Career Path and Financial Independence?

[Warrior74]

This is how people like you think...they think to themselves, "I always have these ideas coming to me...if they're coming to me they must be coming to EVERYONE, and if they're not making money on them, it's because they're lazy".

I know you've been through a lot of crap in your situation, and you're under the impression that, "If *I* can do it, anyone can!" But as you said, it's the same aspects of your personality that caused your problems that gave you the ability to excel at what you do. Admit it...you enjoy what you do. Even when the whole web-development thing is p!ssing you off, you're still loving the conflict.

I've known people who have a talent and passion for "business" no matter what it is...they can do things that would make someone else absolutely miserable and ENJOY it because they love the process of making money.

Then there are people who don't necessarily have the passion for "business", but they have a good head for it, and they have a passion for the specific business idea they're running with. They get INTO something they really enjoy doing and that's what motivates them to succeed in the business.

I'm neither...I don't have a head or passion for business...it bores the p!ss out of me...and the things I DO enjoy doing and am willing to commit time and energy to, I'm either not very good at or they don't make me money.

You guys are addicted to the "hustle"...get money, get b!tches, get more money, get more b!tches. Somehow I just lost track of the "point" of it all. If I spend five or ten or fifteen years of my life "building an empire", I don't become an emperor as a result. I'm still just me...only I'm me with money and b!tches. Is that what makes a "man"??

I've always said to myself, "If you don't have something, it's probably because you don't want it enough". Maybe I just don't want it enough. I'm just staring the inevitability of my own end in the face and thinking, "My time here is limited...do I want to sacrifice THIS time on doing something that makes me miserable just so I have a little more money to throw around when I'm 40 or 50 or 60??" I don't need a teacup giraffe and golden walnuts...what am I gonna do with that crap?

Eventually, just like Alexander, I rot in the ground and whatever kingdom I did or didn't build crumbles into dust.

I don't know what it is that motivates guys like you...and for sure I envy it, but I haven't found that motivation within myself. I guess that makes me an inferior specimen or something. What can I do?

I mean, what drives you? Are you guys trying to prove something to yourselves with this "get money, get b!tches" attitude all the time? Do you really have THAT much love for it?

Heh, put me on a rock-wall or on a motorcycle and I'm ready to destroy my body to prove something, but only because I love the challenge THAT much. Put me in a three-piece suit and turn me loose in the business world...and I'm waiting for 5 O'clock. This crap just doesn't interest me. I hate trying to sell ideas to people who are too dumb to think of them themselves. I feel sorry for them...I feel like a LOT of "business" feels taking advantage of other people's failures. "Selling" in general feels like a dark art...like you're mind-f**king someone else.

Hell, I used to get off on the whole "seduction" dance back when I felt like I had something to prove to my peers, that I had what it takes to "pull women" after going through high school and college and not getting laid. Now...I've proven that I CAN do it, but I neither enjoy it nor do I gain immense satisfaction with the "prize". F**k sex. Even the women that I find sexually attractive don't interest me on a metaphysical level...I'm essentially masturbating with their p*ssies. What's the point of that? What satisfaction is there in conquering a bubble-headed bimbo?

I probably shouldn't even be ON this forum any more...I'm just discouraging the young guys who DO have the gifts and enthusiasm that you have. By all means, if you feel the passion for getting money, go out and GET MONEY, and don't stop for any reason.

I just don't want anything any more. The Buddhists must think that's an enviable position to be in, but it's not, it's actually quite boring. Some days I feel like living or dying are equally attractive alternatives.

Pook and the old SoSuave sages used to say, "Eliminate desire". That seems to have been a mistake.

You've lost all the joy in life. What brings you joy? It's not even about running a business. What would you enjoy doing? If nothing makes you happy, maybe you should try serving other people, do something to help others and see how that makes your feel. Or maybe you're depressed and need to sort it out. It just doesn't sound like a healthy mindset and your business at the moment should be figuring out if this mindset is normal and then doing something about it.

 

[guru1000]

When I was 22 years old, I owned my first business. I was on the 42nd floor of a tall building, leasing 1,200 square feet of office space. One day, one of my employees came back from lunch after having two beers, making an a**hole of himself in the boardroom. He was the firm clown, the jester. I called him over, took him to the window, and said, "I want you to look below," showing him an isolated street 420 feet below, "If you want to succeed, make a promise to yourself. Make the promise that if you fail, you will take this plunge to the street below."

He never showed up to work again.

Not everyone is willing to sacrifice their life, or much, to succeed, that's why many fail. Tell me what you are willing to sacrifice, and I will reasonably tell you your chances of success.

 

[jophil28]

Not everyone is willing to sacrifice their life, or much, to succeed, that's why many fail. Tell me what you are willing to sacrifice, and I will reasonably tell you your chances of success.

^An old truth that has been lost in the PC mamby crap of modern instant gratification.

 

[squirrels]

When I was 22 years old, I owned my first business. I was on the 42nd floor of a tall building, leasing 1,200 square feet of office space. One day, one of my employees came back from lunch after having two beers, making an a**hole of himself in the boardroom. He was the firm clown, the jester. I called him over, took him to the window, and said, "I want you to look below," showing him an isolated street 420 feet below, "If you want to succeed, make a promise to yourself. Make the promise that if you fail, you will take this plunge to the street below."

He never showed up to work again.

Either way, you were right to put the question to him. But was he a bad fit for the endeavor, or was the endeavor a bad fit for him? Are you sure it was that he didn't want to risk his life for "success"? Or was it that he didn't feel that YOUR definition of "success" was worth risking his life?

