I can still remember the very simple version of security I carried with me when I was young.
Do well at school. Be a good boy. Get good grades. Do not create problems.
That was the path in front of me, and I followed it. I was naturally someone who liked clear goals, so it gave me something solid to aim for. At first, I did not think much beyond the next report card. But as I got older, the message became stronger: school was not only about doing well. It was about getting the right education, earning the best degree possible, and making sure I would be safe one day.
My engineering degree became the picture I held in my mind. I saw it as my cushion. My safety net. If I could get there, life would be secure.
Today, I do not think that belief was wrong. But I do think it was incomplete.
The path that felt like the only path
When I was a teenager, I sometimes felt an itch for something different. I wondered whether I might start a business or find another way to build a life. There was curiosity in me. A feeling that perhaps there were paths I could not yet see.
But almost everyone around me agreed on the same plan. My parents wanted the best for me. Society around me had the same message. First get your degree. First make sure you have something to fall back on. Afterwards, you can try whatever you want.
So I put the other questions aside and focused on what was in front of me.
I worked towards the degree, then towards the best job I could get, and then towards moving forward in my career. At first, I was building a safety net. But slowly, without a big decision or a dramatic moment, something else joined in.
Achievement became part of my identity.
I wanted to improve every year. I wanted to be good at what I did. I wanted people to come to me with questions and see me as someone useful. I wanted to be needed. There was also comparison—sometimes with peers, sometimes with old friends, sometimes simply with the image I had in my own mind of the person I thought I should become.
I was not unhappy with it. In many ways, I was doing what I had been taught to do. I was responsible, committed, and moving upwards.
But I was no longer asking myself whether I was building the life I truly wanted. I was simply continuing on the track.
When the degree stopped being the whole answer
I still value my degree deeply. It has given me opportunities, and it continues to give me a sense of practical confidence.
If things went completely wrong financially with my investments or businesses, I know I could use my skills to find a well-paid job again. I would have something real to offer. That matters. It is a genuine form of security.
But after a while, I started to understand that a degree can be a safety net without being the whole answer to life.
You can have a good education, work hard, earn well, and still be tired. You can be successful on paper and still feel that something important is missing. You can keep trying to become more secure while your inner world is asking for attention.
For me, that moment did not arrive as one clear revelation. It came gradually, through feeling the demands of daily life more heavily.
I began to feel that I could not really cope with the pace any more. I was tired. I needed more capacity just to keep up. That was when I began looking into meditation and the importance of rest.
And if I am honest, I did not start there because I had a beautiful, proactive plan for a balanced life. I started there because I felt I needed something to make me stronger. I was looking for a way to carry the same demands better.
That was an important moment for me to see clearly. I had not been taught much about emotional maturity, relationships, health, sleep, food, rest, or inner peace. I had been taught how to work hard and prepare for the future. But I had not been taught how to develop all the other parts of myself that make a life feel whole.
I was trying to survive, not thrive
I do not say this to dismiss financial responsibility. Basic needs matter. When someone is worried about housing, food, health, or income, it is difficult to speak about meditation or balance as though those things solve everything.
But I am talking about something that happens after the basic foundation is in place.
There can still be a strong feeling of urgency. A fear that we are not doing enough. That we need one more qualification, one more promotion, one more achievement, one more level of savings before we are finally allowed to relax.
For a long time, I think I lived with that feeling without fully questioning it.
I had created some practical security, but I was still relating to life from a place of pressure. I was focused on protecting myself from what might go wrong. I was trying to become safe enough to stop feeling afraid.
Stepping away from the rat race gave me something I had not had before: space in my mind.
That space is something I wrote about in Why Creating Time Was the Best Investment I Ever Made. I needed room to think before I could see that the security I was chasing was only part of the life I wanted.
It gave me the energy to look at my life and ask a better question. Not only, How can I make sure I survive? But, What would it mean for me to truly thrive?
That question changed the way I see security.
The security I am building now
Today, I still want practical foundations. I want to be responsible with money. I want to build skills, make thoughtful decisions, and create more than one option for my family. I do not believe in living carelessly and hoping everything will work out.
But the kind of security I am really trying to build is much wider than that.
It is having enough calm in my mind to make good decisions. It is sleeping well and looking after my health so I have the energy to be present. It is developing emotional maturity, so I can deal with difficult moments without allowing them to control me. It is being able to communicate honestly with the people close to me and build relationships that are real.
It is also trusting that I can adapt.
The world is changing quickly. I do not know exactly what work will look like for my children in ten or fifteen years. I do not know which technologies will change the way people earn a living. I cannot give them a perfect map.
But I can try to give them something deeper than a map.
I can teach them to know themselves. To recognise their strengths and weaknesses. To notice which environments help them grow and which ones slowly drain them. To learn how to contribute value in a way that is authentic to them, instead of only doing what fear tells them is safe.
I want them to understand financial literacy, of course. I want them to be able to care for themselves and make responsible decisions. But I do not want them to believe that one degree, one job, or one narrow path is the only road to security.
From fear to contribution
One of the deepest changes for me has been realising that security is not only in what I have achieved. It is also in the person I am becoming.
When I have the capacity to communicate with people, understand what they need, stay authentic to myself, and look for ways to be useful, I trust that I can create value. And when I can create value, I can find ways to create income.
That feels very different from constantly trying to prove that I am safe enough.
It does not mean fear disappears. It does not mean I have all the answers. This has been a gradual understanding built over years, not one insight I woke up with one morning.
But I feel more peaceful when I remember that my security is not held in one thing. It is not held only in a degree, a job title, a business, or an investment account.
It is held in a combination of practical responsibility and personal development. In my ability to learn. In my health. In my relationships. In my inner world. In my willingness to remain flexible and take responsibility for what I can control.
That is why I no longer see the goal as simply surviving with as little risk as possible.
I want to thrive. I want to use the time I have well. I want to keep learning, stay close to the people I love, and contribute in a way that feels true to who I am.
And I hope this blog can offer a small moment of space for someone else who feels too tired or too busy to ask these questions. Sometimes, all we need is a small spark of curiosity: perhaps there is another way to live. Perhaps security can feel more human than we were taught.
That is the kind of security I was really trying to build.
About Patrick
The education system taught us to be good employees. Nobody taught us to build wealth. I share the mindset shifts and real decisions that create financial freedom — so you can skip the decade of trial and error I went through. Here’s how it started →
