The source may be unknown but the sentiment is still true!
If you WANT what the average person has, do what average people do, but if you want something more, you’re going to have to DO something more
Right now while you’re young, have more energy and less commitments, doesn’t it make sense to put in the extraordinary effort while your mind and body can handle it?
‘Nine to Five is how you survive, but I ain’t trying to survive, I’m trying to live it to the limit’
– Jay Z
Me, please!
Now they say money can’t buy you happiness, while that may be true, there’s no shame in being money motivated. For myself, I’m obsessed with the idea of being a self made millionaire, for a variety of reasons: the lifestyle, the financial freedom, the fame aspect, and simply just the title itself. Once I found a career path that I knew could help me achieve this goal, if I just followed a winning formula and did the right things, it made today’s hard work seem worthwhile.
Now the idea of being a millionaire to your average guy, to my parents, to my teachers, to my previous employers, seems completely ludicrous. It seems like a ‘pipe dream’ , something that was completely unachievable. But it’s not as ridiculous as we might think if we look at the numbers…
How many millionaires do you think there are in the world?
100,000?
500,000?
1,000,000?
There’s actually 12,000,000 millionaires on planet Earth. Twelve. Million
Now there’s around 6.8billion people on the planet, if we break it down and do the maths, that means that 1 in every 570 people is a millionaire, that’s all.
That’s no bigger than the size of your average high school in this country. So if I wanted to hit my goal, all I had to do was work harder than and beat 570 people, that’s feasible right? I’ve got around 700 friends on Facebook, but I could probably only count on my fingers the ones that work as hard as me! But you have to actually ask yourself ‘Am I the hardest working person I know?’ And if not why not? What more can I do? Or what more am I willing to do to hit my goals?
Now most people are willing to settle for less, it’s very easy to be average and watch the extraordinary. People will observe greatness in amazement. Why are movie theatres, concert arenas and football stadiums filled with thousands of people paying their hard earned money just to watch a few people at the top of their respective field?
We’ve all got the same amount of time in a day, but how much more efficient will someone at the top of their game, or someone in a position of success use it?
Now I’m not trying to say that makes it easy, if it was, more people would do it right? I would have already done it multiple times over. But I genuinely believe if you’re willing to put in the work, and outwork the other 569, we CAN achieve where others have failed.
Success is a numbers game
Everyone’s running.
It’s a thought provoking idea, but have you ever looked at why they’re running? Now the lion, the lion runs to outrun everyone in his path. If there is one gazelle and 20 lions, the lion has to make sure he’s the fastest of the pride to make sure he’s the one that’s eating. The lion is running with nothing else in mind, the lion runs to WIN.
The gazelle on the other hand, the gazelle knows as long as he outpaces the slowest gazelle, he’s going to escape & survive another day. The gazelle is terrified but he’s running with the intention of NOT LOSING.
When addressed with challenges, do you run to win? Or run to not lose?
I caught up over the weekend with one of last summers big Hollywood blockbusters ‘Now You See Me’. Now I’m not here to write a review or critique the performances of Hollywood legends Michael Caine & Morgan Freeman (outside of Gotham City). The gist of the film is about four magicians that form a supergroup, like Velvet Revolver with card tricks.
Now the opening scene shows Jesse Eisenberg (aka Mr Facebook, Mark Zuckerberg in The Social Network) performing a simple card trick on an unsuspecting fan girl. Here comes one of the central themes of the movie ‘The closer you look, the less you see’ which really got me thinking, how many times have we been left befuddled by magic tricks, then when you walk away and see the same trick performed on the next victim, it becomes painfully obvious how it’s done? ‘Wait… Is it ALWAYS the 7 of diamonds?’
Sometimes in life we get so caught up on what’s happening right in front of our noses that we can’t see a way around it, or take in everything else that’s happening further ahead. Like a driver stuck behind a lorry, if you’re right on his bumper, you’ll be sat there for hours. But if you drop back, you can see when there’s time & space to overtake.
Now it’s often hard to take that step back and logically assess your situation which often has a larger emotional investment. But like that guy who sees the card trick on someone else, that outside perspective from a third party can more often than not offer a new way of thinking, advice, and very often a solution.
Whether friends, family, business partners, or very often people that don’t even know us will have some form of impact on our way of perceiving our situation. Have you ever stopped to think what someone you look up to would do in your situation? Like the South Park song
‘What would Brian Boitano do?’
Mentors have helped me so far throughout my career in a number of ways, whether through step by step guidance, relating to situations they’ve dealt with in the past, seeing a blind spot you may have missed in your game plan. Sometimes even a reassuring ‘trust me, everything’s going to be fine’ can make the world of difference in what can often seem like a completely overwhelming world, whether through business, sport, or personal circumstance.
We only have a finite amount of time in the day, and we only have a set amount of time before deadlines etc. So why would we waste time via pure trial and error when the answers are already out there? Find a circle of people that already have the success and the results you want and allow them in your circle of influence.
‘Whenever I am asked what is the missing link between a promising businessperson and a successful one, mentoring comes to mind.’
– Richard Branson
Hi, I'm Will Ross 