By Patricia Padrón
CRECE Intern 2025
“You’re all entrepreneurs. You’re running a business, it’s called you.”
That line from Dr. George Marakas, Associate Dean for Research and Doctoral Studies at Florida International University, caught me completely off guard.
At first, I didn’t think it applied to me. I’ve never pictured myself as an entrepreneur. I don’t run a startup. I don’t sell a product. But, the more I sat with it, the more it clicked. I am running a business, my own life, and everything I do is either an investment or a cost.
Each day, I make decisions with long-term consequences. On my health, my mindset, my time. When I wake up early to go to the gym, I’m making an investment in my well-being, just like entrepreneurs running their business. When I choose how to spend my time, I’m weighing opportunity costs. When I challenge myself to learn, I’m seeking returns on the most valuable asset I own: me.
Attending the Seminar Series on Progress Studies in FIU sponsored by the Foundation for Economic Education (FEE) was one of those investments. For a few days in July, I joined a room full of people from faraway places like Lithuania, Pakistan, and Brazil, among other countries in Latin America. We came together to explore one question: What is progress? Even though there were MANY answers, as diverse as our backgrounds, we all agreed on one thing, progress is both deeply personal and powerfully collective.
At the seminar, I was introduced to the concept of Humanomics by Dr. Deirdre McCloskey, an economic historian and distinguished professor known for her work on the role of ideas, culture, and ethics in driving prosperity. Humanomics is a way of looking at economics not just through numbers, but through values, stories, and the human spirit. Progress isn’t only measured in terms of GDP; it’s measured in the liberty, dignity, and opportunity people have, the space they’re given to innovate and grow.
One quote that stuck with me during the seminar was from the Nobel Prize–winning economist and political philosopher F.A. Hayek:
“Historically, the path to liberty has led through the achievement of particular liberties.”
It reminded me that progress often begins with small wins, the right to speak freely, to learn, to trade. We don’t suddenly wake up in a free society. We build it, step by step, by protecting the freedoms that allow people to thrive.
To me, progress is waking up with purpose. It’s nurturing my body, expanding my mind, and surrounding myself with people who challenge me to think bigger. It’s using the freedom I have to create more of it, not just for myself, but for others.
I left the seminar reminded that every choice I make comes with an opportunity cost. Every day, I get to decide whether I’m moving toward progress, or away from it. And, in the end, that makes me an entrepreneur. Running the most important business there is: MYSELF.
