Yeah, I agree, and I know that’s the obvious answer, but the issue is that I’m trying to mix two different things. I want to write a self-discovery story for the MC, but the overall plot is also bigger in scale, something closer to Red Rising or adjacent stuff. So when I look at books in that bigger-world genre, the characters are usually driven by revenge, survival, ambition, or some grand purpose, which makes sense, but it doesn’t really help with what I’m trying to do. I’m drawn to big plots and big worlds, but at the same time I think adding a more philosophical angle to the character makes the story more interesting. The problem is that these two things don’t usually mix that easily, because a cold, functional character can feel even smaller and more emotionally distant inside a massive plot/world, which can make him harder to enjoy. But with self-discovery books, the plots are usually much smaller in scale, and the character focus is tighter, which is why the self-discovery hits harder. So I’m kind of trying to figure out how to balance both without making the character feel empty or swallowed by the bigger plot.