How does one get off the merry-go-round?

Who wants off the Merry go round?

go bankrupt

Get yourself this or that gear is not the point. Our tastes are too varied and the one man's heaven is the other man's hell..and as Tbg so rightly says, why get off at all. This IS our hobby and our passion and that's all there is to it. What most of us do reach however, after a long learning period which may have cost plenty, is that level of contentment, where the need to experiment further and to spend more money gets down to practically zero.

I think Drubin is talking about not going round and round any longer. He didn't mention leaving the amusement park

Actually, come to think of it, in my opinion the merry go round is not a good metaphore for what we are doing. Going round and round implies no progress. You may change your position within that given circle but you get no further. I find this too pessimistic a view for what we are intelligently doing, because progress towards a goal, as subjective as it may be, (although there is such a thing as the absolute sound) is possible. I would prefer the image of the spiral , because this would not imply the futility of our efforts to progress. The top end of my spiral would be what I hear as the "abolute" in my favourite concerthall in my favourite seat. Sometimes , when experimenting, trying new gear or tweaking, you slide forward and upward on this spiral, sometimes you slide back. On a merry go round you don't get anywhere, just have movment ( speak, different sounds as you change gear or tweak) but you don't get anywhere and you should in fact get off it by trying to figure ou how you would like your gear to perform in aural terms and relentlessly strive for that. Then you've left the carousel (or treadmill in other terms) and are on a spiral with a definite goal or end and if you think you're close to what you'd like, you can stop struggling upwards, only watching out not to slide back.