Written by: Brad Pedersen

Have you ever set your sights on something that felt just out of reach—some big, bold milestone you believed would finally make you feel complete?

Maybe it was a title. A certain bank balance. A home. A number on the scale. We all have our version of “arrival,” that thing we think will deliver lasting happiness, peace or validation.

For me, it was a McLaren.

The photo above shows me sitting in it (yes, that’s a post-surgery knee brace). What you don’t see is the context: it was the final photo I took with the car. I’d just sold it, and the new owner was on their way to pick it up.

When I first took delivery a few years earlier, it felt like a dream. Sleek. Loud. Head-turning. A machine built for speed and status.  What I didn’t realize at the time, was how symbolic that car would become; a major inflection point of increased self awareness on my growth journey.

When the Dream Doesn’t Fit

Not long before the McLaren, I’d experienced what many would call a dream outcome.

After over 20 years of building companies, through a litany of challenges including bankruptcies, betrayals and other hardships; through relentless effort, we’d finally made it. We had built a profitable, respected business known for creativity and innovation, having customers around the planet. 

As part of our growth strategy, and in an effort to find some liquidity for our long term investors, we merged with another company and set our sights on a M&A public roll-up.  On paper, it made sense. But what we didn’t account for was culture, and when that began to clash, the board made its decision.

Ninety days after the merger closed, I was fired from the very company I had co-founded.

No dramatic showdown. No raised voices. Just a Jerry McQuire like send off in a busy restaurant in order to avoid emotional outbursts. 

Once the dust had settled from the fallout, I came to a hard but clear conclusion: I couldn’t stay involved in the business.  The trust had been broken, and without any meaningful input on the direction of the company, remaining involved felt like a slow erosion of integrity. I knew I needed out.

After several months of negotiation, I reached an agreement with my partners to buy out my shares. The result was a significant financial exit, one that, by most accounts, would be considered a dream scenario. It gave me the freedom to live life on my own terms.

But here’s the truth: I hated the story.

Like many entrepreneurs, I had romanticized the journey. The narrative was familiar and almost cinematic. You start from nothing, fight uphill battles, pouring your life into building something against the odds. Eventually, someone comes along and buys it at the perfect moment for a life-changing sum of money. Fade to black….happily ever after.

Not only is that outcome a “Disneyfied” version of reality, but it is extraordinarily rare. What I also have come to learn is that it's also deeply misleading. The “perfect exit” isn’t the real finish line we imagine and, on its own, it will never deliver the fulfillment we expect.

What I actually felt in the aftermath of my exit, was something I didn’t expect: shame.

Yes, the financial outcome was transformational, but something inside me whispered that I hadn’t truly earned it.  It was circumstantial; a stroke of luck as the result of events and timing out of my control. 

The exit didn’t feel like a victory and that unsettled sense stayed with me. 

Quiet, but persistent.

The Performance Script

Yes, I had achieved financial freedom.  But instead of feeling grounded and fulfilled, I felt like an imposter.  My insecurity, though subtle, was persistent. It showed up in quiet moments and loud decisions.

One of those decisions was jumping right back into business. Just six months after my exit, I became the co-founder of Pela, a business that today I am very proud of. On the surface, it looked like ambition but beneath that, it was also about distraction—staying busy enough to avoid the uncomfortable questions. Most importantly for me it was another shot at trying to write a better story.

Another outlet was more material: I bought a McLaren.

When the car first arrived, it felt like a defining moment. It was sleek, powerful, and unapologetically loud; engineered for performance and presence. The exhaust, directly ported from the engine, would send out a plume of fire with a perfectly timed downshift, a feature designed as much for spectacle as for speed. 

However if I’m honest, what I loved most wasn't the design, it was the feeling I got when others noticed. Every time I drove it, heads would turn and for a moment, I was convinced that it was admiration.

But that illusion didn’t last and almost immediately, the cracks in the picture I had imagined about owning the car began to show.

Within the first month, the car had already been back to the dealership three times. Then came the maintenance—hefty bills for the battery, oil changes, and storage. And when I was away from Florida, I found myself worrying about everything from mold to theft to flooding as a result of the potential hurricanes. 

What surprised me most, though, was how quickly I started noticing other cars—sleeker, newer, and more expensive models. The thrill began to fade, and the sense of pride I once felt was quietly replaced by comparison and insecurity.  What I began to realize is that I didn’t really own the McLaren. Based on the headspace it was taking up, the reality is that the McLaren really owned me. 

The Myth of Arrival

As I reflect back, I can now recognize that I had been living by a script I didn’t even realize I was following:

If I have a flashy super car→ then I will impress others with it → and then be worthy of love, admiration, and belonging.

It’s a familiar formula, especially for high achievers, and in the short term it can produce results. But on the inside, it leaves us chasing, pursuing and performing all for extrinsic validation which eventually leads to exhaustion.

The merger. The exit. The car.

All of them were fueled by that same belief: that I needed to prove I was enough—first to my father, then to the world, and eventually, to myself.  But here’s the irony: the more I accumulated, the more I feared losing it. And the more I achieved, the more pressure I felt to keep achieving. It was like drinking salt water in hopes of quenching a deep thirst; consuming more, but only intensifying the longing.

At its core, that wasn’t finding fulfillment, it was an addiction; disguised as accomplishment.

I was still in the game, but I had set the rules in a way that made winning impossible and as Naval Ravikant would say: “Play stupid games, win stupid prizes.”

A Better Equation

In the end, it was never really about the car. It was about the belief system that led me to buy it and the equation I had been living by for most of my life.  For years, I operated from one of two scripts: 

Do → Have → Be 

Or

Have → Do → Be. 

Both followed the same flawed logic—that my worth was something to be earned through performance. If I did enough, or had enough, then I would finally be enough and then I would be respected, admired, and worthy of love.

However I have since learned that the equation is wrong and the real transformation in my life started to happen when I flipped it:

Be → Do → Have.

The shift begins when we root ourselves in identity; not in what we do or own, but in who we truly are and who we are becoming. As you reflect on that, consider the difference between résumé virtues and eulogy virtues. One speaks to what you achieved; the other to how you lived and loved.

When your life is remembered, will people talk about your net worth, or about your humility, courage, kindness, and character?

This isn’t about abandoning ambition. It’s about anchoring it. When we prioritize becoming over accumulating; when we lead from purpose rather than performance; our accomplishments become expressions of who we are, not the proof of our worth.

Reflection Questions

As you think about this week's topic about finding our purpose and identity, top and consider:

1. Where have I unknowingly adopted the “Have → Do → Be” mindset in my own life?
    
2. What am I chasing right now—and what do I believe it will give me?
    
3. How would my choices shift if I started with identity rather than achievement?

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