Nine Reasons Why Intelligent, Hardworking People Won't Become Successful This Year
The people that built the world around you aren’t that much smarter than you.
Intelligence is overrated.
College is to blame.
I know some extremely successful dumbasses. They’re successful in their eyes because they own their time and do work they enjoy.
Work is play to them.
My wife grew up in Asian culture. She got taught to be hardworking. She worked damn hard – but at all the wrong things.
No amount of study or corporate work made her happy.
She found her version of success when she worked on things she loved.
One of those was cooking. Cooking led her to discover plant-based nutrition. That led her to discover strength training and her love for hiking.
The person she was when I met her in 2016 is unrecognizable. That’s what is possible.
Working hard isn’t enough. A monkey can work hard too.
The question is, what the freaking hell are you working hard at?
Most people don’t know. This year will be a train wreck in disguise for them. It doesn’t have to be for you.
Here are some things that can stop you finding your version of success.
Trying to fit in
Let me be direct: Fuck fitting in.
How many successful people do you admire that are painfully normal? Zero. They’re weirdos, misfits, and they live life by odd rules.
There’s nothing more freeing than learning to be yourself.
When you become the oddball, you’re well on your way to the good life.
Young people spend their time trying to fit in, but successful people spend their time trying to be different - Anthony Pompliano
Haven’t taken a risk in a bloody long time
The best things that happen in life come from taking risks.
It doesn’t look that way though when you’re faced with a fearful situation. I remember giving a speech for work at a football stadium.
I was terrified. The diarrhea was about to leak down my leg at any moment for the crowd to see and go “yuck!”
I made it through without liquid brown legs.
The audience gave me a standing ovation.
This one act became the foundation for a lot of my future success. It was a huge risk though. If the speech went poorly, my job was on the line.
Talk of making our team redundant due to a restructure had already begun.
The worst didn’t happen though.
Why?
We’re extremely resilient under high pressure.
Your brain and body adapt.
You're way better under stress than you think.
So take the damn risk.
Risks slowly unlock your potential one at a time.
The highest selling book of late explains a lot
If you’ve been living in a bubble, James Clear’s book “Atomic Habits” broke a lot of records recently.
It’s not because James has a pretty face or a nice smile.
It’s because his book on habits is literally the blueprint to success.
The life you want is built on a foundation of habits.
Choose your habits, choose your results.
The best habits are ones that are visible in your calendar. Even better habits are ones that are visible to others. Public habits are harder to cheat on.
Start with habits. Everything else is secondary.
Doing this dumb thing that can destroy your life
The cool kids online love to hate on success.
It ruins their lives, gradually. They slowly burn their future potential, the way a frog slowly enters warm water and boils to death.
Part of the reason is envy. They hate on people who have the success they crave. Alice Lemee introduced me to a better way.
“Someone else's success is an indicator that you can achieve something similar in your own life."
Mind blown.
The people that built the world around you aren’t that much smarter than you.
When you see another person’s results, that’s a sign you can do it too!
Decisions are never made
Success is a series of decisions that lead you there.
Many people never decide. They live in indecision, which is a decision in itself. When you make a decision it cuts off other options. That creates laser-like focus.
Decisions help tell you which habits to do, and which habits to give up.
What’s even more important is making decisions faster. Confidence and practice are how you do it.
When you experiment you get results. Results become evidence. Evidence creates confidence. When you have confidence you can practice what got you the results to go even further. The world moves fast.
A decision made is better than a decision you put off for the rest of your life.
All that does is create enormous regrets. Plus, you can make a different decision if the initial one doesn’t work.
Living in a social media bubble
You know the one. Where you only engage with opinions you agree with and mostly talk to friends, family, and people who’ll always agree with you.
Direct message people on social media like a badass.
Say hi without all the self-interest modern-day jobs teach. These people will help you find success.
The point is I can’t tell you how.
The results that come from a brand new online inner circle are hard to predict. In my life, they’ve been phenomenal. I met my cowboy business partner from Nashville in a group chat full of misfits. The guy’s a weirdo, but he’s got some serious writing/teaching chops.
Get out of the bubble. Reach out to new people online.
Killer question to open with: what are you working on?
Refuse to work after hours or on the weekend
Successful people use their free time to get ahead. That's their secret.
– Brian Feroldi
Most people in society statistically work jobs they hate.
A side hustle is how you start to create a fork in the road ahead. It’s where you experiment with a different type of work. It’s work you earn $0 for at the start.
The sad part is it can’t help you pivot your career to work you love unless you allow it time for the insights to be uncovered.
There’s no need to work stupid hours. But an hour before or after work and on the weekends can completely change your life in a year.
Zero side hustles = barely scraping by in life
Accidentally doing this
If you want to be successful, you must respect one rule – Never lie to yourself - Paulo Coelho
Paulo The Alchemist author is a smart son of a gun. Damn.
Too many people sit there all day and get fire-hosed by their own excuses until they waterboard themselves James-Bond-torture-style.
We lie to ourselves to stay in comfort and avoid rejection/failure.
Don’t be that person. Write down your excuses. Write the opposite of each one.
The opposite of your excuses uncovers your potential.
The truth is there are no limitations. Just the limitations the brain makes up for sh*ts and giggles.
Too far away from life-changing vulnerability
The road to your version of success will have many experiences that make you feel vulnerable.
Getting started
Hearing no
Finding out you were wrong
Speaking up
Trying to get around gatekeepers
Explaining what you want.
Removing what you don’t want.
There’s no getting around it. Each part of the journey will have you questioning yourself. Vulnerability will always be present, even when you’re successful.
The bottom line is this:
Success in anything is the willingness to feel vulnerable.
That’s what far too many intelligent, hardworking people have forgotten.
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You never fail to deliver Tim. Never. Thank you once again and keep doing what you do. Some of us are listening and learning.
Love the one on making your habits public; it introduces a second layer of accountability outside of yourself.