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I am reaching 800k net worth at 24 and these are the things I attribute the most to my success in the past 5 years:
- Chase difficulty. It's counter intuitive but as MJ said in Unscripted , difficulty is the opportunity. Difficulty = high barriers to entry = less competition = more opportunity for you to get the money from people in need of a solution to the problem.
- Learn hard skills (really hard skills): this is basically the point above but applied to skills. For me it was learning web development and coding in general. It was about learning anything it was required for me to build a project I had envisioned, whatever it took.
- In the end, cause and effect is everything: you can sit here and make excuses, there's always a good reason why you shouldn't take action, maybe you're too old or too young. Those excuses don't help you moving forward, at all. So ask yourself, do you want it or not? Do you want the end result? (Money, freedom) or would you rather keep working 9-5 but have a valid alibi as to why you didn't succeed?
- Stop following politics, stop hating on successful people: it's mind boggling to me how much people place their future in the hands and responsibility of politicians. Those people are losers. They have 1 life and they are expecting another human being (not a superhuman) to control and improve their future. That's foolish and infantile. Take your future in your own hands. Stop hating politicians, cause they're probably more successful than you, for this one reason: they're building their own life, you're not. You're sitting in front of a screen hating on them. That's the difference.
As MJ said in one of his books, people waiting in line to get an hamburger for free don't value their time, and are probably broke because a rich person would never do such a thing. The same applies to talking about politics, or protesting on the streets. What the F*ck is that going to do for you? If your country's politicians are corrupt, your two real options are: move out of that country or accept it. That's how I view it. Our energy and time is finite and wasting it on trying to influence politics is energy wasted that could be spent to make your own life better instead.
- Stop watching news: again for the above reason. News channels are particularly designed to make you a fearful human being and they will only reinforce your learned helplessness, also in the business aspect. You'll see news of "outliers" getting rich at 25 and the reporter will say how lucky they are, and you'll end up believing that. Then you'll start slowly building this paradigm where rich people are just lucky. I don't watch the news cause it doesn't make me smarter or make me any money.
- Read books on several subjects. Never fixate on one subject. Become a polymath. It's what allowed me to beat my competitors and stay on top for months, especially as a solo founder. Learn different skills and pair them up to achieve a unique combo that no one can easily replicate.
- Be pragmatic. Look at reality as it is, not as you wish it were. Then resolve to abandon your preconceived notions and do what's necessary to accomplish your goals.
- Yes, it's hard. The greater your goal, the harder and smarter you'll have to work. I knew back at 18 I wanted to be a millionaire by 25 (I wrote that down several times in my journals), I don't know if I'll get there in time, but I am close to that either way. I had to sacrifice everything else in my life. No partying, no romantic relationships, lost all my friends. Be prepared for that if you really want to go big.
- You will fail. I failed more times than I can recount. I started making money at 13 doing freelancing work in graphic design, then at 15 I stopped because I wanted to be like the other kids, hang out and have a social life. I resumed my grind at 19 when I first read Unscripted which undoubtedly changed my life, along other books and communities online. I started a blog, a YouTube channel, one SaaS, which all failed and took 4-5 years of my life. I learned from my first SaaS failure to build what ultimately became my successful business and I never deviated from that.
- Stay on course. Don't chase shiny objects. If you get product market fit, keep hammering that, don't start another business. Getting product market fit is harder than you may think and if you achieve it, resolve to scale the business instead of chasing other shiny objects. Mark Cuban said "you only have to be right once". And this is what I mean. Once you get 1 product market fit, it can retire you and get you rich. The biggest mistake you can do at that point is take it for granted. Instead, scale that one business as much as you can.
- You don't need to go to university to become rich, if you're ambitious. University is required if you want to be an employee, not if you want to be your own boss. I don't have a degree. I dropped out twice. I figured, if you want to become rich you'll find a way regardless, and a piece of paper called degree won't make it any easier or probable. University courses are washed out and an inefficient use of your time. They are slow and full of information that you likely won't need or use to move forward. They are to make you a human encyclopedia. Human encyclopedias don't make money, people who think and adapt and are able to learn new skills as needed, make money.
- Learn the concept of 'efficiency'. Efficiency is crucial to get rich young. Why? Because most actions just won't get you there. You must learn at any point in time to take the most effective action that is also the most efficient. For example, I realized going to university wasn't an efficient use of my time. I had 8 hours in a day. I wanted to be an entrepreneur. Studying linear algebra might have allowed me to become an AI engineer, but I just wanted to be an entrepreneur, so I dropped out and started learning to actually code. Cause my vision was of me building websites and SaaS platforms, not of me getting a PhD and writing papers. Learn to view actions and consequences as intertwined. Take the actions most likely to get you to that goal.
