Rebuilding My Why

Why? That's the question we're always told to ask from a young age. To truly understand something, we need to know why. But as we grow, why becomes less of a question we ask and more of one we forget to answer for ourselves.

As a kid, "Why?" was how I learned. Why does the sky change color? Why does the Earth revolve around the Sun and not the other way around? Why do people chase money? Why do soft skills matter?

Losing people I looked up to, people whose drive and story pushed me, made me question again. Why? What's the point? Why do we do this?

My answer keeps changing, as it should. But it always comes back to one thing. I want to build something that outlasts me. Something that makes a tangible impact on the world, whether big or small.

Before I started Ryft, I was planning to go into investment banking. It made sense on paper. Structured path, clear reward. But it didn't answer my why. I realized I didn't want to analyze other people's work, I wanted to create my own. I enjoyed spreadsheets. I enjoyed the numbers. But I didn't see meaning in them. Numbers only mattered if they represented something I built.

The Drift

Months before I started Ryft, I was withdrawn. My family and I had lost someone very near and dear to us. Someone who did a "first class" job of showing us what real fight was. Even before that, every day felt like a blur. I was away from my family for the first time. I felt alone. I had no one. I would live my life in my room watching TV and doing my homework, but none of it felt meaningful. It always felt like I was just going through the motions.

I kept telling myself that it was just part of growing up. I told myself it would pass. But it was more than that. I would go to class, come back, and feel nothing. No real excitement, no real direction or sense of purpose.

When you lose someone who meant so much to your family, time slows down. You start measuring time not by what you achieved but by what you lost. That was me. I wasn't working towards anything. I was surviving, not living.

There were a lot of days where I had great days. But more days where I had bad days. Not because something bad had happened but simply because things just felt bad. I can't really say how or why I got myself out of the hole. Maybe it is true that time heals all wounds. But as I felt myself coming out of this hole I dug for myself, I realized that no one was going to get me out of it.

No one was coming to save me. I had to pull myself out. Slowly, I started doing small things. Reading again, writing ideas down, reaching out to people who inspired me, even rebuilding relationships that I broke. I didn't know what I was looking for, but I knew I couldn't keep waiting for life to feel meaningful on its own.

That's when I started working towards a summer internship. Luckily I was able to land one and my whole focus became preparing myself for that summer.

The Spark

On my first day, I noticed it. The inefficiency. Spreadsheets that didn't line up. Numbers that made no sense but still drove decisions. Everyone accepted it as normal. I couldn't. I couldn't understand why something so tedious was normalized. I believed there had to be a better way to do this.

The more I dug into it, the more I realized it wasn't just my team, it was the whole system. Sales commissions, reporting, operations, it all felt broken. Every company had the same problem, but no one was fixing it.

That's when the switch flipped. For the first time, I felt that spark again. I started sketching ideas at night, building small models, researching every tool in the market. The pain point was real, and I couldn't stop thinking about it.

I started small. Nights spent on Google Docs, endless Google searches, hours of conversations with ChatGPT. I'd lose track of time, something that hadn't happened in a long while. Every new idea felt like oxygen. The more I built, the less I thought about the things that used to weigh me down. The more I created, the less lost I felt.

The early days of Ryft were exactly what you'd expect from a first-time founder. Messy cold emails, wrong turns, uncertainty at every step. But for the first time, I was chasing something that mattered. I was building and learning for myself, not for grades, teachers, or peers, but for clarity. For purpose.

Building Ryft wasn't smooth. The first version of the team had zero alignment. Everyone wanted the title but not the grind. Some cared about resumes, some about the "startup" image, but few actually wanted to build. It was frustrating, pouring everything into something when the people around you didn't match that energy.

For a while, I questioned if I was the problem. Maybe I was asking for too much. Maybe no one cared the way I did. But over time, I realized conviction can't be taught. You can't make someone believe in something they don't feel.

It took months before the right people showed up, the ones who worked because they believed, not because they were told to. That's when I understood my "why" wasn't just about building a product. It was about building with people who shared that same purpose. The "why" became collective.

Once the team finally clicked, the pace shifted overnight. We aren't just talking about ideas anymore, we're executing. Every new pilot, every tiny win reminds us that progress doesn't come from perfection. It comes from persistence.

But it still isn't easy. There are days when nothing works, when every line of code breaks and every outreach gets ignored. The difference is, we won't stop. We trust that if we keep showing up, the breakthrough will come. And slowly but surely it will. We're not exactly where I want to be. However, I have full belief that if we continue to trust each other and hold onto our why, we will achieve our goals.

The Why

Looking back, I realize the why I started with has evolved. It's no longer just about me finding meaning. It's about us. The people who believed when no one else did. The vision we're chasing together. The impact we want to leave behind.

Building Ryft taught me that purpose isn't something you wait to find. It's something you build, day by day, choice by choice. My why isn't a statement anymore. It's a process. It's every late night, every setback, every win. It's proof that even when things fall apart, you can always rebuild your company, your team, and yourself.

Losing someone changes the way you see time. It makes you realize how fragile everything is, how fast it can all disappear. For a while, that thought used to scare me. Now it drives me.

Entrepreneurship, in its own way, became how I processed that loss. It gave me a way to turn pain into purpose, to create something lasting out of something that felt like it ended too soon. Every time I build, I think about the people who showed me what real strength looks like. They taught me how to fight. Ryft is how I keep fighting for them.