Tag: Success

Don’t Be A Donkey

January 22, 2021 / David Alade

Are you a polymath? Someone that wants to do a lot of things, you see yourself creating a massive empire in a lot of unrelated areas. You just want to do a lot of things or you are even doing them already. However, you noticed the results aren’t forthcoming, or importantly, you realize that the world wants you to pick one thing from all.

I used to be like that or I still am. I want to be 10 different things at a time, I want to have a successful corporate career, I want to create a successful startup, I want to be an investor and on another day I want to be an inventor as well. It’s a lot of things for one person. And you know what, anytime I remember each of those my “want to be’s”, I launch into research on them again. In the end, all those efforts amounted to nothing. Stuck is a more generous word to use for my situation and “being a donkey” would be a perfect word to use.

Let’s get something straight immediately, in this one life that you and I have, we can’t be everything that we possibly want to be. Enough of the “you can whatever you want to be”. Really that’s BS at best.

https://twitter.com/DavidAlade__/status/1351937183570128896?s=20

That said, we can be as many things as are important to us. We just have to stop thinking short term. I do all those my “want to be’s” because I used to think I must be everything right now or never. That’s why I’ve never got anything done until I changed my approach.

Thinking long term is the goal solution

Thinking long term affords us to see life differently. We have all agreed that we can’t possibly be everything that we want to be. However, we can be more than one thing in our lifetime.

Thinking long term means you allow yourself to be one thing per time. Be one thing for a few years, whenever you think you’ve done enough of that thing, gained mastery and accomplished enough, then take the next thing to do. Of course, the idea is that you have the time to do all those, and even if you don’t, the world will benefit more from the result of your extreme focus on one thing than from the dispersed focus you have for a lot. That’s because things that endure and change generations are built on those kinds of foundation.

And like I noted in this article, “another success” is always easier after the first success. You would have proven yourself worthy, capable and deserving of the resources that are required for the next adventure once you can show a result from previous wins. Do you remember that parable of the talent? You saw how those who made initial success were rewarded with more resources to have more success? And don’t forget the one who was into a lot of but had no success, even the little he had was collected from him.

What’s the donkey’s story?

A Buridan’s donkey is standing halfway between a pile of hay and a bucket of water. It keeps looking left and right, trying to decide between hay and water. Unable to decide, it eventually dies of hunger and thirst.

The donkey couldn’t think long term. If he could, he’d clearly realize that he could first drink the water, then go eat the hay.

“Don’t be a donkey. You can do everything you want to do. You just need foresight and patience.

If you’re thirty now and have six different directions you want to pursue, then you can do each one for ten years, and have done all of them by the time you’re ninety. It seems ridiculous to plan to age ninety when you’re thirsty, right? But it’s probably coming, so you might as well take advantage of it” said Sivers. He continued “You can fully focus on one direction at a time, without feeling conflicted or distracted, because you know you’ll get to the others.”

And while you are at that, never forget that most people overestimate what they can do in one year, and underestimate what they can do in ten years. That statement is always true. I’ve chosen to be extremely focused on one thing per time now and I’ve seen an amazing kind of result. This year, this website is my project. Let’s see what one year of extreme focus will bring me.

Think long term.

Don’t be short-sighted.

Don’t be a donkey.

Success Compounds

October 4, 2020 / David Alade

Have you noticed that it’s much easier to get ”another” success once you get the first one?

A common denominator of all humans is the desire to attain their goals which can then be interpreted as success. However, many struggle to achieve these goals because of an endless reason. Yet, a pattern that has been obvious throughout history shows that success in one area attracts or makes success easier in another area. It is only alarming that not everyone is aware of this pattern, hence, very few leverage it.

Our goal more often than not is to move from your zero (no success) to one (first success). Then the universe will show you her abundance.

Such movement isn’t always easy. Many times, it requires us doing things outside of our comfort zone, going the extra mile, failing a lot on the way and even failing to attain one from zero. It’s a cruel process that our nature isn’t wired for. Moving from no-success to first success requires investment in perseverance, hard work, and faith. Very few are ready to make such investment.

Yet, it’s the way of life. It’s the only way to play the game of life that we find ourselves.

Think about it yourself, would rather click a like on a Tweet with 1,000 likes already or on a Tweet with 10 like? Would you rather work with someone who’s been accorded the best in an endeavor or someone who is just setting our with no track record? Would you rather follow an account with 10 followers or follow an account with 10,000 followers?

