The Highest Form of Success Is Choice

Gelme: When I was younger, I always wanted to be different from my parents and from other people in the things I owned.

With age, that became less important.

I can follow rules.

I can blend into the mass.

Now my individuality is more about not automatically following the patterns that are given to us.

You have to have a certain car.

You have to have a certain job.

You have to do certain things because society says that is the successful way to live.

For me, the most important things are my freedom and my time.

How I spend my life.

That is much more important to me now than simply looking different.

The Other Voice: Maybe when we are young, individuality often asks:

“How can I show that I am different?”

But later the question becomes:

“Is this actually the life I want?”

A person can look completely conventional from the outside and still live a very individual life if the important decisions genuinely belong to her.

Gelme: I agree.

For me, a successful life is when I can make my decisions not because circumstances are telling me I have to make them that way, but because I believe that is the right decision for me.

That is the highest success you can have in life.

The Other Voice: Of course, none of us can make every decision completely freely.

Money matters.

Responsibilities matter.

Age matters.

The people we love matter.

Life always places some boundaries around us.

So maybe freedom does not mean:

“Nothing ever forces my decisions.”

Maybe it means:

“As much as reasonably possible, the important decisions of my life belong to me.”

Gelme: That is closer to what I mean.

There will always be things we have to do.

That is life.

But I don't want my whole life to become something I have to do.

I want to have enough freedom to decide:

“This is how I want to spend my time.”

“This matters to me.”

“This doesn't.”

Because time is really what we have.

The Other Voice: And perhaps that is why money matters to you in a very particular way.

Not only because of what it can buy.

Money can protect choice.

Choice can protect time.

And time is the finite thing underneath almost everything we have been talking about.

Gelme: I never wanted success just so I could say that I was successful.

I don't need a certain car or a certain house because somebody decided those things prove that you made it.

If I have to give away all of my time just to maintain the image of a successful life, then I don't see that as success.

The Other Voice: Then your definition is almost the opposite of the usual one.

Instead of asking:

“How much have I accumulated?”

you are asking:

“How much of my life actually belongs to me?”

Gelme: That is really how I see it.

You can make more money.

You can buy another thing.

Many things can be replaced.

But you cannot replace your time.

Once it is gone, it is gone.

The Other Voice: We started this whole part of the conversation by talking about handmade objects and why human time may become more valuable.

But maybe the same question applies to our own lives.

Who gets to decide what our finite time is worth?

Gelme: As much as possible, I want that decision to belong to me.

For me, that is freedom.