[dmilicevic]

life, existence, other people are endlessly complicated. Spending too much time observing and figuring them out, prevents you from living and enjoying it. Something like Heisenberg uncertainty principle in quantum physics.

All my emotions are there with a reason, it's important to figure out what is it.

self-discipline and pursuit of your goals is a road to healthy, stable self-confidence and self-esteem.

Everyone around you seem to know how you should lead your life, listen to only those whose life is similar to what you aspire, filter out the rest.

Surround yourself with people that make you feel good. Cut out the toxic relationships and habits.

Practise gratitude for the people in your life, your health etc...

Do things that matter to you.

[Aty2685]

> listen to only those whose life is similar to what you aspire, filter out the rest

So I believe for the most part, I have been following this advice and I'm not sure if it has been optimal for achieving my goal. I'm not debating, I quite literally don't know. I'm current attending university.

The issue is, I aspire to start my own company, and eventually build a billion dollar company. That is my life's ambition and I will do anything to make it happen. The issue is, the vast majority of people Ive met in university just want to work for Google or Facebook, and don't have any other aspirations outside that.

I purposefully push people away and don't listen to advice because I don't think somebody whose entire purpose in life is to work at Google is somebody I want to be close friends with. I'll be nice to them, but not super close. It really stings because I haven't really made any close friends here and have a hard time fitting in. That's a sacrifice I'm willing to make but I'm not sure it's the optimal path to my goal.

Maybe the optimal path is becoming close friends with these people even though your goals aren't aligned?

Am I going about life wrong?

[justsomeguy3591]

In my experience being good friends with people =/= accepting and applying their life advice. I have plenty of people I consider good friends who do almost nothing to further my career goals but are worth so much to me in terms of emotional support, companionship, and sharing in common interests.

Regarding the Google/Facebook group of potential friends: I would describe most people there as hardworking, diligent, and smart - all wonderful traits to look for in friends even if your end goals aren't necessarily aligned. And given the nature of the companies they're working for - there's plenty of value in hearing their perspective of how things operate from the inside of these companies in addition to the potential networking/social connection opportunities.

My advice (for whatever it's worth) would be to focus on finding a few people you could consider mentors or advisors - preferably people that have founded or are in the process of founding companies and look to them for advice on your particular path and situations. You're right that you likely won't find these people at school; I'd say the a better bet would be something like AngelList, Twitter, in-person events, or even cold-emailing those who you think you can provide some value to (this is important).

Best of luck on your adventure!

[dmilicevic]

Exactly! It doesn't necessarily mean that you shouldn't be good friends with people, only because you wouldn't apply their life advices. There are many other qualities in people that you can benefit from.

[justsomeguy3591]

> Everyone around you seem to know how you should lead your life, listen to only those whose life is similar to what you aspire, filter out the rest.

Well put. I thought about this a bit when collecting advice on next career steps from a range of acquaintances and contacts earlier this year - I realized that it made almost no difference the level of detail/context I provided to them about my situation - they invariably ended up suggesting something in line with what they wished they would've done themselves.

So my way of handling that was just like you wrote - working backwards and prioritizing the feedback from people whose path seems to be in line with my own and heavily de-prioritizing the rest regardless of who they were.

> Do things that matter to you.

Also, simple but true.

[dmilicevic]

Glad we're on the same page with this.