Your answer to the above question is the reason for the following assertions:

Getting a second job is easier than the first.
Raising the second round of funding is easier than the first.
Getting your next 10,000 customers is easier than the first 1,000
Selling your next 10 products is easier than selling the first.

Our goal is to doggedly focus on having the first success. Moving from zero (no success) to one (first success).

The universe is abundantly rich and has more than enough to go round for all, but it needs you to speak her language.

Her language is that of compounding. Difficult to get from no-success to first success but easier to get first success to tenth success. The universe will reward you with more success once it realizes you have your first success. And the more success you have, the more the units will reward you with. Yet, if you have none, it will not reward you with any or more.

Why does the universe work that way?

It behaves that way for varying reasons. The reason I intend to focus on here is the idea of mimetic behaviour of humans popularized by René Girard.

The mimetic theory says we get our desires from society. We want it because others have it. That creates a form of scarcity and invariably chaos.

Scarcity is the way humans interpret value.

If it’s scarce, it must be valuable. We often forget (or refuse to note) that it is only scarce in the first place because we all want the same thing.

However, that behaviour is what keeps the economic wheel rolling so there’s no ending to it. It is only important that you and I learn what’s at work behind the wheel.

Success at one thing creates that illusion of scarcity as well. Suddenly, everyone wants YOUR success or wants to be associated with YOUR success if they’ve concluded they can’t have YOUR success.

That behaviour ordinarily opens the door to you for the next success.

That’s so because those coming after you and that you also allow in your environment have a form of success (that you also want or want to be associated with if you can’t have it) in them that can be easily leveraged for your next success.

They will willingly open those doors for you because (remember) they want to be associated with you or want your success just as you theirs.

Like I said, it keeps the wheel rolling so you can’t undo it.

Understanding it though is a leverage.

My Evolving Definition of Success

August 27, 2020 / David Alade

We all try hard in life to attain “success”. But what is success? More money in the account, more time with family or both? And how can we achieve both without sacrificing the other?

This is a personal struggle and I believe it’s more integral in human society than we might like to admit. We all struggle to find a definition for success. At one point success is money made, at another point it is the number of people you influenced, at one point it is winning a 100-meter race at another point it is raising kids whom you are proud of. The definition is fluid.

I have also struggled with the question for years. About 4 years ago I stumbled on a TED Talk by John Wooden (The Difference Between Winning and Succeeding), that day and over the period of meditating on it, my definition of success had changed. John used a profound story to wrap up what to him would be termed as a success.

“At God’s footstool to confess, a poor soul knelt and bowed his head. ‘I failed!’ he cried. The Master said, ‘Thou didst thy best, that is success.”

From that day on, I adopted this definition of success for myself. If I had given it my best, the outcome of my best will not determine my success, my best alone is enough. The ensuing months, and years have been profound. But here I am again evolving in my definition of success.

The Evolution

Two things have lingered for so long in my heart.

One, at the point of death, I’ve heard different stories of people having a rethink about their life and redefining the very fabrics upon which they’ve lived there while life. The get to there death bed and all that they have erstwhile defined as success begins to change. It is no longer the number of gold medals nor is it the number of applause. In fact, not the amount of dollar in the bank account. All of which Clayton Christensen referred to as “summary statistics”. They are basically thinking about what success is to them. But as all will admit, it is usually too late for the majority by the time they start to reconsider.

This year started with me reading the book “AI Superpowers” by Kai-Fu Lee (a respected fellow in the field of AI)

My goal of picking up the book is definitely not to learn something about success as is to learn about the future of AI and the power play between Silicon Valley and China. But as life would have it, Kai-Fu Lee happened to have been close to death as well and like all who came close to this, he needed to redefine success and ask the question what really matters? What really counts? Seeing that is where the real definition of success begins.

Before his near-death experience, he has lived his life as an “optimization machine”. Simply put, as an optimization machine, he gave his best and went extra mile for the things that qualify to fall under “summary statistics” while giving the minimum possible to things that can not be quantified but yet required his attention (this principally includes time with family).

The result, he had a stellar career that took him from Microsoft to Google and later as a Venture Capitalist leading the new wave of venture funding in China. He was obviously a role model for all ambitious Chinese youths. That wasn’t just all, he also built a beautiful family who loves him, cares for him and which got the minimum possible of his time just to ensure all dimensions of his life are optimized.

