I'd say my audiophile journey has consisted of 2 phases.
Phase 1 was self-started.
At an early age, very early age, I liked music. I gravitated to buying records, record players, transistor radios. At least in part, I was invited to parties probably because I was the one that had all the music.
Then, I guess I'd say I became somewhat dormant in terms of being an audiophile.
Phase 2 was started by my brother and sister-in-law.
By brother and sister-in-law gave me an Ipod for my birthday one year. I knew about Ipods and what an Ipod was but never really paid them much attention. But once I got the Ipod and became familiar with it I became kinda fascninated with it and understood better why and how it had impacted the world.
This woke up the dormant audiophile in me.