I thought I had life figured out—money, comfort, no hard work. Then my dad snapped. One minute, I was in my warm bed, the next, dumped in the mountains like a lost package. No phone signal. No way out. Just an old wooden house and a lesson I never saw coming.

“Get up,” my dad’s voice boomed, thick with disappointment. “You sleep like a king. When I was your age, I was busting my ass.” I smirked. “Poor life isn’t for me. I was born to be rich.” His jaw clenched. “Fine,” he said. “You’ll get your chance.” Moments later, I stood alone in the woods. “Follow the path,” he called, driving away.

I found the cabin hours later, starving. I tore into the food. “You didn’t even wash your hands,” a voice said. Jack. Old, rough, and unimpressed. “Who are you?” I asked. “That’s a better question,” he smirked. My grandfather, it turned out.

Days of hard labor followed. When I offered him cash, he tossed it in the river. “You think money solves everything?” he said. By the time I realized I’d earned my meal, something shifted.Real wealth, he told me, “is what you build with your own hands.”