Lose to Win or the Art of Succeeding in Life
The universal principle to navigate through everything
Each of us has a personal list of what we dream of becoming in life:
Writers, businessmen, influencers, parents, mentors, generals. Just name your thing.
Everyone wants it — not everyone gets it.
What differentiates a hyper-successful performer from an average loser?
The winners know how to lose.
To demonstrate how the principle works, I show you an analogy with learning the guitar.
1. Inception
In the beginning, here’s only you and your guitar.
You and your goal.
Seeing this fancy wooden plank for the first time makes you wonder, but after pulling the strings the divine sound comes out, and your heart trembles.
It’s what you’ve always dreamed of — to be a musician.
But the initial enthusiasm quickly vanishes as you put your fingers on the strings and push them against the fretboard.
You take the fingers off the fretboard and stare at them, unable to utter a single word.
Pain…
Corns…
And blood if you are too enthusiastic.
You lost.
2. Doubts take over
Now you can understand why so many people quit the guitar and start doubting whether you should become one of them.
You feel hardship every time you step into uncharted waters.
You see, here’s a deal.
Either you give up, fearing to repeat the initial pain, or you make a conscious decision to keep doing the thing and progress a step closer to success.
I remind you, the music dreams haven’t gone anywhere. Sore fingers as well.
Everything you touch for the first time isn’t going according to plan. Thinking otherwise is devastating, so you need to learn how to manage your grandeur expectations.
It’s not a movie, where scriptwriting magic paints the world the way the writer wants it to be. Such instant success without any effort and sacrifice on the hero’s side makes the movies dull as hell.
Why? Because nobody believes in that.
You’re the writer and the reader of your story at the same time.
You stand at the crossroads, choosing between a sweet loss or a salty win.
You’ve lost already. Loss is inevitable.
However, your perception and following actions depends totally on you.
3. Make it or break it
You — 1 : Guitar — 0.
Your finger pads still -1, but give it a few days and they will be harder and stronger and ready to turn you into a guitar god.
You decide to go on.
The best decision of your life.
Why?
Because if you knew my view stats, you’d wonder why I keep spending so much time on this f...
But yet here I am. Torturing the readers, algorithms, and myself with this article. And plan to keep torturing)
Now nothing can stop you.
The birth of a new Eric Clapton, Brian May, David Gilmour, Eddie Van Halen, Slash, or whoever your favorite guitarist is.
You won.
But if the pain made you stop…
Oh, boy…
4. Game over
You — 0 : Guitar — 10000*0.97634/0.5²³⁴
That’s how terrifying the guitar looks to you now.
If previously you’d just lost a fight, now you’re completely destroyed.
You hide the instrument in the darkest corner of your home, planning to give it away on someone’s birthday.
The brain associates the guitar with corns, the same way it associates the dream with pain.
However badly you want your dreams to come true, they won’t until your will to master the craft overpowers the pain the road to mastery requires.
I speak just about a guitar here, but the axiom works for anything:
Writing a book, launching a business, advancing a career, starting a family. Name your stuff.
It’s only you and your stupid brain, trying to protect both of you from theoretical pain and stopping you from succeeding in life.
So if you want to win…
Learn how to lose.
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