Some guy is selling his Law Degree from Prestigious University X on Craigslist (thanks Ben for sharing):
This priceless collectible will permit you to be surrounded by hobby-less assholes whose entire life is dictated by billing by the hour and being anal dickheads. Additionally, this piece of paper has the amazing ability to keep you from doing what you really want to do in life, all in the name of purported prestige and financial success. Finally, girls in the Marina will swoon with retarded thoughts of sugar daddy when they hear you went to XXX prestigious law school and are a lawyer.
It’s a tragedy when remarkable people realize they are remarkable too late.
This case proves the sad reality that has struck me recently:
Context trumps individuality.
The reason an out-of-the-box thinker and ambitious person may follow a traditional and less fulfilling path is because either a) the societal pressure is too strong to avoid, or b) the context lacks the tools, means and support to exploit that capacity.
The reason I relate to this lawyer, is that we both realized too late that with a different context and more support for our ambitions, we would have gotten further. I will always wonder where I would be if I would have been born in the US, or at least, in another first world country that had similar intellectual opportunities.
For example, when I think of Colin Wright or Ben Casnocha, friends that have achieved much more than I did so far, I feel that I lost the race. Not the race with them (although I am competitive), but the race with myself had I had their context.
The obvious response is that things couldn’t have happened in any other way and that I wouldn’t have realized this if I hadn’t been through what I did. While true, the possibilities that escaped me since day one (and still do) are too many to be ignored in a flat world.
Another harsh realization of late awareness is the need to lower my expectations. While others were taking advantage of the entrepreneurial culture and taking unconventional paths, I spent most of my life realizing that there was such a thing as an entrepreneurial culture and an unconventional path.
While others were doing, I was catching up. I’m way behind on the path that society considers successful.
And there are real barriers, such as language, visa requirements and currency exchange, to name a few. While not impossible to overcome, they are permanent weights that slow down anyone that has to deal with them.
The hardest truth is this: The world doesn’t give a crap about what I’ve done so far. The world wants start-ups, Fortune 500 corporate experience and world traveling knowledge. It doesn’t care about self-realizations and unconventional personal philosophies, however hard it was to reach them.
This is not a regret. It’s coming to terms with reality. It’s what every ambitious person who lacks a supportive context has to understand:
My definition of success has to be unique and personal, because it will never match the world’s.
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This post reminds me of things I went through earlier after I graduated from college. Like the lawyer, I felt my degree was a piece of crap even though I *supposedly* went to a prestigious lib arts school. I felt I should’ve done things differently or taken a different path.
Actually, such thoughts still go through my head from time to time.
I think we all imagine a part of our lives in realities “unlived” or occasionally play the “what-if” scenario. But I think desiring a supportive context, like you say, is resistance made manifest. In other words, thinking you’re “behind” while someone is “ahead” is detrimental. I don’t think it’s reality either. Personal realizations and personal philosophies are what make the world it is. And, if you are talking about the nuts and bolts of any kind of experience for any kind of success – then realizations and philosophies make that up, too.
Because, at the end of the day, the world is not going to care if you have Fortune 500 experience and world traveling experience if you’re an asshole who can’t keep himself in check.
Eh, maybe I’m rambling.
This is not a what if because there are no regrets. There’s nothing I could have done differently. And it’s not dreaming either, because I’m not thinking “what if I would have been the best soccer player.”
This is just pointing out the difference in possibilities, the already famous “Outliers” situation.
Detrimental or not, it’s reality, and I’m a fan of embracing reality. In fact, I’d dare to say that I’m immune to lowering my efforts because of my realism.
I’m not sure exactly who you refer to when you say “The world wants start-ups, Fortune 500 corporate experience and world traveling knowledge. It doesn’t care about self-realizations and unconventional personal philosophies, however hard it was to reach them.” Some people definitely value the things you have experienced, realized, created, and shared. In other words, yes, there is a part of the “market” that values what you bring to the table.
You have a great point that we don’t all start on a level playing field, even if it is a “flat world”, but maybe you’re chasing someone else’s dream if you’re looking with too much lust at the Silicon Valley startup model. Nobody ever said you have to be in the US to start what you want to start. You don’t have to follow the “template” startup model!
And there are plenty of barriers for entry for all of us, regardless of what country someone is born in. I probably would have been more “successful” by these metrics if I’d been born in the Bay Area as opposed to Sacramento, CA. Or to entrepreneurial (or rich) parents. Or if I’d gone to private school rather than public school. Or a prestigious university rather than a state university. You can speculate on all kinds of things, OR you can just get your ass moving toward whatever destination you have in mind.
