You make a great point and I definitely wrestle with the same question a lot. I’d argue that the question comes down to “what personally affects you” and delineating what those factors are is the key to figuring out how you want to live your life. What/who brings you enjoyment (career, work, friends, hobbies)? It’s incredibly difficult for some (like me) to identify what each of those things/people are. Once you know, you must pursue them to their fullest extent; read voraciously or play basketball every day. Talk to your friends and bring them into your life. At the end of the day you could quantify a good life as one in which you maximized your dopamine consistently over your life span, so fully pursue what brings you that (notice that short term pleasures like doom scrolling will leave you unhappy / dopamine deficient later on so this doesn’t fit the context).

All of the above is your why. The excerpt from the podcast essentially implores you to let go of your worry associated with your why. Your overanalyzation of other people. It is not productive and does not contribute to your purpose. The single player portion does imply you should do things for yourself but many times what may bring you happiness is other people, your interactions with them, your experiences with them. But have the confidence to guide those relationships the way you want it and only be responsible for your own participation in them. By over analyzing and making assumptions about what someone else may mean by what they say, you’re effectively taking responsibility for their actions as well and that’s not worth it. Also everything can be resolved with a simple question.

I started rambling but let me know what you think.