I wish you a happy new year.

If I had to summarise one big lesson from my life so far, this would be it:

Most people design their work first and then try to squeeze life around it.

I’ve learned to do the opposite, and it has changed everything.

When we’re younger, it makes sense to chase momentum.

You say yes to opportunities, long hours, fast growth. I did the same.

I built an agency early, scaled it quickly, ran teams, handled pressure, and played the “more is better” game.

It taught me discipline, skill, and resilience. No regrets there.

But at some point, especially after family enters the picture, the cost of not designing life consciously becomes very clear. We also start ageing. Ageing actually starts at 30, but we ignore it until 40 or 50 when it's too late.

Instead of thinking about health and family, I was trained by society to ask:

"What's next?", "How do I scale?", "How do I grow from here?", "What to buy next?", "Who to hire next?", "How can I make more?".

In essence, all these questions are all versions of the same mindset:

Society's ask of us to not be happy where we presently are.

After realising this, I started asking a different question..

Not “How do I grow/scale this?”​
But “What kind of day do I actually want to live?”

Start with non-negotiables, not goals

Most people start with income goals, titles, or milestones.

I started with non-negotiables.

Things like:

• Being present with my children daily, not “when work allows”
• Having unhurried mornings
• Protecting health and sleep
• Working deeply, not constantly
• Living in a place that feels calm, not competitive

Only after writing these down did I allow work back into the picture.

This is where many people get uncomfortable. They worry this approach will make them “less ambitious”.

In reality, it does the opposite. It forces clarity.

I choose clarity and alignment over ambition and social comparison.

When life's real values are clear, work decisions become simpler.

You say no faster. You stop overbuilding. You stop confusing movement with progress.

Businesses are tools, not identities

One of the biggest mental shifts for me was separating who I am from what I run.

For a long time, the agency wasn’t just work: it was identity.

Letting go of that felt risky. But once I reframed businesses as tools, not extensions of my self-worth, everything softened.

A tool exists to serve a purpose. If it no longer fits your hand or your life, you either modify it or put it down.

That’s how I now see work:

• Business is a cash-flow tool
• Content is a legacy tool
• Investments are a wealth compounding tool
• Geography is a lifestyle optimisation tool

None of them define me.

They support the life I want to live now, not a hypothetical future version of myself.

Geography is part of life design

Choosing to live in Vietnam wasn’t about running away from anything. It was about reducing friction.

Lower cost of living, slower pace, fewer distractions, more nature, more family time.

Same skills. Same internet. Radically different nervous system response.

This is something I wish more people considered:

You don’t always need to earn more. Sometimes you just need to need less.

When your baseline expenses drop, pressure drops.

When pressure drops, decision-making improves. When decisions improve, life quality compounds quietly.

Design for calm, not maximum output

Here’s a slightly unpopular view:​
If your life only works when you’re operating at peak performance, it’s fragile.

I no longer design days assuming high motivation.

I design them assuming normal energy. Systems, routines, and simple defaults do the heavy lifting.

I work deeply, but not endlessly. I train regularly, but not obsessively.

I eat simply. I invest passively. I aim for sustainability, not intensity.

This doesn’t make life smaller. It makes it more repeatable.

Freedom needs structure

One important counterpoint:

Life-first design only works if you respect structure.

Freedom without boundaries becomes drift.

Designing life first doesn’t mean doing “whatever you feel like”. It means choosing constraints intentionally.

My calendar is lighter than before, but it’s deliberate.

My commitments are fewer, but clearer.

The quiet payoff

The biggest benefit of this approach isn’t more money or even more time.

It’s mental spaciousness.

Fewer internal negotiations. Less rushing.

Less “I should be doing something else right now.”

More presence with my kids. More patience in conversations. More energy for things that actually matter.

If I were sharing this with you as a friend, I’d say this:

You don’t need to redesign your whole life overnight.

Start by redesigning one ideal day.

Then one week.

Then one year.

Let work adapt to that, not the other way around.

Wish you a happy new year.

Regards,

Rishabh