Today I woke up with the terrible realization that I haven't been giving this life everything I have. I've gotten lazy by resting on my past accomplishments. And yes, although it pains me to admit, my previous actions reflected self-entitlement, hollow ambitions, and that is definitely NOT who I want to be so it's time for a change. This is the primary reason why I'm posting this on my blog; here, I will be publicly accountable for my promises regardless if anyone reads this or not. (What can I say, I don't have the greatest following.)
Most of us young professionals have enormous ambitions to 1) make an impact in the world and 2) maybe make some money along the way while pursing #1. However, how many of us actually act upon those? Exactly, not many. We read stories about Mark Zuckerberg, Warren Buffet, Steve Jobs, Richard Branson, Walt Disney, or Henry Ford and in our young-ambitious-idealistic minds we find a way to consider them our equals. We come to the conclusion that "If they can do it, why can't we?" But we never consider HOW exactly we are going to accomplish this macro-scale impact we desire. Instead, we become consumed with our daily routines and the next thing you know, one day becomes a week, then a month, then a couple years. All while personal responsibilities keep growing exponentially and we no longer have the flexibility to take risk we can TODAY.
If we never take time to self-reflect and calculate a plan, then all we have is a hollow ambition that creates frustration, and in some cases depression, when we compare those ambitions to reality. This my dear friends is the quarter-life crisis, and I'm experiencing one.
To find a way out of this hole, I recently asked an extremely successful entrepreneur who never went to college for some guidance/advice. I wanted to know how he was able to get to where he was and his response was as insightful as it was simple. He looked me right into my eyes and said "All you have to do is hustle." I was shocked. So shocked in fact, I didn't know how to respond. I was certain there was more to it. There had to be some big secret successful people knew that I didn't, but apparently there isn't. We all know we need to hustle, it's the actually doing it part that we struggle with. We have to remind ourselves that the difference between success and mediocrity is action. Just like Sir Issac Newton said in his laws of Thermodynamics "For every action there's an equal or greater reaction" (Obviously, I'm improvising his words). So guess what happens when we take no action? NOTHING.
To conclude, I'm going to leave you all with a video I wish could wake me up everyday. I hope it makes the same impact on you that it does on me, and that is it makes me want to run through a wall........hypothetically, not physically of course..... Okay, you win. Maybe I'll run through drywall, but that's just for effects.
Now ask yourself, do you want to succeed as bad as you want to breathe? Or do you just kinda-want-it?
