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On Patience
Everyone will tell you to do what you love. To not settle in your career, never settle in your love life.
Not many people will tell you about patience.
It’s probably the secret to winning anything.
Everyone is concerned with the beginning. The launch day of their product or website. Of the first date. Your first day of working out and dieting. They have an image of the final outcome.
Making money. A happy life. A lean, strong body.
But the middle is the real test.
It’s the grind. It’s boring. It’s often depressing.
It’s the empty road on a long road trip where you’re running low on gas and food, and it seems like there’s nothing worthwhile in sight.
Most people give up too soon. You go on a couple bad dates and believe you are cursed and destined to be alone forever. So you promise yourself to stop dating for a few months.
Your sales slump after your first week launch. You were exciting news! But now the presses and blogs need something fresh, and you’re already 7 days too old.
And this is where patience comes in. If you can fight that voice in your head that is trying to convince you you’ve failed, and keep working on refining your methods to reach your goal, you’ve already beat 100% of the competition. The competition being the negative version of yourself.
In my short professional career, I have started about 6 companies. The more recent ones I invested significantly in. And of those, I quit most, if not all too early.
I could regret all the money that was wasted, but money can always be made back. The lesson was worth the thousands I’ve “lost”. Patience is something I finally have a grasp of, which is difficult in the internet age of I want it now. And especially harder when you’re not getting any younger.
Rarely is anything great and successful built overnight. It’s often accomplished by continuing to work when everyone else is giving up.
I was sitting in this mogul’s house. My brother was there, and they were having lunch. It was real nice, going down to the beach and everything. And then we see this woman walking on the beach. It’s Diana Ross. I ran down there and got her.
So now we’re sitting in this room. Diana Ross is sitting with Eddie in the mogul’s section. I’m with some common folk on the other side. We’re talking, having fun. One guy happens to use the f-word. And Diana Ross comes all the way across the room and says,
“Excuse me, I don’t know who you gentlemen are, but I don’t tolerate any profanity in my vicinity.”
Now we’re not at Diana Ross’s house. We’re in another house. We don’t work for her. That’s what we’re all thinking. And one guy goes, “Fuck you, Diana.” She was stunned. Her face, it looked like pieces of it were falling off.
No one was sorry. Because what sticks out in this story for me is: Why are people kissing Diana Ross’s ass? Is she God? No. She sang on some records and did a good job! I give her props. But that doesn’t make you more of an adult than me. That doesn’t give you any more rights than me. Being your fan is optional. If you forget that, because everybody’s been blowing sunshine up your ass, you’re putting yourself in the position to take a fall. That’s the moral of the story. Always stay humble. It’s the only way you can’t get humiliated.
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