Beautiful result! You said. I also believed that.

I believed it until he went on to tell stories of regret about how what he had optimized his life for so far isn’t what he would call success. The summary statistics weren’t enough.

He wished he had spent more time with family, love more, be useful more to humanity in a new dimension that summary statistics can’t understand.

But that’s was not all about it. After reading this part of Kai-Fu’s story, I asked myself, how would I live my own life? What will I optimize for? What will I define success as?

I was selfish and maybe hard-hearted.

I told myself, I would rather also have my story like that of Kai-Fu. Optimize the early stage for “summary statistics”, then learn later in life that that is not what matters then make a pivot. By then, I thought money will be plenty, medals countless and stories to tell.

Don’t blame me so much for thinking that way. Remember I said at the beginning that I have read a lot of similar stories like his.

First, optimize for summary statistics, then come close to death and realize that it was all not a right optimization then make a pivot to the right lane. That way, you benefit from both worlds.

I literally thought that was the only way to benefit from both worlds.

But I was wrong again.

All through life, defining success for what it really is has been a concern. And many times when we think about it, money comes to mind seeing it is on of the few things (summary statistics) that can quickly tell if our effort is producing value and proffer perception (illusion) of success.

While it’s absolutely good and one should chase it, it turns out that it is never enough and in fact, if its pairs were mutually exclusive, giving it up over other things that can not be explained by summary statistics is always the best bet. And this brings me to my second part of the two things that have lingered in my heart.

I had an epiphany and a coming together of different bodies of knowledge when I heard of Clayton’s death. The many testimonies about this 6’8 tall man reinforced my epiphany.

But before the epiphany, let me pick from where I stopped on the first narrative.

Why did I think of going the normal route as all I’ve read of – the route of optimising first for summary statistics and then making a pivot upon realization of the wrong optimization?

https://twitter.com/DavidAlade__/status/1211984695791149057?s=20

For a simple and not counter-intuitive reason. I thought the pursuit of summary statistics and other things unexplainable by summary statistics are mutually exclusive. The pursuit of one means letting go of the other.

And I thought that way because all stories I’ve read seems to be that way.

The ones who optimized for summary statistics tend to give up on other experiences and the ones who chose other experiences gave up significantly on summary statistics.

However, I wanted both.

So the way I could see that happening was to follow the footsteps of those that I see ahead. Do one first then, follow the other later in life.

The death of Clayton brought a rather paradigm-changing epiphany.

“You could pursue both concurrently was what Clayton’s life preached to me. I could see it more obviously from testimonies about him, books he wrote, articles he wrote and lectures that he gave.”

Clayton faced a similar dilemma as I did and his faith in God above all else saw him through and I believe it was so in order for him to be a living testimony.

He also discovered quickly by the virtue of his work that all we face is the “dilemma of resource allocation” in the face of conflicting interests. Learning to appropriately allocate that resource (time) between those things that can be explained by summary statistics and those that cannot is our goal.

Another thing he quickly learned as well was that those things that cannot be explained by summary statistics are weighing more in gold than the counterpart. Realising this made him allocate his resources optimally for all interests of his.

He practically lived his life as a beacon of light to all around him and beyond including me whom he never met until he died.

These two events or call it worldview have come to shape my new definition of success.

My New Definition of Success

“Success to me now is a moment thing. It is fluid and not static. It evolves but predictable. It is mostly wrapped on the moments when I contribute to another person’s betterment and upliftment. Success is gotten not just from me exclusively but from my interaction with the world around me. How I have better and extend its life.”

And if I must introduce a summary statistics to my view of success, it must be one that is hinged on output instead of input.

Output: how much have I given to those who in my wildest dream I cannot except them to repay me? How many hours of my time have I sacrificially given to make someone else better and develop? How many did I point to the way of God?

Input: how much did I make in an hour? How many gold medals did I win? How many hours did I spend studying for the next exam that will help get a promotion?

Output not input is the way about my new view of success.

https://twitter.com/DavidAlade__/status/1221447311747883009?ref_src=twsrc%5Etfw%7Ctwcamp%5Etweetembed%7Ctwterm%5E1221447311747883009%7Ctwgr%5E%7Ctwcon%5Es1_&ref_url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.davidalade.com%2Fmy-evolving-definition-of-success%2F

I have chosen to still bring in the concept of summary statistics because I understand the fundamental human craving for statistics. Our brain is really wired to value these summary statistics.

