
The most successful people I know are remarkably disinterested in money as a motivator, and mostly view it as a tool. In most cases, a tool to give control over the work they do more than anything else.
Statistics are a useful reminder of the actual incidence of super high incomes in the country. Reading about silicon valley it's easy to think that loads of people are making $100M left and right. But actually it's closer to one in a million:
(1) Yes, idiots are getting rich. But most idiots are still poor, just like most smart people are poor. No human society has managed to create a lasting positive correlation between merit and success, because we, as people, are too fucking stupid and prone to complacency for that to be stable.
(2) People everywhere exaggerate their success and connections to important people. In finance, you encounter this around bonus time because the bonus is a performance review, so everyone claims to have received the top bonus available to their year.
I really like the 'level of fearlessness' analogy. That's my main reason for wanting more money. My actual material needs are pretty low, and my material 'wants' aren't much higher.
Totally agree. The simple question "do I really fear doing that" is very useful too. I quit my management consulting job to start a company when I asked myself this and answered "anyway I'll always be able to live comfortably so why not"
Money is an attractive nuisance :-) Its too easy to use it as a proxy for 'score'. Kind of silly hearing folks smirk "he's only worth about 50 million." Its a problem I wouldn't mind having but wouldn't sacrifice my family for.
There's nothing wrong with ambition or aiming to make lots of money, but when these are driven by envy you maximise angst on missing a goal and you will always have someone to still envy no matter how successful (unless you're literally one in a billion successful).
I remember thinking I was pretty successful when I got my first 6 figure bonus until I realized that my peers had been getting these kinds of bonuses for the past 8 years and the bonus was small potatoes compared to seeing your portfolio growing by 35 percent each year.
More success means more successful peers.