Following the crowds won't get you thereAfter a couple of hours spent on a certain report or analysis I usually take 5 minutes to browse through my favorite news and finance sites to update on recent events and financial developments.
This week, to my surprise, a familiar face looked back at me from the home page of one of the most prominent financial websites around. Even more astounding was the fact that this person, once a good friend of mine, was chosen to be one of the most promising entrepreneurs in Europe.
It seems that while a distant and remote individual achieves financial success we somehow calm our envious and frustrated spirits by attributing his or her success to some magical factors unknown to us whether it is family and friends or pure luck.
When someone you're quite familiar with makes it big there are questions that need answering, all emanating from the same frustrating thought: Why him and not me?
The questions of success and financial independence and the way to achieve is perhaps one of the most troubling the minds of all of us, at least in western societies. Many of us spend long days in tiring jobs, feeling stranded and stuck. How do you weave the magic of financial independence?
I can't say I felt great at the moment I read through the article. I was naturally very happy for my friend but my mind quickly strayed off to other directions. Although I lead quite a successful life I've yet to become a success in my eyes.
I consider myself very talented and a great employee but it seems the set of skills I have is destined to leave me fighting to climb-up the corporate ladder, each exhausting step at a time.
To really succeed you need to be a visionary, to be determined enough, to have a certain hunger and to be brave enough to follow your convictions. Naturally these have to be combined with intelligence, marketing and social intelligence, hard work and luck. The combination of these traits and circumstances is obviously rare.
There's no reason to adopt a fatalistic approach. Actually most of us, including me, haven't really tried. I think I speak for many of us when I say we're just too comfortable and not hungry enough. Unfortunately we're caught in a situation we're not happy in but we don't have the courage or conviction to try and change it.
To really succeed, much like in the stock market, one has to avoid the crowds, or leverage them. You can have a pretty good life following the classic examples but in order to really stand out it seems we need to be innovative in some fashion, and dare.
The very appropriate motto of the British SAS or Special Air Service, which is one of the most famed special ops units in the world, is simple and powerful: Who Dares Wins. I, myself, intend to dare a little more.
Related Posts:
- Coming To Terms with Never Getting Rich – A Look at the Pre-Requirements
- Key psychological factors in stock market success
- Would You Be Willing To Pay 60% Tax For a Higher Level of Social Equality?
How Can they Possibly Afford That? Or Is Money in the Eye of the Beholder? - No Salvation from Productivity Improvements: The Failed 35 Hour Work Week Experiment and Work-Life Balance Examined
2 comments:
love the post. Yes, I dare to win and have set out to do just that. I plan to be financially independent by the age of 25.
It's definitely the fear of ridicule that keeps people from going against the crowd.
Of course, the rewards are worth it!
The 'crowd' these days seems to be all about getting a great, high-paying job, but that feels silly to me. My friends just don't understand the way I feel.
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