Aztec Silver
Newbie
- Jun 1, 2019
- 32
- 25
Now, the most fruitful way for me to sharpen my blog writing skills is to write about something I’m interested in and believe you will find useful. Let’s take this win-win opportunity for me to tell you that you, yes you, will fail miserably on your IM journey. Quite frankly, you’ll fail on all your journeys. Before you knock my virtual teeth out, allow me to explain why you must acknowledge this nasty truth. This article will cover not only why you will fail but why it’s important that you learn how to recover from a failure.
Let’s begin with the most obvious reason you will fail, the odds are against you. Assuming your desired outcome is favorable (money, influence, more money) someone else has already taken your journey. As a matter of fact, many people have taken your journey. No matter how good your method is, you can’t avoid the friction of saturation. Take a step back from IM and the internet. I want to introduce you to some stats.
According to the U.S. government, only 50% of businesses survive the first five years of operation. Four out of one-hundred small businesses survive the ten-year mark. 50% of small businesses are operated from home. If you have no idea why I shared those stats, you need to be asking yourself more questions. These businesses “made it” they “won.” They cut the ribbon and for the next five years, slowly sank. Ask yourself what your chances look like. As a thought experiment, in your mind, tell me why your IM journey will beat the odds. When you’re done reading this article, no matter what opinion you formed, above your comment type “My IM journey will beat the odds because …” and give me your answer.
Your perception of success as a beginner or an undefeated champion is warped. Following advice from those who “made it” or people who you believe are successful is flawed. Survivorship bias throws your logic right out the window. I’ll never do this beautiful concept any justice so I recommend you check Youtube for some videos on it. Wikipedia tells us Survivor Bias is the logical error of concentrating on the people or things that made it past some selection process and overlooking those that did not, typically because of their lack of visibility. This can lead to false conclusions in several different ways.
In English, this simply means that successful people are often unaware of the true reason they succeeded. This leads to misinformation as to what it truly takes to succeed. Survivor bias is why successful people have to slap their names all over their products. Most people can’t recreate their success because they have no idea what made them successful the first time. This is true in the IM world more than anywhere else. As Grant Stephan said, the best way to make money online is by talking about making money online. Self-proclaimed Gurus sell one website/digital marketing package to a small business, compound their profit, build a shallow brand, and shell out a course where they show you “Exactly how I made $25,000 with my phone in one day!!!” Most success is a facade. Swallow that pill now, It will hurt less.
So your odds aren’t good and copying the steps of successful people is illogical. The reasonable thing to do is give up, right? Yes. This isn’t one of those situations where trying harder will change the outcome. Quit while you’re ahead. Look at this dude. Did you actually believe that?! Ok, the real solution is to fail with purpose. Bad odds don’t mean impossible, and a world of bad advice doesn’t negate the process of trial and error. It is not enough to “learn from your failures.” If someone tried to beat the stock market, they would fail often. With luck, they may get a few lucky breaks. If they learned from each failure all their lives, would they ever learn to beat the market for good? No!
There is a story about an Austrian mathematician who beat the lottery for a living and a story of a construction worker hitting the jackpot twice in a week. All cases of success are a game of numbers. Your $15 bucks and two domains have the same opportunity as an IMer with a $10,000 budget and two virtual assistants at selling things online. You don’t have the same chances as him. When you both put yourself in a favorable position and increase your odds to succeed, you will obtain your goal. The beginner mind will only do one. This will annoy successful IMers but trying multiple things and quitting is the same concept as buckling down on one method or goal. They are both playing the game of numbers but you will generally have a better time dedicating yourself. However, some people run against such terrible odds that buckling down will virtually never payoff (think about the unsung heroes throughout history.)
In conclusion, failure will happen. The best thing you can do is understand how your recovery will help your odds of success. Western culture (and by extension any culture impacted by its media) has a strong belief in never giving up and doing anything necessary to succeed. The problem is that these concepts are not mutually exclusive. Sometimes quitting while you’re ahead is securing your future success by any means necessary. Sometimes not taking a risk you come across is not giving up because ultimately you will be better off. With so many variables at play, your best shot is learning when to stick it through and when to attack from a different angle. Don’t confuse your goals with your dream. You will have many goals in life, but only one dream you must bring to fruition. Now get out there, get your ass kicked, and evolve until you accomplish your goal!!!
[Editors notes: Pacing for this article was tricky because the tone is very serious but not precisely negative. All views expressed here are written in an attempt to educate, in no manner do I wish to minimize anyone's success or struggles.
In honor of the subject matter, I have decided this article will not be successful in reaching more than one person
I know it seems unpopular but I made my decision final
I took hours to script, pace, write, research, edit, and revise this article. That being said, I am sure something will be overlooked or grammatical errors will be afoot. Forgive me for this.
