Optimization becoming the entire point can turn into its own kind of trap. But there is another side to it: why does the higher purpose have to come first?
There is an assumption that we should find a grand mission, then optimize ourselves in service of it:
Purpose → optimization → achievement.
I am not sure human beings always develop that neatly. Sometimes the sequence is closer to:
Optimization → experience → change → reflection → purpose.
Maybe someone starts lifting simply because they want to look better. Maybe they track sleep because watching the numbers improve fascinates them. Maybe they get into self-experimentation because they are curious about how far they can push themselves.
For a while, optimization really may be the goal. I think that is okay.
The person at the destination is different
The person who reaches that first destination is not necessarily the same person who started the journey.
You might spend three years building your body, improving your health, experimenting, failing, learning discipline, gaining confidence, meeting different people, and changing your relationship with yourself.
Then one day you look around and think: “Okay. I have optimized the hell out of this. Now what?”
That question, asked then, may produce a completely different answer than forcing yourself to answer it on day one. Sometimes you have to reach a destination to discover that it was not actually the destination. Sometimes you need Chapter 2 before you even have the vocabulary to understand what Chapter 10 should be about.
That is why I am hesitant to judge people who are currently optimizing “for the sake of optimization.” Maybe they have not found the bigger mission yet. Maybe they are not supposed to yet. Maybe this phase is precisely what will create the person capable of recognizing that mission later.
There is value in occasionally asking, “Is this still serving me?” But that is very different from telling someone, “Your pursuit is empty unless you can already explain what higher purpose it serves.”
People have to live their own developmental process. You can share what you learned from yours, but you cannot hand somebody the conclusion and let them skip the experience that would have made it meaningful.
And if somebody eventually decides, “I just enjoy seeing how far I can take my body, health, appearance, or performance,” I am not convinced that needs a grander justification.
Sometimes the journey itself is enough.