Why I Have NO FRIENDS (and why it's a good thing)

I’m 17 years old, and I have no friends.

Well, tbh, that’s a bit of a lie.

Hopefully you’ve realised by now that a lot of my titles are slightly exaggerated - I do have some friends.

I talk to some people at school, I have mates at football, I do go out and see friends maybe once every few weeks.

But definitely not as much as most people would say I “should” at my age.

My typical day looks something like: wake up at 6am, work for an hour or so, go to school, go to the gym/football training, come home, do homework, work on my channel/business again, have dinner, go to sleep.

And many people would look at that routine, and say I need to be more “balanced”.

But this is bullshit.

The most successful people in any field, at least for a period in their life, were not “balanced”. They put a disproportionate amount of time into their sport, or their craft, or their business - because this is how you achieve mastery.

Now I’m definitely not supporting “hustle culture” - if you’ve been on my channel for a while, you know I hate those “YouTube students” who tell you to grind and study for 12 hours a day, to the point where you’re not even learning anything (and you’re just sitting there so you can get your number of “study hours” up.)

But the truth is, balance looks different for different people.

Tim Grover (Michael Jordan’s and Kobe Bryant’s trainer) talks about how you don’t find balance, you create it. Everything doesn’t have to be 50/50 - for one person it might be 60/40, for another it might be 80/20.

The key is to find what works for you. What balance looks like for you.

But all these other people are going to try and tell you to follow their versions of balance instead.

An example is Alex Hormozi - this super-huge entrepreneur. His whole life is basically wake up, work on his business, research for his business, talk about business. (Then maybe he goes to the gym too.)

And most people would look at his life and say, “he’s not balanced”. “He needs a hobby, he needs to go out and see friends.” But the problem is, you’re projecting your idea of balance onto someone else.

Maybe if you had his life, you would be miserable. So? You’re not him. He loves his life.

So for me, I’ve always found I have this tendency to obsess over something. When I was a bit younger, (maybe a bit naively) I tried to become a professional footballer. My entire life revolved around that for a couple years.

I would train, yes, but I would also work out, optimize my diet, my sleep, research the human body and every small way I can improve, my recovery, I took ice baths, contrast showers, I foam rolled, I watched footage of pro players and analysed them.

But on the flipside - I also didn’t go out and see friends as much.

And when I started seeing some progress, when I went from the worst player on the worst team to winning Player Of The Season for a good team 2 years later, I genuinely felt happy.

Then now when my focus switched to something else, I started obsessing in a similar way over my YouTube channel, and my freelancing business (which I’ll probably talk a bit more about in a future video).

I genuinely enjoyed spending all day working on this, seeing progress, and that just made me so happy and fulfilled.

But then I started thinking “oh, well no one else is doing this. maybe I’m doing too much? maybe I’m not balanced?”

So even though I didn’t really want to, I actually almost forced myself to take some time off, to go see friends, to watch a movie with my family or something.

And I’m not saying there’s anything wrong with these things, but even when I was there I found my mind drifting back to my obsession again.

But what I’ve realised now is that it’s okay to be like this.

I naturally obsess over things. I want to spend a lot of my time and energy on things. And that’s okay. That’s just who I am.

Yes, maybe if someone else did this, they’d be depressed. But it works for me.

I don’t have to live out someone else’s idea of a perfect lifestyle instead of my own.

I know it might sound cringe, but I do really think I am wired a bit differently. I just love to obsess over a goal, then when I achieve it I feel a bit empty - at least until I find the next obsession.

I would always find myself wanting to spend less time watching tv, going out, whatever, and spend more time working on my goal.

And the realisation I have come to, from reading some books, and hearing successful people talk - is that that’s okay. I’m allowed to feel like this.

You’re allowed to feel like this.

So the title was kind of a lie. I do have some friends, just maybe not as much as most people think is “cool” or “normal”.

I get most of my social needs fulfilled from just going to school, going to football 3-4 times a week, talking to my family, and maybe once every few weeks, once a month, I might go out and see friends.

This works for me.

I know there will be some people in the comments who are going to say “oh, but that life looks so boring and depressing. You’re just deluded, you’re not him, you’re not a sigma male, you’re working too hard”.

But when you say that, you’re making an unfair comparison.

You’re drawing comparisons from what you think is a good life for you - but I’m not you. I’m me.

We’re different.

We all have different strengths and weaknesses, different mindsets, different upbringings. And we all need to embrace it, our strengths and weaknesses.

We will all have regrets when we get to the end of your life.

If you ask a billionaire what he regrets the most, and he usually says something along the lines of “I wish I spent more time with friends, with family. I would trade anything to get that back”.

Then you ask someone who is less materially successful, and a lot of the time they’ll say “I wish I studied harder, I wish I tried a bit harder, I wish I pushed myself more.”

You will have some regrets either way.

“No regrets” is bullshit - we will all have regrets, you just get to choose the ones you will have.

And at this point in my life, I’m happy sacrificing a bit of the social time, I’m happy to think “oh, it would have been nice to spend a bit more time having fun”, in exchange for a better future.

With this balance, I feel happy with the amount of progress I’m making in all areas, and the amount of fun and wellbeing I get.

Not necessarily saying it’s what you should do too.

Maybe it will work for you. Maybe you need more time for socialisation, and relaxing. Maybe you need less, and actually want to work more than me. But whatever it is, balance looks different for everyone.

All I’m saying is, don’t feel guilty about working so hard. Don’t feel like you have to force yourself to be “balanced” if you genuinely feel like you want to obsess over something.

Maybe I will burn out, who knows - but I’ve been going like this for a few months now, and I think this is the “balance” that works for me.

So the final message is: don’t force yourself to live out someone else’s idea of balance at the expense of your own happiness.

Hope this letter gave you something to think about.

Speak to you soon,

Yvan