# Overcoming Existential Crises: Finding Meaning in Uncertain Times
It hits you at the strangest moments.
Maybe it’s 3 AM when you can’t sleep, or mid-meeting when everyone’s nodding along and you’re thinking, “What am I actually doing here?” That hollow feeling when everything looks fine on the outside but something fundamental feels off. I’ve been there—staring at a life that checked all the boxes while wondering why it felt so empty.
If you’re in one of those seasons right now, where the big questions won’t leave you alone and the answers feel impossibly far away, I want you to know something: this disorientation isn’t a sign that you’re broken. It might actually be the beginning of something important.
But something felt empty. In that moment, a question hit me hard: “Is this really what it’s all about?”
Maybe you know that feeling. The late-night doubts that creep in when everyone else is sleeping. The weight of wondering if all this hustle actually means something.
Here’s the truth: If you’re building something meaningful, you’re going to face moments that shake you to your core—moments where the path ahead seems unclear, and the “why” behind it all feels distant.
I call these existential speedbumps.
They’re those moments when success feels hollow, and the endless pursuit of more leaves you questioning everything. But here’s what I’ve learned: These moments aren’t just normal. They’re necessary.
## The Heart of an Existential Crisis
Think of an existential crisis like standing at the summit of a mountain you’ve been climbing for years. Instead of feeling triumphant, you look around and wonder: “Now what?”
It hits different for us entrepreneurs.
We’re taught to chase goals, to hustle, to achieve. But no one prepares us for what happens when we get there. When we finally reach our milestones, the feeling is often overshadowed by a sense of isolation and vulnerability—the achievement we envisioned can morph into a daunting realization of new challenges and responsibilities that nobody warned us about.
It requires understanding patterns of uncertainty, navigating the unpredictable nature of success, and learning that the journey doesn’t end with a goal reached; in many ways, it’s just beginning.
I remember closing a major deal—one I’d been working on for months. Instead of celebration, I felt a strange emptiness. The target I’d been aiming at was gone. And with it, my sense of direction.
This isn’t weakness. It’s human. And it happens precisely because we’re the kind of people who push boundaries and ask big questions.
## Why Entrepreneurs Feel This More Deeply
We’re wired differently, you and I.
We see possibilities where others see problems. We dream bigger, push harder, and often tie our identity to our impact in ways that most people never will. But that’s exactly why the existential questions hit us harder.
I learned this lesson when my first company crossed $1M in revenue.
Instead of popping champagne, I found myself sitting alone in my backyard, wondering if this was really what I’d worked so hard for.
The truth? Success amplifies our existential questions. It doesn’t answer them.
When you’re sprinting toward a goal, you don’t have time to question the race. But when you pause—even for a moment—the big questions flood in: Is this making a difference? Am I building something meaningful? What happens when I reach all my goals and still feel this gnawing sense that something essential is missing?
## Finding Your Way Through the Fog
Here’s what works for me:
**Embrace the questions.** Don’t run from the doubt. Sit with it. Let it teach you something about yourself that you couldn’t have learned any other way.
**Get physical.** Some of my clearest insights come during long runs or heavy lifting sessions—there’s something about moving your body that quiets the mind and creates space for wisdom to surface.
**Find your people.** Not the networking kind. The real kind. The ones who get it, who’ve walked through their own dark nights of the soul and emerged with stories worth telling.
**Write it down.** Get the thoughts out of your head and onto paper. They’re less scary there. And patterns start to emerge that you couldn’t see when everything was swirling around in your skull.
**Remember death.** Sound dark? Maybe. But nothing brings clarity quite like remembering we’re all temporary—it helps separate what matters from what doesn’t with startling efficiency.
## Turning Crisis into Clarity
The breakthrough came for me on a trail run.
Halfway up a mountain, lungs burning, I realized something: The existential questions weren’t the problem. Running from them was.
These moments of doubt? They’re invitations. Invitations to go deeper, to build with more purpose, to lead with more humanity than you thought you had in you.
Every time I’ve faced these questions head-on, something powerful has emerged on the other side. A clearer vision. A stronger why. A better way forward that I never could have found by staying comfortable.
## The Truth About Finding Meaning
Here’s what I know now: Meaning isn’t something you find once and keep forever.
It’s something you create, daily, through small choices and brave actions.
The existential crisis you’re feeling? It might be the best thing that’s happened to your business—and to you. Because when you emerge (and you will emerge), you’ll build differently. Lead differently. Live differently.
You’ll stop chasing success for its own sake. And start creating success that matters.
Remember: The questions that keep you up at night are the same ones that can wake you up to a better way of living and leading.
So here’s to the questions. Here’s to the doubt. Here’s to building something that matters.
## Related Reading
Making Impact and Finding Purpose in Finance with Christan Hiscock
