Patience and perseverance

It did not work.

Ok, but how long did you try? Was it ten minutes, two weeks, three months, one year?

People are not always immediately ready to respond to whatever it is you have on offer that will change their lives (for the better). Patience and perseverance are as important as ideation and execution.

Go big, go small

To go big, you have to go small.

To become a master, you have to narrow your focus.

To grow your company, you have to narrow your target market.

To make your job profile stand out, you have to narrow (and perfect) the things you tell about.

It is counterintuitive, and that’s why so many people get this wrong. But the only way to go big, is to go small.

On hold

Not everything that you like, that you want to do, that seems interesting, that you are committed to, comes easily. Sometimes the pursue of that thing means you get stuck in other aspects of your life, simply because you are left with no energy for them.

And so, it might be a good idea to put that thing on hold, to wait for a better time, to progress on other fronts. There’s nothing worst than achieving something when knowing that all the rest has been left behind.

Money doesn’t lie

Google’s mission was to organize the world’s information and make it universally accessible and useful. Today, 81.3% of their revenue comes from advertising, which admittedly has little to do with making information universally accessible.

Facebook’s mission was to give people the power to build community and bring the world closer together. Today, 97.7% of their revenue comes from advertising, which admittedly has little to do with giving people the power to build community or bringing the world closer together.

If you don’t measure the right things, it’s very easy to end up in a very different place from the one you initially had in mind.

Darkest solitude

In dark times, solitude is never the answer.

Because in solitude the darkest narrative becomes the only possible one. There is no escape to negativity and self-pity if we don’t connect, don’t open up, don’t reach out.

The good news is, solitude is a choice.