Comment by submeta

It’s sort of like the parent whose kids have finally left home or the person who hits retirement after decades of routine. You spend so long in a role that demands all your energy—raising children, clocking into work, scaling a startup—that once it’s gone, it feels disorienting. It’s not really about the money he made; it’s about losing the sense of urgency and purpose that kept him going. Now he’s stuck figuring out how to fill that void, which is something parents and retirees often deal with, too.

Professional athletes who retire face a similar void after years of training for a single goal; military personnel returning from deployment often grapple with the loss of a clear mission; newly graduated students or PhD candidates who’ve just defended their thesis can feel a void, too. It’s the same pattern: once your main structure or purpose vanishes, you have to figure out how to fill the space it leaves behind.

His story is not about money. Although many see that as the main info here, it’s not. It’s about losing identity, the main goal in life.