Common knowledge and common sense, well, they don’t always make sense. And if you simply follow what everyone else is already doing and what they’ve always been doing, then you can only expect to be mediocre at best. That’s the very definition of average. Conventional, traditional thinking will tell you that you should get a steady, 9-to-5 kind of job but that will only lead you to a conventional 9-to-5 kind of life at best.
And if you’re reading this blog and if you’re interested in making money online, chances are that you’re also interested in what it takes to think outside the box, to get beyond the bubble. And to do that, you need to shift your mindset and adjust your perspective, seeing things in a whole new light and understanding them in a brand new way. Allow me to explain.
Pain Is Bad, Right?
Success is good. Failure is bad. Average, everyday people might not choose to put it so simply, but that is generally how they think about success and failure. Failure is something to be avoided and success is something to strive for. But as we’ve said before, you will fail. And probably often.
But successful people are quick to point out that failure isn’t a bad thing. Failure represents a learning opportunity. The path to success is paved with all sorts of failures. The fear of failure can prevent you from trying in the first place.
And the way that most people think about pain is equally simplistic and misguided. Pain is bad, right? Pain should be avoided because it is unpleasant, right? Quite the contrary. Pain is a good thing. It’s useful, because it teaches you what you should avoid. After you burn your hand from touching a hot stove, you learn not to do that again. After you stub your toe on the coffee table, you learn to watch where you step. Pain is a great teacher.
It’s not just physical pain either. Emotional and psychological pain work on the same fundamental principles as physical pain and science has even demonstrated that the net effect is effectively the same too. When you experience the pain of a messy breakup, when you experience the pain of rejection, you learn that what led to those situations should probably be avoided. You learn how to approach personal relationships better. You learn how to better present yourself so you’re less likely to get rejected.
Pain can be a good thing if you learn to use it to your advantage.
Hakuna Matata?
Remember in The Lion King when Timon and Pumbaa teach Simba about “hakuna matata” and how it means “no worries, for the rest of your days”? How it’s your “problem free philosophy”? Yeah, they didn’t really know what they were talking about, because Simba still had all sorts of problems he had to face.
Here’s the thing. It was never about trying to live a life completely devoid of problems. That doesn’t exist and it’s just not possible. Everyone has problems. Instead, it’s about choosing to have the right problems, to endure the good problems. Even Warren Buffett has money problems, but I’m sure his are way better than what the homeless guy living on the street has to deal with.
A big life lesson we should all take to heart is that happiness is not a solvable equation itself. However, we derive great happiness from solving the problems in our lives. And we can’t solve them if we don’t have them in the first place. We just need to choose the right problems that we actually want to solve… before we move on to the next one.
Shift Your Mindset
Here’s the common question that people either ask themselves or the people they think they’re trying to help: What do you want? What do you want to have in your life to be happy? Who do you want to be?
But the regular answer to this line of questioning is going to sound pretty much the same for the overwhelming majority. I want to have money. I want to have a job I love, a family I adore, and enough spare time to enjoy my hobbies. I want to eat well and travel the world. I want to be my own boss. These are all very common answers and they don’t really answer anything.
Instead of asking what you want to have or who you want to be, ask yourself what pain do you want to endure. What problems do you want to endure? What pain and hardship are you willing to suffer though on the path to the things that you want? I don’t know about you, but I’d rather be worrying about maximizing the gains on my investments than worrying about how I’m going to pay for my next meal.
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