Quiet Clarity is a 2x/week newsletter and podcast for people who want to build a life of presence, depth, and deliberate intention.
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Exhaustion doesn’t always mean you’re working hard.
Sometimes it can mean you’re working against yourself.
I used to think if something felt easy, it didn’t count.
But really, I was just afraid that without the struggle, I wouldn’t feel worthy of success.
Where It Showed Up in My Life
Most of my early years were built on fighting who I was.
There was school, with an endless parade of tests and grades.
I remember in middle and high school trying to push myself to score as high as my friends.
I'd watch classmates effortlessly absorb information while I forced myself to memorize, to perform, to keep up.
Their success felt so natural, but mine felt like an uphill battle.
Then there were the "right" paths everyone pushed.
Get good grades, get into a good college, get a stable job and get the promotion.
Every conversation had the same underlying message: What you naturally want to do isn't enough. You need to become something else.
We were all playing by rules that rewarded everything I wasn't good at.
Collaboration was cheating. Building things outside the curriculum was a distraction. Following your excitement was "losing focus."
But then there were a few moments where I just... didn't fight.
In high school, while everyone else was grinding for grades (which I still did, just maybe not as much as them), something pulled me toward building a chess academy.
A lot of people in my life thought I was wasting my time.
But for the first time, something felt effortless.
The work didn't feel like work. The late nights didn't feel like sacrifice.
I'd build a curriculum, teach kids, and organize tournaments. And time would disappear.
This confused me. Was I lazy? Was I taking the easy way out?
Should I have been studying harder for my calculus exam?
What the Wisdom Reveals
In mythology, there's a recurring pattern Joseph Campbell called "refusing the call."
The hero hears their calling but turns away, convinced they're meant for something more normal, more acceptable.
They waste years trying to be someone else's idea of successful.
Moses insisted he couldn't speak well enough to lead.
Jonah literally sailed in the opposite direction from his calling.
Even the Buddha, upon awakening, doubted whether what he realized could be shared. He thought that the truth was too subtle and deep and nobody would understand.
If they had kept refusing, the story would have ended in silence before it began.
But they listened, and that’s why they became the greats.
Most of us spend years refusing our own call.
But everything shifts the moment you lean in—when you stop resisting and finally step into the life that was waiting for you.
There's a beautiful quote I recently came across:
"When a pickpocket meets a saint, he sees only pockets."
For a long time in my life, I was so busy picking the pockets of conventional achievement that I couldn't see what was sacred about my own path.
My teachers saw distraction where there was passion.
My peers saw laziness where there was flow.
I saw weakness where there was gift.
But as I leaned into what I genuinely was pulled by, things started to change.
How I'm Trying to Live Now
I've started to understand something.
Your nature isn't something you need to fix. It's the thing that makes you irreplaceable.
The unconventional bets that actually worked in my life weren't really bets at all.
They were just moments where I stopped fighting myself and leaned into my pull:
The chess academy in high school: That "distraction" became the extracurricular edge that helped get me into my dream school: Berkeley. And it wasn’t because it was strategic, but because it was genuinely what I loved.
Creating content in college while others chased internships: That "waste of time" became the foundation of my entire business and built my personal brand. Not because I planned it, but because I was just so excited by it.
Building my business instead of climbing a corporate ladder: It thrives because I built it around my nature—no rigid structure, creating my own systems, finding people better than me at specific things, orchestrating rather than grinding.
Nowadays I’m still building and creating.
But it comes from flow and not force.
When I follow the pull instead of pushing, things just seem to align.
And yes, life still throws unpredictable things at you.
That doesn’t mean skip responsibilities or quit when it gets hard, it means honor the work that excites you instead of ignoring it.
The world doesn’t need another person strangling their nature to fit a mold.
It needs you to stop bending yourself to fit, and start building from the truth of who you are.
Here are 4 lessons I want to leave you with:
Not every struggle is a signal to quit. Some hard things are misaligned, but others are simply your duty. When I built my chess academy, I still focused on grades. That responsibility wasn’t my calling, but it was necessary. Wisdom is knowing the difference.
Ease isn’t laziness. The work that feels natural to you but valuable to others is your gift. That’s the direction life is pointing you.
Alignment needs both. Gifts without struggle stay shallow. Struggle without gifts burns you out. Real success is carrying your gift through the struggle that matters.
So follow the pull. Trust the step you can’t explain. That’s where every worthy path begins.
