You probably have seen successful people saying that if you work hard, take some risks and
never give up; you are going to be successful. The path to success has never been so clear,
we have documented the lives of an endless number of successful people to figure out
what truly makes them successful, and it seems like if we just follow their advice and work
hard enough, we should be able to replicate their success, but why aren't there more successful
people? Why the overwhelming majority who follow this type of advice end up achieving
nothing? What I want to figure out in this video is - can you really get rich by working
hard Regardless of who you? Or is it just a myth that we have been fed with?
By the end of this video, you will understand how much luck plays in each and everyone's
success, and do you even stand a stance to be the next bill gates or warren Buffett if
you work as hard
as them.
The Dark Side Of becoming Successful
Back in the mid 20th century, during World War 2, Britain started losing lots of aircraft,
and it became a quite serious problem, so they tried to figure out a way to reduce that
number; otherwise they might lose the war if they keep losing so
many planes. The logical thing was to put more armor around
the aircraft to make it more resistant against bullets, but that was not an option since
adding more armor to an already heavy aircraft would make it much slower and an easier target
for the enemy. So engineers came up with another solution,
let's just add extra armor to the parts of the aircraft that gets hit the most.
They took a look at the aircraft that came back after a mission and realized that the
wings of the aircraft had a lot more bullet holes than other parts such as the engine.
So naturally, the engineers came to the conclusion that the enemy targets the wings more often.
If we just add more armor to those areas of the aircraft, they will crash less often.
Right?! Wrong!
Despite the fact that it looks like a logical solution, it is not. The engineers based their
opinion on their aircraft that returned back home from the battlefield. And didn't take
into account all the aircraft that got hit in other places and were crashed.
The reason why so little aircrafts had bullet holes in their engines is that most of them
couldn't make it back and were destroyed on the battlefield.
If you visit the hospital, you will see many
more people with injuries in their legs and arms than
people with injuries in their chests or head. That's not because people don't get shot in
the head or chest, but rather because they end up dead in the battleground.
This concept is known as survivorship bias.
Understanding the implications of this bias can help us make more rational decisions.
Let's take the example of YouTube. There are some YouTubers who dropped out of college
and started streaming video games both on Twitch and YouTube, and some of them have
ended up really successful. They earned more money than a college graduate could potentially
make. From one side, it looks like if you are a
good gamer and commentator, if you also drop out of college, work super hard, be patient,
you might end up as successful as them. Which, in theory, seems legit.
However, what we didn't take into account is the huge number of hard-working gamers
who did exactly that but failed. Steve Jobs dropped out of college and built
the world's largest company but how many other young entrepreneurs dropped out of college
to start a company and made it? There are thousands of others who tried and failed,
but you have never heard about them.
And that begs the question: are you really in control of your life? Or freedom is that
just an illusion?
The truth is the number of factors that influence our success is way beyond our control.
Take the butterfly, for example. It's such a small and weak creature that it has absolutely
no influence over anything in this world, but the flap of a butterfly's wings in the
Amazon (forest) creates a tiny change in the atmospheric pressure, overtime they compound
and cause a tornado in Texas. Of course, the tornado wasn't solely created by the butterfly
because there are so many factors that influence the weather, including the flap of the butterfly's
wings. The world is connected in so many ways you
can't imagine. Back in 1962, during the cold war, a US destroyer
(ship) located a Russian nuclear submarine in the International waters near Cuba. To
force the submarine to come to the surface, the US destroyer began dropping explosives.
The Russian nuclear submarine lost contact with Moscow for a number of days already.
So the officers thought that a war broke out between the soviet union and the US since
a US destroyer have been dropping explosive on them. The captain of the submarine, Valentin
Savitsky, decided that a war might already have started and wanted to launch a nuclear
torpedo. But to launch a nuclear Torpedo, three officers on board had to agree unanimously
to authorize a nuclear launch. Vasily Arkhipov, who was one of the officers, was against the
launch. If it wasn't for him, the nuclear torpedo
would have been launched, the United States and the Soviet Union would have turned each
other into nuclear wastelands. Which means the dot com revolution wouldn't have taken
place in silicon valley, which means Jeff Bezos wouldn't become the richest person in
the world today. It not to say that Vasily Arkhipov made Jeff
Bezos so successful, but things would have turned differently if he has authorised the
launch. Imagine how many more factors are there that
influences your life. Factor you do not even consider when you plan your life.
So let's try to answer the question of this
video.
- Can you really get rich by working hard?
The answer is complicated. It's both yes and no.
If you were born in the 1970s in a third-world country in Africa, no matter how talented
and smart you were, you probably would have died from malaria or from any other disease.
Even if you ended up surviving, you had to work for 12 hours a day to put food on the
table because you would die from hunger otherwise.
On the other hand, if you were born in California
in the 1970s, you would have been in the middle of the internet revolution when you reach
your 20s. Chances you would start an internet company or join one would be much higher than
if you were born in a third world country back then.
Here is another example, If you ask a successful
hockey player why he has been so successful, he will probably tell you that he has been
working super hard, he has been consistent and never gave up despite the hardship, but
he would never mention the fact that one of the reasons he is successful because he has
been born on the 2nd of January. The cut-off dates for kids hockey league is the 1st of
January. Kids who are born in the first part of the year are, on average, a little bigger
and taller than December-born players. This head start gives players born in the first
months of the year a life-long advantage: as kids, they are more likely to be chosen
for top tier competitive teams, they get more ice time and better coaching. That's why almost
half (40%) of the players who are selected into top tier league have been born between
January and March. While Those born in the last quarter of the year might as well just
"give up on hockey. And that's the case with everything and everyone.
What eventually determines your success is everything, even the factors that you have
no control over, such as your birthday, birthplace, your parents, the relationship between your
parents, the school you go to, and a million other factors.
We have made an entire video explaining why you will most probably end up poor if you
are born into a low-income family.
By now, you are probably discouraged. You might say what's the point of doing anything
If I am not in control? Well, if you don't work hard, you will most
definitely be poor. There are cerntaly things we can’t control.
But if you are born in the right place and don't have to spend 12 hours a day just to
put food on the table, you stand a chance to achieve financial independence. You might
stand a chance to become a millionaire if you push hard enough.
Maybe not a a billionaire because only 2825 people could become one out of 7.8 billion
that inhabit this planet.
But There is just no way to know that unless you try. So you are left with 2 options, you
either going to try and find out or don’t and stay where you. Maybe the odds are in
your favour and the only thing that is left is
you trying. The choice is yours.