Can you talk about the quality(ies) or trait(s) that contributed most to your success? I read about your adversity and I want to know what is your personal mindset of getting through those challenges.
Combined with the following asks:
Hello, Mr. ENTJ. Have you ever been depressed? How did you manage to come out of the rut and find the will to live on? I realize that this is a personal question, and you don’t really have to answer but it’d help in understanding different paradigms and help someone who else who is struggling. Thank You
What do you think is required from a person to succeed ?
Dealing with failure and overcoming adversity
What are some of your top habits that have helped your success? What are some habits in your life you think you need to change?
Did the qualities you’ve mentioned (emotional self-regulation, mental fortitude) come naturally to you? Was it something you had to develop? How can I develop them? Thanks for dedicating your time to this blog. Helped a lot.
The answer is grit (resilience). I have an abundant supply of resilience that’s carried me through a childhood rife with crushing poverty, domestic abuse, physical danger, health crises (hip reconstruction, cancer), rejection, failure, and all the in-betweens that life threw at me to get to where I am today.
To develop and maintain grit, there are 3 core values carved into my soul:
1. “I am not a victim, I am my own hero.”
This stops spirals of self-pity and feelings of helplessness. This creates hope and courage. This reminds me that while I’ve been on the receiving end of some awful events (I mean, truly, ridiculous shit), I still have within me to change my circumstances– then I do it.
Poverty? I put myself through school (I paid 100% of my own tuition, no help from my parents– not a single penny– for undergraduate and graduate school), grinded through 6+ years of studies to graduate from 2 elite universities at the top of my class, hustled through my career, and now I’m wealthy. My parents never have to worry about money again, ever, my wife is taken care of, my daughter is spoiled rotten, my vacations are booked, my bank account is fat, my stock portfolio is cruising, and my career is skyrocketing. I have clothes on my back, a roof over my head, food in my stomach, and a smile on my face.
Physical danger? I fulfilled a lifelong dream to move my family out of the ghetto, buy our parents a home a few years back, and they now live in an affluent neighborhood within a gated community.
Health crisis? I saw the best physicians available, ate healthy, exercised, and continue to take care of my health to the best of my ability. I’ve recovered, I’m well, I’m healthy, I’m cancer free, I’m pain free.
There are many things in life that are unfair and out of your control; but how you prepare for the worst, plan for the best, and respond to those circumstances are in your power. That’s where you need to step up and shine. There will be amazing people along this journey that will help by providing advice, encouragement, and support but at the end of the day they have their own lives to live, their own problems to solve, and their own mountains to climb so you must always be your own advocate. You can’t hitch a ride on their wagon because they’re not going where you’re going. This is your ship and you are the captain, it’s your responsibility to steer it in the right direction so master the things within your control.
2. “Tomorrow will be better.”
This helps with impatience when progress is slow and fights off doubts and despair when changes don’t come as quickly as I want. This creates discipline and consistency. I always tell my wife, the INTJ, after every setback that “I feel like something good is waiting for me around the corner. I don’t know what it is, how it’ll come, or when it’ll come, but I feel it.” And it inevitably does as long as I show up, give 100%, and keep working towards my goals.
“Tomorrow will be better” helps me take things step by step because I have the tendency to look a hundred miles down the road and cringe at the distance still left to travel. I’ve repeated this over and over again, through my crap retail job at Target, through being a janitor scrubbing toilets in the mall, through my long hours cramming for the MCAT, through high stress in my consulting job, and so on and so forth. 1 day becomes 1 week, 1 week becomes 1 month, 1 month becomes 1 year, 1 year becomes 10 years, and suddenly we’re in 2019 and I’ve graduated from my dream schools, I work in my dream job, I’m married to my dream girl, I drive my dream car, and I’ve traveled to destinations around the world I used to only dream about.
Confucius wasn’t playing around when he said “a journey of a 1000 miles begins with a single step.” It won’t be an overnight thing. If your goal is to lose weight, then you’re not going to do 100 push-ups today and get a six-pack tomorrow. If your goal is to raise your grades, then you’re not going to read a chapter and magically get a 4.0 GPA tomorrow. I didn’t snap my fingers one day and suddenly my dream life appeared at my doorstep the next morning. That’s not how it works. However, if today is better than yesterday, and tomorrow is better than today, then those wins will add up over time until you finally get to where you’re going.
3. “You’re going to have to kill me to stop me.”
This is not an exaggeration, this is a fact. This creates tenacity and stamina. You may be smarter than me, you may be taller than me, you may be richer than me, you may be more handsome than me, you may be better than me in every facet but you are not going to outwork, outhustle, or outlast me. Period.
Learn to fight like hell.
This is a mentality I take towards every goal I’ve set because it keeps me alert, prepared, and responsive to seize opportunities as soon as they pop up. I always tell people around me whenever we’re working on their goals to “be ready” because if you’re ready, then you don’t need to waste time getting ready. Opportunities in life fly by in a blink of an eye like a job posting that opens and closes because you didn’t have a resume prepared, a scholarship perfectly matched for your background that got away because your grades weren’t high enough, or the love of your life that gets away because you weren’t available when you two crossed paths. Be ready and stay ready so when the opportunities present themselves you can immediately seize them.
I achieve this by being in constant motion in my life; I am reading, I am exercising, I am traveling, I am working, I am mentoring, I am meeting new people, I am growing relationships with the people I already know, I am perfecting my craft, I am expanding my network, I am learning a new skill, I am building my knowledge, I am recharging, I am reflecting on my life, priorities, mistakes, and next steps– I am improving every single day and I don’t stop. I stay insanely busy, which you might’ve noticed if it’s taken me 6 years to respond to your ask or Tumblr message (my bad), with meaningful things that add to my life. I move with purpose, I work like I’m possessed.
The United States Armed Forces has a saying:
“Everyone wants to go to heaven, but nobody wants to die.”
There are many people in this world who fall short of their full potential because they aren’t willing to work or fight for what they want. They hit a little speed bump, lose heart, and give up, but with a little digging it becomes obvious they didn’t try hard enough to push through the barriers. I worked 3 jobs from 3AM to 8AM and 12PM to 10PM while taking classes to pay tuition and rent, I scrubbed toilets, I bussed tables, I lived on packets of ramen for weeks because that was the only food I could afford, I studied by flashlight, I slept in my car, I walked to work in the rain when I couldn’t afford gas, I studied from outdated textbooks in the library because I didn’t have the money to buy or rent new ones, I attended every career recruiting event, I showed up at office hours to every class I struggled in, I chased every tutoring session until I understood the subject matter, and I was always the first one in and last one out of the classroom or the office wherever I was. I always fought for it. I exhausted every option so that even if I failed, I could sleep peacefully knowing I had done everything in my power to succeed, I had closure that I did my absolute best.
That’s how a scrappy kid born in poverty in the slums of a third world Southeast Asian country, raised in an unstable home, and burdened with too many challenges to list, became educated, graduated, elevated, and gainfully compensated. To not only survive in life, but to thrive.
