What’s the point of all of this again?

Becoming is the only metric that matters

Last week, my friend Kevin Stuckey and I were having a convo about the point of life. This is something we do often, having those big existential discussions about the point of it all. We love paying attention—to the state of the world, the conversations swirling around us, the subtle shifts in what people are yearning for. This time of year is ripe for those reflections. The end of the year invites honesty, vulnerability, and big questions.

The question that keeps surfacing, from our friends, from our communities, and even from ourselves, is this:

What is success today?

No one really seems to know anymore. The old metrics—money, titles, recognition—don’t seem to hold the same weight they used to. They don’t feel like enough. People are wondering: If those things aren’t the goal, then what is? What are we even doing here?

I found myself asking those same questions this week.

Being an entrepreneur is such an emotional rollercoaster ride. We’ve been working on building something for years now. It’s taken different forms over time, and we’re still growing, still figuring it out. By the metrics that matter to us—the inputs—we’re successful. We’re showing up, doing the work, making progress.

But living in an outcome-driven world makes staying focused on inputs hard without compromising or sacrificing to show results that will subdue others voices and opinions.

Sometimes the old voices creep in: Maybe you should go back and get a big-paying job. Maybe this wasn’t worth it. Maybe you should have stayed on the traditional path—you’d have even more now.

And yet, I made a promise to myself that I wouldn’t live like that again. That I wouldn’t trade myself for a check or lose my soul to someone else’s idea of success.

The promise was to stay committed to becoming.

It’s not easy. No one tells you how hard it is to stay the course, to stay in integrity, to trust the process when the world is shouting at you to deliver outcomes. But if there’s one thing I’ve learned, it’s this:

Success is not the goal. Becoming is.

The Life That Looked Like Everything

In 2019, I was at the “top” of my game. I was an executive at Netflix, the biggest cultural powerhouse in the world. My team was doing work people dream about. My name was on lists. Recruiters were in my inbox every week.

At home, things looked just as golden. My husband and I were closing on our dream house in Sherman Oaks. My daughter was thriving in her LA teenage dream life.

From the outside, it was perfect. But inside, I felt like I was dying.

The promotions and raises didn’t bring excitement—just emptiness. The more I achieved, the more life demanded of me, until I felt like a machine in a never-ending loop of meetings, emails, and exhaustion. I was constantly moving, but I wasn’t living.

I began to ask myself: Is this it? Is this what life is supposed to be?

And when I thought about the future and saw the people “above me,” I didn’t have any desire for a bigger jobs, more pressure, more money—I didn’t feel inspired. I felt suffocated.

The Trap of Outcomes

Here’s what I’ve learned about focusing on outcomes: they’re a trap.

Outcomes are always moving. You achieve one goal, and the next one immediately appears. A bigger paycheck. A better title. A more impressive achievement. You keep chasing, because the world convinces you that’s what success looks like. Society changes, and then you have to change too. It’s a target that always moves and I think that’s one of the reasons we’re all so tired.

But outcomes breed anxiety. They tie your worth to external things—things you can’t fully control. They keep you stuck in cycles of overworking, overthinking, and overcompensating.

And the worst part? They don’t fulfill you.

Focusing on inputs, on the other hand, sets you free.

When you focus on the process—on the work itself, on your alignment, on becoming—you’re no longer tethered to the world’s expectations. You’re free to experiment, practice out loud, to rest, to take joy in the journey instead of the destination.

And most importantly, you’re free to be in full expression of yourself.

The Cost of Burning It All Down

When the pandemic hit in 2020, everything I’d been ignoring came to the surface. Netflix became unbearable. My marriage started to crumble. Life felt like it was falling apart.

I didn’t know what to do, so I threw myself into something new. I took a job at Clubhouse, hoping that a change of scenery might fix what was broken. But nothing had changed—not in me, not in the way I was living.

By 2021, I was sitting alone in my dream house, drinking Casamigos straight, and crying out to God:

"God, I just want to be free. I want to feel life. I want to feel fulfilled. I don’t want this life I’ve created. If you have to burn it all down, burn it."

And He did.

Burning it down wasn’t one dramatic moment. There were actually many dramatic moments but it was a slow unraveling. Piece by piece, the life I’d built fell away. The house, the job, the status, the attention, friends, lifestyle, the version of myself I thought I had to be—all of it had to go.

But no one tells you what burning it down costs.

• The shame: People will look at you like you’re crazy. Friends will question you. Family will worry. And you’ll question yourself, wondering if you made the wrong choice.

• The loneliness: Becoming means stepping off the well-worn path. It’s walking a road most people don’t understand. You’ll feel the weight of leaving behind your old communities.

• The sadness: You’ll mourn the version of yourself that fit into the life you’re leaving behind. It will come in waves, surprising you when you least expect it.

The Practice of Becoming

The metric of success isn’t money or titles or approval. It’s becoming.

Becoming isn’t a destination—it’s a daily practice. It’s the commitment to inputs over outcomes, integrity over performance, and freedom over expectation.

Here’s how I’ve learned to stay in the practice:

1. Ask God. You are His idea, not your own. Ask Him what He designed you for. Trust Him to show you.

2. Learn your design. Pay attention to what energizes you. What are your gifts? Who are you meant to serve? This isn’t about hustling for purpose—it’s about recognizing what’s already in you.

3. Mourn who you thought you were. To step into who you’re becoming, you have to let go of who you’ve been. That’s a real loss, and it deserves space.

4. Reflect daily. Ask yourself:

   • Am I becoming who God called me to be?

   • Am I aligned with my design?

   • Did I serve who I was meant to serve today?

If you can say yes to those questions, nothing else matters.

When you choose becoming, you find freedom. You find joy. You find alignment with the person you were always meant to be.

The only metric that matters is this: Are you becoming who you were created to be? Everything else is just noise.

Sending you so much love,

m