I thought success meant climbing the corporate ladder faster until Chapter 7 of “The Journey” asked: “What if you’re climbing the wrong ladder entirely?”
The story
Before: I used to think success meant climbing the corporate ladder faster, hitting income targets, and checking boxes everyone else valued. I was constantly comparing myself to others and wondering why I felt empty despite “achieving” things.
After: Chapter 7 of Attila Horvath’s “The Journey” completely rewired how I think about growth. Now I focus on what he calls “un-empirical concepts” – love, wisdom, ethical frameworks – instead of just measurable wins.
The game-changer? Horvath’s Law of the Harvest and Natural Law. You reap what you sow, and your actions have consequences way beyond what you see immediately. This shifted my question from “What will make me successful?” to “What actions align with who I actually am?”
The nine principles hit different when you’re ready: self-education beyond what school taught you, changing your thinking patterns, building new habits that actually serve YOU, taking action instead of just consuming content, building dreams that matter to you personally, staying persistent when it gets hard, managing that voice in your head, learning from failures instead of hiding from them, and finding your actual purpose.
But here’s what really stuck with me – Horvath asks this brutal question: “What if you’re climbing the wrong ladder entirely?”
That question made me realize I was living someone else’s life. The individuation process he talks about – becoming uniquely yourself instead of what everyone expects – is uncomfortable but necessary.
Taking full responsibility for everything changed everything. No more blaming circumstances or other people. When you own your journey completely, you finally get the power to change it.
If you’re tired of following someone else’s blueprint for your life, Chapter 7 gives you permission to build your own.
For more about Chapter 7 of Attila B. Horvath’s book, “The Journey – I wish I knew this before I was 21”, visit https://attilahorvath.net/the-journey.
