Chasing Success, Carrying Anxiety: The Karma You Don't See
Success never quiets the anxiety underneath it. Hustle culture runs on karma — a restless cycle of chasing the next job, package, or achievement in hopes of filling an inner void. Young professionals in Bangalore who've "succeeded" on paper remain fearful, ashamed, and unsettled within, proof that success is a liar: it promises liberation but delivers only debt. Anxiety itself traces not to the future but to a present that's been neglected, and real freedom from restlessness begins only by turning inward.
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Questioner: Hello, sir. So, my first question is: in practical life, we see that restlessness is kind of rewarded. There's this concept of a side hustle in working professionals. You are, if you're not working a side hustle, if you're not working on your next great startup idea, then you're wasting your time. So it seems that we've built a world that does not allow us to come to a place of self-understanding and this place of effortless rest. So I wanted to understand.
Acharya Prashant: Why do we hustle? We hustle because we feel there is an inadequacy within, and if I achieve this or achieve that, I'll be able to plug the void. There is a loneliness or restlessness within, something incomplete, and if I elbow out the other, there is that prized catch, there is that fabled destination. If I reach there, then I'll be home.
It has happened not once but several times in my last one month of stay at Bangalore. I take long walks and I meet youngsters. The city is full of youngsters only, and they would come and discuss, and 80% of the discussions, sir, have been about the hustle itself.