What will not be allowed is for the wrong summary statistics to find its way into the new paradigm.

But why does it matter that we get our definition of success right?

I think the reason should have been apparent from foregoing. But I will take time to spell it out.

It’s important that we define success for ourselves so that we can optimize for the most efficient and rewarding thing early on.

I am fond of asking the question…

What are you optimizing for?

Except you define success for yourself, you might find it hard, really hard optimizing for what really matters to you.

Defining success then gives you focus, a sense of purpose and sets you ablaze to pursue hard after what matters to you.

That is why I have taken it upon myself to define success in a very personal way. Because it is my life.

Finally but not finally

I started by telling you the story of how we all search for a definition, John Wooden for me gave the best definition I have found until that time. Now I have developed my own definition by connecting different dots. Does that mean I am discarding my earlier definition of success which is “giving one’s best to a course and taking that as a success instead of the outcome of such course?”

No, I have not and will not. There is an intersection between both, one definition is about giving your best, the other is about service to others. What I have learnt is that service to others can be a lot of work, sometimes you even get badly rewarded for doing so. But that is where the intersection lies, not the outcome of the course but you giving your best to the course. The course in this scenario being service to others.

What my new definition of success has then allowed me to do is to be more focused optimizing for the right metrics in my life as a new way of viewing success.

The Little Incremental Changes We Aren’t Wired For

July 1, 2020 / David Alade

We aren’t appreciative of little incremental changes but they are what define us in the end

Events in my life and how my life has turned out taught me something. And that is to value the little incremental changes in my life. Those little-incremental changes compound over time if you have staying power.

When I entered University, I did not have a dream, goal or any of sort. For me, it was the next thing to do after secondary school.

But I encountered books and that changed the narrative for me.

The thing is I did not know about the changed narrative until like 5-years later. That was when I started seeing the effects of all the late-night reading, the little money spent on books, the times of borrowing books to read.

All compounded to make who I am today. And since I’m seeing results now, I am even more ready to make those little incremental changes towards a better me.

The message of Jesus in the Bible is profound. Jesus operated under the assumption that ignorance is bondage which indeed it is. That was why he said: “you will know the truth and the truth will set you free.”

For Jesus as well, any kind of knowledge is not enough, it has to be the knowledge of the truth. That alone can set free from the bondage of ignorance.

As the Bible admonishes, the truth (knowledge) is something you have to constantly search for. Without it, you remain in bondage and blind.

I like the words of Daniel when he said: “And I Daniel understood by books.” That understanding led to the beginning of liberation for the Israelite in the then Babylon that enslaved them.

Paul admonished Timothy to study and show himself approved as a workman that is not ashamed of his duty.

Paul himself was a well-read one. Standing before King Agrippa for judgment, he got what I called the best compliment ever given by a man to Paul. “Paul, Paul, much learning has made you mad,” said King Agrippa after listening to Paul dissect history.

The task ahead of every human is simple but I will not claim it is easy. Evolutionary biologist claims not much has changed from our DNA in thousands of years. The implication of that is that we still much think and respond to a stimulus like our ancestors.

The task ahead of each individual is to simply be a better version of themselves every day long.

Yet, because once we are of age, changes that we make to ourselves are less physical and more mental they seem to be difficult to notice. Difficult to notice translates to less desirable. Our DNA is not wired for such a process.

But we must commit to it. But we must attempt it. But we must do it.

When I look back and see the many people whose lives have become better because of what I do, I marvel. I also imagined what would their life look like if I wasn’t who I am becoming.

Imagine many people whose lives will be better because you are better as well.

Each of our life is a movie and in that movie, we are individually the hero.

My goal is to be part of that movie of yours. And while I can’t be the hero in your movie, I look to be the one who helped you realize how heroic you are.

If you aim to be a better version of yourself and invariably play a role in other people’s movies, the place of knowledge can’t be emphasized enough.

You see, while we were growing a lot of changes that happened to us is a divide between physical and mental. You learned to walk and speak & you grew teeth and bigger body. But that’s about it that matters.

After all that, what’s left for you is mental development. Because as an adult your physical growth won’t count much any longer. The world need value to come out of you.

“My people perish for lack of knowledge” is another verse in the Bible that I like.

Developing mental capacity means you make better decisions, invariably, a better life. Bad decisions can lead to ruin.

