Successful People Don't Care
“Successful people are bold enough to behave like they already won”
Some days I feel like Kanye West on “Last Call” of College Dropout (Not the Yeezus one lol). Knowing that success is so imminent and seeing your vision through the tunnel, but exhausted by the weight of potential. History shows us that Biggie was booed off the Apollo stage, Jay Z forgot the lyrics at his first show, Destiny’s Child didn’t win Star Search, but reality shows us they still made it. See everyone starts somewhere. But successful people are bold enough to behave like they already won. They believe and promote their idea so much that they sound crazy. For example, Cardi B (and Eve) used to strip on a pole. I bet when they told other girls in the dressing rooms back in the day, “Hey, I'm gonna drop a hit record one day”- they all hated. I mean Bodak Yellow is fire, and I don't know what the title even means. But people don’t have to see your vision when you are coming up and making moves, that’s what makes it special.
“Now I could let these dream killers kill my self-esteem. Or use my arrogance as the steam to power my dreams”
And speaking of visions, I want to take a detour to Bran in Games of Thrones (How about that season finale though?!) Because he didn’t just wake up one day and say, “I am going to be the three eyed raven”- He just became it. He lived and breathed it, and suddenly it was true. He made it all the way to the wall- a paraplegic pushed in a sled by a young girl in the worst winter of all winters - among wild animals and dead men, and he fulfilled his destiny.
READY
See, successful people just keep going. Along the way people will hate you for reasons you won’t understand. Successful people don’t even have the time to care, because their confidence and faith are so strong. For successful people, it’s almost always “only a matter of time” and it is never worth the time to waste on what someone else thinks. Famous author Malcolm Gladwell of the book Outliers, notes that the average time to greatness in anything is around 10,000 hours. Time is valuable and ruminating takes up energy you could be expending on yourself. So do yourself a favor and vow to not give a **ck about all the negative energy examples listed below.
People will project their fears and failures on you. You cannot care.
People will think you are doing too much. You still can’t care
People will think you should be doing something else. Don’t care.
People will disappoint you. You can’t care.
People will think your ideas are stupid or preposterous. Do not care.
People will think you are annoying. Don’t care.
People will get tired of supporting, liking, and pretending to care. Still don’t care.
FOCUSED
“Do just one thing each day toward your goal”
I won tickets to a free intimate Alicia Keys Concert back during my NYU days, and I remember her saying to the crowd- do just one thing each day toward your goal. This stuck with me because I know that little by little becomes a lot. I know that 1+1=2. It doesn’t take a genius to understand that things add up- and then despite what people may say- one day all of a sudden- success becomes real.