As I said above, people who don't have what they want, often they don't want it ENOUGH. You're talking about a situation where you're surrounding yourself with people who want what you want JUST AS BADLY as you do, i.e. willing to give their lives for it. But I can almost guarantee that whatever it is you wanted at that time you made that commitment to yourself, another person...me for example...would not want it badly enough to make that kind of commitment...might even find the work itself so repugnant that splatter on the pavement MIGHT seem like the better option if those were the only two options.

There are endeavors that I've undertaken that DO carry the risk of death or severe injury. I understand the value in that kind of commitment to something. But that's not a commitment you can force upon yourself unless you REALLY find some satisfaction or fulfillment in something. It'd be nice to be "independently wealthy"...but then what? When I think of what it would be like to be rich, I see the same lonely person, sitting in a much bigger house with a better selection of cars, still without faith in himself or any other member of the human race.

Like Warrior said:

You've lost all the joy in life. What brings you joy? It's not even about running a business. What would you enjoy doing? If nothing makes you happy, maybe you should try serving other people, do something to help others and see how that makes your feel. Or maybe you're depressed and need to sort it out. It just doesn't sound like a healthy mindset and your business at the moment should be figuring out if this mindset is normal and then doing something about it.

 

[speed dawg]

delete

 

[backbreaker]

When I was 22 years old, I owned my first business. I was on the 42nd floor of a tall building, leasing 1,200 square feet of office space. One day, one of my employees came back from lunch after having two beers, making an a**hole of himself in the boardroom. He was the firm clown, the jester. I called him over, took him to the window, and said, "I want you to look below," showing him an isolated street 420 feet below, "If you want to succeed, make a promise to yourself. Make the promise that if you fail, you will take this plunge to the street below."

He never showed up to work again.

Not everyone is willing to sacrifice their life, or much, to succeed, that's why many fail. Tell me what you are willing to sacrifice, and I will reasonably tell you your chances of success.

+10000000000000


It's no different than anyone else. How men want smoking hot women who are smart, can cook and can suck a basketball through an antenna, but dont' read themselves, dont' get in shape, etc.

How as Americans, we want to reduce the budget yet dont' want to cut anything or raise taxes.


But, you have to find somehting, that you are willing to sacrifice everything else for. Squirrels, I get ideas all the time. I have wireframes for a US only based freelance website similar to guru.com and elance.com, only US freelancers, i would call it keepithere.com or keepithere.net a play on words. 95% sure i'm not going to do it. and I know if I did it would be successful, but i'm not willing to put in the time or effort to make it work because it's not worth sacrificing for to me.

Too many people don't want to "miss anything". The few times I try to talk to people about being successful and whittle down their ideas to basically they need to make some sacrifices, they all come back saying "well, you only live once, and I don't want to give up going out" or "i want to have a life". Lol, you think I LIKED sitting at home for 3 years while all my friends were getting laid and going to parties? (the funny thing is, when I started going out once I started having some success, I probably got laid more in 3 months, from June to September, then they had in the last 3 years lol, i'm quite sure of it. 2-3 girls a week, knocking them down like bowling pins, and the same guys who used to laugh at me for not having a life, became resentful for having too much of a life. funny how that works.) the It's not about what you want to do, it's about what you HAVE to do. That's a distinction that many people don't make. At the end of the day, that's what it all comes do. And that's fine. Just acknowledge it and be honest with yourself. Stop being bitter at people who did make those sacrifices that you did not feel were worth making.

But, to be clear, you aren't going to do anything significant, unless you give up something significant. The greater the goal or dream, the greater the sacrifice that is called for.

You have to not only come up with a good idea, it has to be one that you believe in to the point you are willing to give up something to get.

 

[simba_]

squirrels, you are one negative dude at the moment. i can literally feel it reading your ****. seen you do much better in the past (while back), things must not be going your way lately.

i'm sure you have had ideas, you just disregard them as poor. everything is a learning experience dude, in the worst case you'll grow a little more. what do you really have to lose? you don't know whats on the other side until you get there. i can promise you its great, but you have to see that for yourself. it will be hard, it will take time, you will suffer setbacks and failures along the way, but its all a process. take the plunge man. stop being such a *****.

the book 'Think and Grow Rich' by Napolean Hill was helpful to me. you don't have to internalize any of its ideas if you don't want to, but read it for yourself with an open mind (unlike the negative **** you're spewing here).

i appologize if my writing style isnt the easiest to read, my intentions are only to try and help.

 

[Teflon_Mcgee]

Here are some of my thoughts on ideas based on my years of studying entrepreneurship:

1. Ideas are worthless. An idea is worth nothing without execution. Anybody can have a great idea. Until they actually do something with it, the idea is as worthless as a piece of poo.

2. Great ideas aren't really all they are cracked up to be. In "Innovation and Entrepreneurship", Druker has a whole chapter about how great ideas are a long shot for getting rich.

3. Good or okay ideas that are well executed are how most millions are made.

4. Ideas come from process. Rarely do people have those "ah-ha" moments where the idea goes on to make millions (I refer you back to Druker.) In reality, one idea leads to another and another and another that eventually leads to money. It's only the work that's put into one idea that then leads to the other idea.

5. You really don't need an idea to start a business. Just take somebody else's idea, and do it better or somewhere else. This is really how a large number of businesses are created. In fact, it's almost impossible to think of a successful business that is entirely original. But it's very easy to think of all the clones (i.e. Facebook vs. Myspace) that made billions.