Everything today feels like a numbers game. Strength. Income. Followers. Stats everywhere. Soul nowhere.
“Maxxing” started in role-playing games. Players would push a character’s stats (strength, agility, intelligence) to their highest possible level. The simple goal was to minimize weaknesses and maximize advantages. A grind that lived safely inside a screen.
But then the logic left the screen. It followed us into the gym, dating, careers, even the mirror. Life became a competitive ladder. And most of us started climbing without ever asking who built it.
When Self-Improvement Became Competitive
Before the mid-2010s, self-improvement felt quieter and more personal. Then social media scaled everything, and the tone shifted from growth into performance. Feeds filled with “top 1%” routines, income screenshots, physique updates, productivity hacks… you name it. The message: upgrade, or get left behind.
More recently, automation intensified this pressure. Artificial Intelligence flooded the internet with blueprints for dominance, scripts for charisma, frameworks for becoming “high value.” Some of it helps. Much of it is baloney. Just saying :-).
This didn’t appear out of nowhere. In How Hyper-Individualism Made Us Forget Each Other, we explored how identity itself became the modern project. When the individual becomes the center of everything, optimization starts to feel like responsibility. Social media simply turned that impulse into a scoreboard.
Looksmaxxing and the Outer Game
The clearest example is looksmaxxing. Entire communities treat appearance like a character build. Platforms such as the Chad leaderboard rank men by height, bone structure, symmetry, body fat percentage, overall “appeal.”
The structure is identical to a game interface: identify flaw → apply upgrade → increase rank. Jaw surgery becomes a stat boost. Botox smooths “imperfections.” Steroids accelerate muscle gains. Even hairstyles and perfumes are treated as adjustable settings.
Recently, #2 ranked “Chad” Androgenic was exposed during a livestream for wearing a wig. When it was pulled off, his ranking dropped instantly.
And looks were only the beginning. Soon came moneymaxxing, gymmaxxing, productivity maxxing, dopamine maxxing. What can be measured can be improved. What can be improved can be compared. That is where it turns unhealthy, a man my age argues.
The Psychological Cost
This culture changes how you see yourself. Instead of living from the inside out, you start watching yourself from the outside in. You become both player and critic.
Psychologists call this self-objectification. You monitor how you sit. You rehearse what you will say before speaking. You predict how a post or career move will be judged. Even in neutral moments, the nervous system stays slightly on edge.
Over time, comparison becomes automatic. Relationships feel strategic instead of safe. The self splits into two versions: the one who lives, and the one who performs.
That thinning of depth is one reason modern life can feel strangely empty, something analyzed in Why Modern Life Feels Empty.
Soulmaxxing
To be clear, the issue is not whether to improve. It is what you are improving for.
The alternative? Soulmaxxing. And no, not the music genre. In essence, optimizing the soul means strengthening qualities that cannot be captured in a screenshot: staying grounded, intellectually honest, loyal to your higher self, and present in the life you are actually living.
The soul animates the person behind the action. You cannot point to it or weigh it on a scale, yet its presence is unmistakable. It is what allows you to act with care, to connect deeply, to feel joy and contentment that no leaderboard can track. And it continues long after the body has stopped moving.
Continue exploring how modern life is impacting body and mind:
Fit & Free does not collapse when the wig comes off.
