What's your goal: Thousandaire or Millionaire?

In Episode 270 of the Indie Hackers podcast, Courtland & Channing talked to Shaan Puri about life-changing exists.

There was one funny line that really stuck with me.

They mentioned that certain podcasts have billionaires talking about billionaire things.

In My First Million, Shaan & Sam are millionaires talking about millionaire things.

And jokingly, they mentioned that Indie Hackers is thousandaires talking about thousandaire things.

Looking back --
That made me think, what am I optimizing for?

Obviously optimizing to become a millionaire is great. But maybe when you're starting out, that's not your goal. Maybe your goal is instead just to become the "thousandaire" who is aiming to quit their day job, and then eventually tackle the higher goals.

If you're that type, then it might help to check out other more directed resources like Rob Walling's Stair Step Method to Bootstrapping, which talks about exactly this: "how do you become a sustainable thousandaire first, so that you can start your million dollar SaaS idea after?"

Building a million dollar marketplace is great. It's difficult, there are many challenges, and if it's something you love and want to do, props to you.

The point here is to know what you're optimizing for. Once you know what you want, you can strategize to maximize your chance of success for your specific goal.