I am going to say something about religion and then get out of the way. I am a relatively religious person. I believe in God. I apologize for bringing it into a conversation about a career, but I think being authentic matters more, and I do not want to pretend I am a secular person when I am not. I am not imposing anything on anybody. I am telling you a thought process, and whether you are Christian, or you believe in God some other way, or you do not believe at all, I think it is still useful.
Ask most people in my position why they believe in God and the answer comes back fast. I want to go to heaven. I want paradise.
"Why do you believe in God?" "Because I want to go to heaven." What did that person just admit?
You are not worshiping God in that case. You are worshiping paradise. And the test is simple: if there were no heaven and no hell, would you still believe? If the answer is no, then the belief was never the thing, the reward was, and you have started the most important relationship in your life from the wrong position.
The same mistake has a form everybody recognizes. My wife met me more than twenty years ago. Imagine if she had said, Kuzzat, one day if I marry you I am going to live in a beautiful house, and that is why I want to marry you. We have a word for that and it is not a kind one. It is a bad position to start from because there is no love in it. The love has to be the purpose. The better life is the outcome.
And I can show you the difference held up against a hard year, because we had one. Out of the right purpose we built a family. We supported each other in the difficult days and in the good days. We did not quit each other when things got difficult, we stuck together, and that is why we have a better life now and four children in it. The better life was never the thing she came for. It is what the thing she came for produced.