This morning someone asked me: What does wealth mean for you in the next ten years?
I'm 49. Three years into recovery from burnout. Three kids (19, 16, 16). Still married since 2007. A cat, an old boat, an allotment garden. Friends and family I actually enjoy spending time with. I go for walks in the woods. I look forward to this winter's cross-country skiing.
Wealth, for me, isn't about acquiring new things.
It's about shifting the volume knob on what already exists.
Here's what I've learned: Less is More. But just enough is way too little.
Let's unpack that.
The Cottage Moment
Two years ago I was lying on the sofa in our cottage at the allotment garden, completely depleted. I had been on a sick-leave from my job for a full year. I was completely burned out.
I had this thought: a billion in the bank wouldn't make a difference right now. I didn't have the energy to go do anything. The money would just sit there, useless, while I lay here unable to move.
Every motivational poster will tell you that money doesn't buy happiness. That health is wealth. That you can't enjoy anything without your health.
They're not wrong.
But it took lying on that sofa, too exhausted to enjoy the garden I'd worked years to cultivate, to really feel the truth of it.
Without energy, nothing else matters. Not the money. Not the opportunities. Not even the things you've built.
The Cupboard Principle
You know how when a cupboard is completely full - every inch utilized - it becomes impossible to use?
You can't find anything. You can't rearrange anything. You can't add anything new. There's no room to even shift things around to see what you have.
A chock-full cupboard is a useless cupboard.
The same principle applies to your calendar, your energy, your home, your mental space, your nervous system.
When everything is utilized to 100%, you have no room to breathe. No room to think. No room to respond to what life brings. No room for space itself.
Some days it feels like the walls are caving in. Not because anything specific is wrong, but because there's no margin. No pause. No breath between things.
This is what most people optimize for: "enough."
Enough money. Enough time. Enough energy. Just enough to get by.
We try to get enough by getting more. We fill up as much as we can. Cupboards, calendars, weekends.
Chasing for the feeling of having enough.
Yet ...
"Enough" is actually a form of poverty.
Real wealth requires space.
Margin.
How Much Margin?
I've been thinking about this. How much space is actually needed?
Turns out, it varies.
A cupboard? Maybe 20% empty is fine. You open it, grab something, close it. Low stakes. Predictable.
Your home? If a room is 50% full, it's over-crowded.
Your health and energy? You need at least 50% margin. You're living in your body 24/7. If you're running at 80% capacity, there's no room for the unexpected cold, the stressful day, the night you don't sleep well.
Your life in general - your time, your mental space, your calendar?
This needs 60-80% empty.
Life is inherently unpredictable. You need room to be larger than what comes your way. Full presence requires space.
Being Larger Than
I've been using this thought-tool: Is the problem larger than me, or am I larger than the problem?
When I have abundant energy, I'm larger than the work. I'm larger than the challenges. There's room to fully engage, to be present, to even enjoy the difficulty.
When I'm depleted, the smallest thing feels impossible. An email becomes a mountain.
Being fit isn't about aesthetics or metrics.
Being fit is having energy in surplus. Being larger than the problems. Being able to fit it all in and still have plenty of room left.
I realized recently: this works for pleasures too.
When you're larger than a pleasure - when you have margin - you can fully engage with it without being consumed by it. You can be all-in, own it, take real delight in it.
Wealth is having space to be fully present in whatever you're doing.
The Suffocation Pattern
I spent years optimizing for "enough" by striving from more.
Enough income to cover expenses. Enough time to meet deadlines. Enough energy to get through the day.
It led to burnout.
When you're optimized for "enough," any deviation breaks you.
Get sick? No margin.
Opportunity appears? No room.
Life gets complicated? No space.
Want to say no? Can't afford to.
Want to say yes? Too depleted.
I had to watch the perfect TV show. If I was going to spend 30 minutes watching something, it had to be worth it. The death grip of optimization.
I quadruple-checked every email before sending. What if I said it wrong? What if they misunderstood?
I couldn't just call a friend to talk. That felt indulgent. I should be working. Using time productively.
This is what living without margin does to you.
It makes everything urgent. Everything consequential. Everything exhausting.
Creating Space
Three years into recovery, I'm learning to create space.
I can just watch something on telly now. It doesn't have to be perfect. The death grip is loosening.
I only double-check emails these days.
I'm better at small talk. I don't have so many of those "who do you think you are to ask someone about this" thoughts.
My nervous system is learning to relax.
As it relaxes, I'm noticing something: the spaciousness I feel internally is directly related to the spaciousness in my external life.
Physical chaos in my home? That takes energy to navigate, every single day.
Crammed calendar? That creates internal pressure, even if individual commitments are fine.
No financial margin? That ties me to work I don't want to be doing, which drains energy, which eliminates margin elsewhere.
It's all connected.
Traditional wealth: Accumulation (more money, assets, options): Filling.
True wealth: Spaciousness (more room, margin, capacity for life): Emptying
Now, You
So where in your life are you still filling when you should be emptying?
Your calendar? Your commitments? Your home? Your expectations of yourself?
What would happen if you stopped optimizing for "just enough" and started creating margin instead?
Not someday. Not when you've achieved X goal or saved Y amount.
Starting now.
What's one thing you could turn down - right now - to create that space?
Because here's what I'm learning three years into recovery:
Real wealth isn't about having more.
Real wealth is having room.
Sten Morten Misund-Asphaug is building Omumu, a platform for customer education, while recovering from burnout and learning what sustainable business actually means. This is part of his Building in Public series - documenting the messy, real journey from burned out to built different.
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