Who's living a riskier life?
An employee with good income and tons of debt or a freelancer with unreliable income but little to no debt.
Who's living life to the fullest?
A person who travels 6 different countries in a year or a person who's living with his family with a good work life balance.
Who is more stressed and who enjoys more, I guess you can never know until you have a light bulb moment. Until you become more aware about your life. About what you value more in your life.
You act like mortals in all that you fear and like immortals in all that you desire. — Seneca
When you become aware about your life, about your values, you start living a different life.
Getting older makes you aware.
Having a near death experience makes you aware.
Losing someone close to you, a loved one makes you aware.
Life is A Game Of Chances
Chances influence a big part of your life. It decides who your parents are, who you would marry to and what career you choose. It all depends on the chances.
Then, these chances will define your connections and your opportunities. You can control your decisions between the chances you get.
Play Life Like A Video Game
Whenever I am stuck in a phase of anxiety or stress, I play video games.
Apart from the fact that it takes me to another world, and my mind is consumed in fictional characters leaving behind the real world worries, there are many important lessons I have learnt by playing video games.
The meaning of life changes to what levels I can unlock. What powers I can use to win when others have more skills.
It makes me more competitive.
But the most important lesson is that once you lose in a game, you can start over. There is nothing stopping you from playing it again.
And when you try it enough times, you will eventually win.
Also, when you lose, you will change your strategies so that you can win next time. You keep learning. You keep evolving.
Once you learn enough, you will level up to play with better players. To face stronger challenges.
When you treat your life like a video game, you will play hard levels again and again. When you fail at some level, you will learn from it, try it again and make strategic plans to win.
There is not much downside. There is no loss. There is only win eventually.
You learn to Play To Win.
Learn To Leverage
A few decades ago, in order to set up a small business, you should have huge upfront capital, some connections, some staff to run daily operations.
Doing so, you would face huge risk of losing all your capital in case the business fails. Not only would you lose money but years of your life. Because you would have to start again from scratch.
Also, you won't have unlimited upside. A store can earn limited amount of money. A local business can earn only a limited amount of money.
And the chances of failure in the local business are huge.
But times have changed now. You don't need much, just need an idea. And some amount of time daily.
The environment is perfect. The requirement is low. So low that you can try things over and over.
You don't have to be stuck with a single career or single income source. Now, the list of career opportunities have grown exponentially.
People are making millions by reviewing smart phones and gadgets. By sharing their industry specific knowledge. By playing video games.
They are combining curiosity and skills.
To achieve significant results in a short amount of time, you have to leverage something. Leverage through skills, connection, content, ideas, knowledge or in any way you can.
No Upfront Cost:
For example, creating content cost little to nothing. And you can earn enough money if people can relate to your content.
It can be on hive, youtube, twitter. Creating content is easy. The down side is just that you lose some time.
You can Test Ideas with No Downside:
You can test ideas by running ads, by creating content. If people are interested in your ideas, you can take the project seriously. If it's video or articles, you can research more, improve your skills later. If it's an app, a game etc, you can hire freelancers and start working on that project.
You can start with nothing and work your way up.
The Lesson
Make multiple small bets for massive success.
The strategy is simple. Make little bets on things that won't result in big setbacks.
Make little bets that have huge upside and small downside. And repeat the process over and over again.
Keep building the stable income and keep trying small bets in your spare time. Make bets regardless of what you do. Relying on just one thing for your livelihood is also a bet.
Inaction is a bet.
By trying nothing new, you are betting that the old things will work forever.
The only true safe thing you can do is to try over and over again. To go for it, to get rejected, to repeat, to strive, to wish. Without rejection there is no frontier, there is no passion, and there is no magic. — James Altucher