i think the biggest failure of my early twenties was that i never really built anything inside my own life.. i got very good at reacting, consuming, surviving, getting back to "baseline".. life happened *to* me and i became competent at enduring it.. , i realized that getting back to baseline isnt the same thing as building a life that I actually want to exist in, its just continuing to subsist and essentially "float" through a life that was imposed on me through circumstances rather than authorship.. most of what we call "self improvement" today is REACTIVE not proactive.. lose the weight, pay off the debt, reduce the anxiety, leave the place you hate etc etc etc.. all youre really doing is removing what went wrong and you are REACTING to the circumstances life has imposed on you.. authorship is asking a different question: what do i actually want to exist in my life that doesnt exist yet? reactive competence can make you good at restoring a life you never chose.. *authorship* is different bc you are creating something that circumstance did not hand you