The project I kept putting off

Back from a hiatus to focus building on Voter Choice. Thanks for your patience.

Earlier this year, I was focused on finding a job or clients. I was building a portfolio and figuring out how to present myself professionally.

The voting app was an idea I kept putting behind that work, even after sharing a candidate-research prompt during the Texas primaries in March. I wanted to help people research members of Congress through their voting records, campaign funding, and stock trades.¹

The trouble was that I couldn’t get myself to care about the career and brand work in the way I thought I should. Networking took a lot out of me. The content I was writing made sense as a professional strategy, but it wasn’t what I wanted to be writing about. I kept thinking about the social problems I wanted to spend my time on instead.

I had a lot of assumptions about what success was supposed to look like for me. The voting idea wasn’t part of that picture. I was treating it as something I could get to later, when I had more time or a clearer professional direction.

But I wasn’t getting closer to that direction by ignoring what I wanted to do.

But I Still Haven’t Found What I’m Looking For

I think a lot these days about the lives of the wealthy.

Not in the lavish lifestyle sense, but whether they found that sense of fulfillment after “making it” that our culture often assumes. I lurk on wealth subreddits, listen to podcasts, and occasionally read a book written by a wealthy person who writes candidly about it.

These stories don’t tell me how every wealthy person feels. But they do make me wonder what we expect success to give us.

We’re told that success brings satisfaction and significance. That once we’ve made it, we’ll find something that’s missing from our lives now.

Yet I keep hearing stories of people who reached that milestone and still felt something missing. They found satisfaction and pride along the way, but it wasn’t “it.” So they chase down a new dream. A bigger number to earn. Another venture. More power and prestige.

What if I’m not maximizing this one life that I have?

Shouldn’t I be striving for more?

There’s little room in this mindset for having less, only more.

Research suggests that the kind of goal matters, too. A study of recent college graduates found that reaching goals around growth, close relationships, health, and community was linked to better well-being. Reaching goals around money, fame, and image didn’t show the same benefit.²

That doesn’t settle what success means for each of us. But it gives me another reason to question what we’re asking it to do.

In a recent Exit Paradox interview, Eric Ries describes one version of this as “status farming.” Someone who no longer needs more money may still want more recognition, respect, or influence.³

He remembers preparing to give a talk to 800 people and deciding that if even one founder avoided some of the pain he’d experienced because of what he shared, the effort would be worthwhile.³ I think about the difference between that and needing the audience to prove your significance.

Sometimes what we seek through money and power is a sense of belonging, connection, or value. To feel enough.

Giving the idea a chance

My coach helped me see that I’d already ruled out the voting app without testing it. I was assuming that the work I cared about couldn’t succeed, and then using that assumption to keep doing work I didn’t feel connected to.

A 2025 review of research found that pursuing goals rooted in our own interests and values was linked to greater effort, progress, and well-being.⁴ It couldn’t tell me whether the app would succeed. But it made sense of why I wanted to give it a chance.

So I gave myself three months to try.

Less than a month in, I knew I wanted to keep going. I didn’t have the results yet, but I felt better about what I was doing with my days.

Before the results came in

That was the part I hadn’t expected. I thought taking on problems I couldn’t solve would leave me more discouraged. But setting them aside hadn’t been helping either.

Working on the app gave those concerns somewhere to go. I felt more satisfied even with the outcome still uncertain.

I don’t think we need to fully give up on the narrative of wealth and success, either. They allow for greater comforts and opportunities, and motivate us to pursue ambitious work. Research also finds that higher income is linked to greater day-to-day happiness for most people.⁵

But I do think we can be more careful about what we expect success to bring.

I still care about finding work and earning a living. I also don’t want to keep treating the work I care about as something I have to earn the right to do later.

For me, building Voter Choice has been a way to put that into practice. I haven’t answered every question about where it will lead. But I’m glad I gave it a chance.

You can try it here, or listen to my conversation with Juliet MacDowell on Between us and the Machine.⁶

I also want to thank Chris Scott, Masuma Ahuja, Chris Taylor, Abdullah Faisal, Mani Jonnalagadda, Grace Hu-Morley, Sukhi Grewal, Rupa Chaturvedi, Kevin Keiper, Shannon Hosmer, Ophelia Senfter, and Jonas Kuhn for your time, insights and feedback. You’ve helped shape Voter Choice, and I can’t thank you enough 🙏

Sending you all my best,

Muxin

References

Footnotes

1. Voter Choice.

2. Niemiec, C. P., Ryan, R. M., & Deci, E. L. (2009). “The path taken: Consequences of attaining intrinsic and extrinsic aspirations in post-college life.” Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 291–306. Full text.

3. Eric Ries, interview with Anastasia Koroleva, “Why Building Again Can Be Harder After Success,” Exit Paradox, episode 61, 55:29. Spotify · Transcript.

4. Sezer, B., et al. (2025). “Goal motives, approach/avoidance appraisals, psychological needs, and well-being: A systematic review and meta-analysis.” Motivation Science, 11, 259–276. Paper.

5. Killingsworth, M. A., Kahneman, D., & Mellers, B. (2023). “Income and emotional well-being: A conflict resolved.” PNAS, 120, e2208661120. Paper.

6. Muxin Li, interview with Juliet MacDowell, “Can AI Be Safe in a System Built to Race?”, Between us and the Machine — How to build AI that deepens our humanity, October 1, 2026. Spotify.