Hopefully you’ve seen it already, but if not, try traveling somewhere where children literally have no food, no clothes on their back, no parents, no homes, then sit back and think about what you have going for you. The world isn’t fair, but you and I both have been given way too many advantages to sit around comparing ourselves to others’ ideas of success. Keep killin’ it brother.
Let me be more specific with that. What I meant to express was:
DO NOT lower your expectations!! DO NOT think that you have to play catch-up. Realize that you have the ability to accomplish almost ANYTHING—you can bend the rules of REALITY when you realize that you don’t have to play by anyone’s rules and you don’t have to live up to anyone ELSE’S expectations.
Like I said, keep killin’ it Carlos!
Haha, too much Disney talk for my taste, but I love the feeling behind it. I work hard, and that’s how I let life take me where it has to. Thanks, my untemplated brother!
1) What I mean is that my inner processes are less valuable for the simple reason that they are inner. Maybe I should have said they are not AS valuable.
2) I’m not really chasing anyone’s dreams, nor I give a crap about Silicon Valley
My only competition is with my hypothetical American self. In fact, I’m not a 100% start-up guy.
3) The barriers that you mention are initial, while the ones that I’m talking about are permanent and bigger. Language is one big ass barrier!
4) I’ve seen it and I hope my post hasn’t come off as some sort of ingratitude towards the opportunities that I’ve had. Of course I consider myself on VERY lucky person. Like I said, I’m only comparing myself to an even luckier self. I think it’s healthy to grasp the reality of life. That’s how I motivate myself.
You have fought really hard to overcome the language barrier. Though I have not done business with you, so to speak, and I have not been along for most of the struggle, from my perspective that looks like a barrier you have almost completely overcome (though I will likely continue to make up English ‘colloquialisms’ just to throw you).
I feel very similarly when I look at such inspirational people around me. There is a part of me that wants to kick the wall because I wasn’t born with entrepreneurial influences or as productively guiding mentors, etc. There are so many opportunities I didn’t take, and I could be so much further along now, if I had only known that the option was out there. And it isn’t the same as playing catch up with anyone else, my goals are different, my skills in different areas; it’s playing that game with myself, but not really knowing what I’m catching up to because the alternative never happened. So it’s just a motivational thing. ‘Hey, I have these opportunities now. I can see these options now. They may not be as beautifully lined up as they could be or might have been if things were different, but they’re here. It’s time to stop losing time.’
If it’s any consolation, you’re one of those inspiring people to me that makes me think of the options I wasn’t aware of before.
The language barrier is a barrier that takes way more than a year to overcome. If I were to do a podcast, people wouldn’t understand it, or would get frustrated. An American friend was THAT honest with me once
Also, look at the way people like Colin Wright, Colin Marshall, and other bloggers write. That vocabulary and prose is almost unreachable for me, and by the day I acquire it, it may be too late.
The difference is that once you realize it, you have nothing to stop you. But I can’t even travel to where my co-founders are. I can’t go to events. I can’t meet up IRL with potential business contacts.
Again, this is not a regret, it’s a harsh realization of context limitations that will always be there for me. I would be just a dreamer instead of an overachiever if I were to ignore this.
Thanks for the kind words, my feminist friend
Have you seen the movie, The Peaceful Warrior, based on a book by Dan Millman?
Check it out.
Noted.
I haven’t read any of the comments, and I don’t intend to. Karma tells me that by so ignoring everyone else, I myself will be ignored. We all know that’s not quite how things work.
I just want to ponder on what you, Carlos, have said. You’re jumping around a topic that I don’t quite get upon first reading. I’ll be sure to read it again sometime.
The more I sit and put off finishing this comment and looking back up at your article, the more I seem to understand what you’re saying:
Context matters more in the world; individual view/self-realization/enlightenment is just that. It’s individual: not what the world sees.
Right?
Yes.
WOW.
“The hardest truth is this: The world doesn’t give a crap about what I’ve done so far. The world wants start-ups, Fortune 500 corporate experience and world traveling knowledge. It doesn’t care about self-realizations and unconventional personal philosophies, however hard it was to reach them.
This is not a regret. It’s coming to terms with reality. It’s what every ambitious person who lacks a supportive context has to understand:
My definition of success has to be unique and personal, because it will never match the world’s.”
This is what I’ve recently come to terms with, and I’m surprised, saddened, and happy that your going through the same thing.
It’s good to know others are going through what I am, but don’t take it for “I don’t wish good things for you”, it’s just that misery loves company and all.
ps- It’s not quit misery, but you know what I mean. I hope.
Would love to hear more about your story Arsene. I’m always up for some company