Finally, I made no substantial claims within the article that require extensive sources (all assumptions and leaps were clear to follow.) If for some reason, sources are demanded, I will provide the article, website, and wiki link to my information. Although, most of my points are logic-orientated and not information orientated.
Thanks for reading!
- Aztec Silver]
Let’s begin with the most obvious reason you will fail, the odds are against you. Assuming your desired outcome is favorable (money, influence, more money) someone else has already taken your journey. As a matter of fact, many people have taken your journey. No matter how good your method is, you can’t avoid the friction of saturation. Take a step back from IM and the internet. I want to introduce you to some stats.
According to the U.S. government, only 50% of businesses survive the first five years of operation. Four out of one-hundred small businesses survive the ten-year mark. 50% of small businesses are operated from home. If you have no idea why I shared those stats, you need to be asking yourself more questions. These businesses “made it” they “won.” They cut the ribbon and for the next five years, slowly sank. Ask yourself what your chances look like. As a thought experiment, in your mind, tell me why your IM journey will beat the odds. When you’re done reading this article, no matter what opinion you formed, above your comment type “My IM journey will beat the odds because …” and give me your answer.
Your perception of success as a beginner or an undefeated champion is warped. Following advice from those who “made it” or people who you believe are successful is flawed. Survivorship bias throws your logic right out the window. I’ll never do this beautiful concept any justice so I recommend you check Youtube for some videos on it. Wikipedia tells us Survivor Bias is the logical error of concentrating on the people or things that made it past some selection process and overlooking those that did not, typically because of their lack of visibility. This can lead to false conclusions in several different ways.
In English, this simply means that successful people are often unaware of the true reason they succeeded. This leads to misinformation as to what it truly takes to succeed. Survivor bias is why successful people have to slap their names all over their products. Most people can’t recreate their success because they have no idea what made them successful the first time. This is true in the IM world more than anywhere else. As Grant Stephan said, the best way to make money online is by talking about making money online. Self-proclaimed Gurus sell one website/digital marketing package to a small business, compound their profit, build a shallow brand, and shell out a course where they show you “Exactly how I made $25,000 with my phone in one day!!!” Most success is a facade. Swallow that pill now, It will hurt less.
So your odds aren’t good and copying the steps of successful people is illogical. The reasonable thing to do is give up, right? Yes. This isn’t one of those situations where trying harder will change the outcome. Quit while you’re ahead. Look at this dude. Did you actually believe that?! Ok, the real solution is to fail with purpose. Bad odds don’t mean impossible, and a world of bad advice doesn’t negate the process of trial and error. It is not enough to “learn from your failures.” If someone tried to beat the stock market, they would fail often. With luck, they may get a few lucky breaks. If they learned from each failure all their lives, would they ever learn to beat the market for good? No!
There is a story about an Austrian mathematician who beat the lottery for a living and a story of a construction worker hitting the jackpot twice in a week. All cases of success are a game of numbers. Your $15 bucks and two domains have the same opportunity as an IMer with a $10,000 budget and two virtual assistants at selling things online. You don’t have the same chances as him. When you both put yourself in a favorable position and increase your odds to succeed, you will obtain your goal. The beginner mind will only do one. This will annoy successful IMers but trying multiple things and quitting is the same concept as buckling down on one method or goal. They are both playing the game of numbers but you will generally have a better time dedicating yourself. However, some people run against such terrible odds that buckling down will virtually never payoff (think about the unsung heroes throughout history.)
In conclusion, failure will happen. The best thing you can do is understand how your recovery will help your odds of success. Western culture (and by extension any culture impacted by its media) has a strong belief in never giving up and doing anything necessary to succeed. The problem is that these concepts are not mutually exclusive. Sometimes quitting while you’re ahead is securing your future success by any means necessary. Sometimes not taking a risk you come across is not giving up because ultimately you will be better off. With so many variables at play, your best shot is learning when to stick it through and when to attack from a different angle. Don’t confuse your goals with your dream. You will have many goals in life, but only one dream you must bring to fruition. Now get out there, get your ass kicked, and evolve until you accomplish your goal!!!
[Editors notes: Pacing for this article was tricky because the tone is very serious but not precisely negative. All views expressed here are written in an attempt to educate, in no manner do I wish to minimize anyone's success or struggles.
In honor of the subject matter, I have decided this article will not be successful in reaching more than one person
I know it seems unpopular but I made my decision final I took hours to script, pace, write, research, edit, and revise this article. That being said, I am sure something will be overlooked or grammatical errors will be afoot. Forgive me for this.
Finally, I made no substantial claims within the article that require extensive sources (all assumptions and leaps were clear to follow.) If for some reason, sources are demanded, I will provide the article, website, and wiki link to my information. Although, most of my points are logic-orientated and not information orientated.
Thanks for reading!
- Aztec Silver]
