Success is a lousy teacher

Success is a lousy teacher:

Heard a Bill Gates quote recently:

‘Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces smart people into thinking they can’t lose.’

This is a great paradox because the most successful people know how important losing is to the process.

Success comes from failure.

It comes from working on the same problem over and over again for years with no signs of success. It comes from failing but never giving up.

Never forget that.

The work is where success comes from.

The work is a constant struggle. It will never be easy but as long as you’re being challenged and pushing yourself, the struggle is always worth it.

Life is a struggle. Find the struggle that makes you happy.

What I’ve realized recently is becoming more successful than others requires you to take big risks others aren’t willing to take. You have to be willing to look like a fool in the short term to look like a genius in the long term. You have to enjoy failure. Enjoy the days where writing is hard and no one reads your work.

That’s where real success comes from. Nadal mentioned it in a recent interview. The reason he’s successful is because of the work he puts in on the days he doesn’t want to. 

My idol, Kobe, lived by it.

Greatness requires sacrifice. How much are you willing to sacrifice to be great? Because there will be tons of failure along the way.

Failure is the price of admission for success. The more you fail, the more you’ll be successful.

Increase your frequency of failures and over time, you’ll eventually be successful. This is how I think about learning new skills. If you commit 6 months to a year to learning any skill, you’ll be surprised how much you can do. Any adult can do it. Whether it’s drawing, learning a language, writing, martial arts, dancing or pottery, anyone can learn those skills.

The problem is people don’t believe they can learn those things. Most adults assume their ability to learn new skills is capped after a certain age. That’s wrong. The neurons in your brain are adaptable. They can create more neural connections the more they are exposed. If you challenge your neurons by doing difficult things for long periods of time, your brain rewires itself.

If you commit an hour plus every day for 3-6 months to accomplish a specific task, you’ll be surprised how much you can get done. ‘Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in 10 years.’ – another quote from Bill Gates.

People don’t reflect on how much time they’re wasting through technology. Screens are making us zombies and slaves to our phones. It’s happening everywhere. People don’t allow themselves time for boredom and to think. If you throw your phone in another room, set a timer, and work on something for yourself, you can accomplish so much with your time.

The issue is people don’t want to do the work. They don’t want the struggle. They don’t want to be a beginner again in something. They don’t want to look like fools. They don’t want to fail.

You need to reframe failure in your mind. It’s hard when your brain has been wired a certain way from your childhood.

When we were kids, we were punished for making mistakes. Growing up in a family that prioritized education, any time I came from school with less than an A, I was nervously shitting my pants every bus ride home. I’m sure many kids felt this, but also had to deal with even worse circumstances. They may have been severely punished, abused or neglected when they did something wrong.

Because of how our brains were wired when we were kids, we see failure as detrimental. In Carol Dweck’s book called Mindset (my notes here), she pioneers the concept of fixed vs. growth mindset. Most adults she calls in the fixed mindset where they believe their intelligence and abilities are capped. Those in the growth mindset embrace failure and challenges and believe they always can grow.

The most successful people in the world are in the second camp. You have to believe that there’s always more work to do. You can’t be satisfied with where you’re at, either personally or professionally, because there’s always more challenges to embrace. There’s always more ways you can grow.

The way I see it, I’ve just started on my journey. Even though I’ve graduated as a doctor and worked as a venture capitalist in the biotech industry, I feel like I haven’t done anything.

There’s so much more failure and difficult experiences I need to have before I can say I’ve been successful.

Success can be a lousy teacher but not if you’re always trying to fail.

Keep failing, you’re doing great.