Happiness comes from a lot of things, one of such is seeing that because of you someone didn’t give up. Because of you, someone won.

Again, the task ahead of you is simple, but I will never conclude nor assume it is easy. Your DNA wasn’t wired for such a task to be a free flow.

The task is to embrace little incremental changes in your life every day. Because such changes are mental, they are difficult to notice and may be discouraging. But understand that those changes compound. The beginning of compounding is always not interesting. Even so, the few who persevere and wait through will reap abundantly.

“The cowards never started, and the weak died along the way. That leaves us, ladies and gentlemen. Us.”
– Phil Knight

Us, my friend is all that’s left.

Let’s make a difference together while we still can.

I share my stories to help others.

I hope you have been helped?

Engineering Luck: Can We Create Our Luck?

March 4, 2020 / David Alade

I was recently asked the question “How can I ensure that I am in the right place at the right time?” by a friend.

The question was an offshoot of the tweet below:

https://twitter.com/MykAdeyanju/status/1234145706123939841?s=20

Immediately after the question, I asked myself have I been lucky? If yes, did I do anything to influence that?

As soon as I asked that, a couple of things came to mind.

Mama gave her all to give me education: She did hard things
I failed a lot at many adventures but the few I succeeded at are life-changing: I experimented at scale
I made an attempt to go for things that interests me: I tried things out

It was these three things that I realized might have contributed to the lucks that I have.

Upon realising that, I answered my friend accordingly, detailing what I believe one can do to increase their chances of being at the right place at the right time.

The following was my response:

This question puzzled me for a while as an individual as well.

I observed that randomness above all things determines a lot about the world in which we live in. And because I believe the Bible and the Bible made claim to the effect of randomness as well (the race is not for the swift but unto whom mercy is shown), I knew from then on that I should take that seriously.

Upon that realization, I started paying attention to patterns.

Following are what I’ve not only learned but that I am actually doing.

Lady Luck favours the one who tries

Being at the right place at the right time I must tell you has a huge element of luck in it.

However, luck work in such a way that it tends to favour people who make attempts more.

A short story

I got my first job from social media. I did a couple of work to get it. Again and again, the question I’ve been asking myself has been what if I never did all I did then? Absolutely I won’t get the job.

Did what I did guarantee the luck? Sure No. I’ve seen others do it and nothing still to show for it. But I happened to just be there at the right time.

So you’ve got to do the work (all work) that brings luck closer to you.

That’s one of the ways I’ve learnt about how to be at the right place at the right time.

Experimentation at scale

Still learning from the first point.

You see, we are a bunch of clueless being. The best we know is yesterday, the average we know is today and about tomorrow, we know absolutely nothing in the realm of possibilities.

Owing to this, we need to experiment.

Experimentation is all about doing anything and all things that look interesting to you. It’s fine to fail at it and then you would move on to another thing.

Because in the grand scheme of things you don’t know what you would do that will offer you what you want out of life, your best bet is to do all things possible and let chance and time choose which one it will use to favour you.

If you don’t do, you won’t know if it can find you a thing.

Short narrative

My adventure into writing was all a product of experimentation even though I never know when I started. But in retrospect, it’s been one of the best things I’ve ever done for myself. I’ve experimented on 100 more things and my success rate is probably less than 10% but the little % of success is just well enough to make up for other efforts.

Now think about it, what if I never experimented?

To close this, I should say to you that…

“Success is directly proportional to the number of experiments that you perform.”✓

Do hard things

Still taking a cue from the lessons from the earlier two points.

It’s an incredibly competitive world we live in and it is only by doing hard things that you seem to be able to beat all odds.

Hard and easy

Reading is easy, writing is hard (that’s why more read, few write)
Copying someone or some systems is easy, being authentic and or creating your own system is hard.

Examples abound.

But this is what doing hard things does…

It offers you Options.

You see, option is what we all want. Unconsciously, it’s what we even optimise for. It is because you want option that makes you say this “I want to be financially strong so to the point that I can achieve other aims”.

The way to Option is to do hard things.

Paul Graham explained this point better than I could ever do. Link to his essay.

Please read that article. It’s a long one but my perspective change from the day I read it.

Those are the three things that I believe one can do to increase there chances of being at the right place at the right time.

Lady luck favours the one who tries
Experiment at scale
Do hard things.

That is at least what I am doing and I can say it has worked for me so far and it will work more.