- Chase difficulty. It's counter intuitive but as MJ said in Unscripted , difficulty is the opportunity. Difficulty = high barriers to entry = less competition = more opportunity for you to get the money from people in need of a solution to the problem.
- Learn hard skills (really hard skills): this is basically the point above but applied to skills. For me it was learning web development and coding in general. It was about learning anything it was required for me to build a project I had envisioned, whatever it took.
- In the end, cause and effect is everything: you can sit here and make excuses, there's always a good reason why you shouldn't take action, maybe you're too old or too young. Those excuses don't help you moving forward, at all. So ask yourself, do you want it or not? Do you want the end result? (Money, freedom) or would you rather keep working 9-5 but have a valid alibi as to why you didn't succeed?
- Stop following politics, stop hating on successful people: it's mind boggling to me how much people place their future in the hands and responsibility of politicians. Those people are losers. They have 1 life and they are expecting another human being (not a superhuman) to control and improve their future. That's foolish and infantile. Take your future in your own hands. Stop hating politicians, cause they're probably more successful than you, for this one reason: they're building their own life, you're not. You're sitting in front of a screen hating on them. That's the difference.
As MJ said in one of his books, people waiting in line to get an hamburger for free don't value their time, and are probably broke because a rich person would never do such a thing. The same applies to talking about politics, or protesting on the streets. What the F*ck is that going to do for you? If your country's politicians are corrupt, your two real options are: move out of that country or accept it. That's how I view it. Our energy and time is finite and wasting it on trying to influence politics is energy wasted that could be spent to make your own life better instead.
- Stop watching news: again for the above reason. News channels are particularly designed to make you a fearful human being and they will only reinforce your learned helplessness, also in the business aspect. You'll see news of "outliers" getting rich at 25 and the reporter will say how lucky they are, and you'll end up believing that. Then you'll start slowly building this paradigm where rich people are just lucky. I don't watch the news cause it doesn't make me smarter or make me any money.
- Read books on several subjects. Never fixate on one subject. Become a polymath. It's what allowed me to beat my competitors and stay on top for months, especially as a solo founder. Learn different skills and pair them up to achieve a unique combo that no one can easily replicate.
- Be pragmatic. Look at reality as it is, not as you wish it were. Then resolve to abandon your preconceived notions and do what's necessary to accomplish your goals.
- Yes, it's hard. The greater your goal, the harder and smarter you'll have to work. I knew back at 18 I wanted to be a millionaire by 25 (I wrote that down several times in my journals), I don't know if I'll get there in time, but I am close to that either way. I had to sacrifice everything else in my life. No partying, no romantic relationships, lost all my friends. Be prepared for that if you really want to go big.
- You will fail. I failed more times than I can recount. I started making money at 13 doing freelancing work in graphic design, then at 15 I stopped because I wanted to be like the other kids, hang out and have a social life. I resumed my grind at 19 when I first read Unscripted which undoubtedly changed my life, along other books and communities online. I started a blog, a YouTube channel, one SaaS, which all failed and took 4-5 years of my life. I learned from my first SaaS failure to build what ultimately became my successful business and I never deviated from that.
- Stay on course. Don't chase shiny objects. If you get product market fit, keep hammering that, don't start another business. Getting product market fit is harder than you may think and if you achieve it, resolve to scale the business instead of chasing other shiny objects. Mark Cuban said "you only have to be right once". And this is what I mean. Once you get 1 product market fit, it can retire you and get you rich. The biggest mistake you can do at that point is take it for granted. Instead, scale that one business as much as you can.
- You don't need to go to university to become rich, if you're ambitious. University is required if you want to be an employee, not if you want to be your own boss. I don't have a degree. I dropped out twice. I figured, if you want to become rich you'll find a way regardless, and a piece of paper called degree won't make it any easier or probable. University courses are washed out and an inefficient use of your time. They are slow and full of information that you likely won't need or use to move forward. They are to make you a human encyclopedia. Human encyclopedias don't make money, people who think and adapt and are able to learn new skills as needed, make money.
- Learn the concept of 'efficiency'. Efficiency is crucial to get rich young. Why? Because most actions just won't get you there. You must learn at any point in time to take the most effective action that is also the most efficient. For example, I realized going to university wasn't an efficient use of my time. I had 8 hours in a day. I wanted to be an entrepreneur. Studying linear algebra might have allowed me to become an AI engineer, but I just wanted to be an entrepreneur, so I dropped out and started learning to actually code. Cause my vision was of me building websites and SaaS platforms, not of me getting a PhD and writing papers. Learn to view actions and consequences as intertwined. Take the actions most likely to get you to that goal.
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