What I’ve Learned Writing 500 Blog Posts
As of today, I've published 500 blog posts online since January 2017. That's slightly more than 1 per week. Given this, I wanted to discuss the biggest lessons I've learned from this and how they can help you.
Consistency Beats Everything
If there were one idea that I could bestow upon anyone who wants success in life, it's—consistency beats everything. This is true in investing, in fitness, in your career, with your relationships, and so much more. It's been true everywhere I've ever looked. Those who are consistent outperform those who aren't in the long run. Kobe Bryant is probably the best example of this. Kobe was known for his early AM workouts, but what he did to prepare for the 2012 Olympics was on another level. One trainer for Team USA described how he helped Kobe work out for 75 minutes at 5 AM, went back to his hotel to get some sleep, and then returned by 11 AM to see Kobe still practicing. Kobe had never left and told the trainer that he wanted to make 800 shots before the main practice at 11. And he did. Kobe outworked everyone in the league and is today considered one of the greatest basketball players of all time as a result. Consistency can also be used to make seemingly impossible tasks far more manageable. For example, when I was writing The Wealth Ladder, I knew I had to end up with a book that was around 55,000 words. This can seem insurmountable when staring at a blank page. But when I broke it up across 6 months, I realized I only had to write a little over 300 words a day. That wasn't too bad. A few paragraphs a day and I'd end up with a book. All I had to do was be consistent. No matter what you pursue in life, consistency is the trick to get through it. It's also how you improve as well.Doing is Improving
When I first started blogging, I wasn't a great writer. Read my earliest work and you'll see. Actually, don't read it. Because if you did, you'd see that I don't have a God-given talent for prose. I'm much more of a numbers guy than a poet. But things didn't stay this way. I kept writing week after week. And, slowly, I got better. I didn't read books on "how to become a better writer" or take an online writing course. I just kept writing. The act of doing was how I improved. And this improvement didn't happen all at once either. I didn't go to bed one night a bad writer and wake up a good one. No, it was a gradual process that I'm still working on almost 10 years later. Why is doing the ultimate form of mastery? Because it forces reps, reps, reps. That's how you learn and get better. Don't just take it from me though, consider one of my favorite experiments on the topic. In the experiment, students in a ceramics class were split into two groups. One group would be graded on the quantity of the work they produced while the other group would be graded on the quality of the work they produced. The quantity group had to create as many clay pots as possible over the semester while the quality group only had to produce a single clay pot as best they could. Months later when the students turned in their pots to be graded, the teacher came to a surprising realization — all of the highest quality pots were actually produced by students in the quantity group. Those who focused on producing actually improved more than those who were told to explicitly focus on improving. When pursuing perfection, we fail to find it. But when pursuing production, we somehow do. Nevertheless, improving can't be your only goal. Because focusing too much on the outcome is the wrong way to approach life.The Journey is the Outcome
It's natural to judge your performance based on the outcome. If you release a product, you want people to buy it. If you write a book, you want it to sell. I get it. But being too outcome-focused always leads to dissatisfaction. Because you either: fail to reach your goal, or accomplish it and are left wondering, "What's next?" As Jim Carrey once said:I think everybody should get rich and famous and do everything they ever dreamed of so they can see that it's not the answer.I've been fortunate enough to meet a lot of successful people in the financial and literary space. And none of them seem far happier than anyone else. If anything, many wanted even more success. And there's nothing wrong with that, but it's a dangerous game to play for long because you can't win. And if no outcome ever brings ultimate satisfaction, then your only option is to focus on the journey. Not because it will bring rewards, but because it's who you are. It's only the journey that can lead to fulfillment, not the destination. Once you realize this, it completely redefines how you view success. Being successful is no longer about a number or amount. It's also about how you accomplished what you did. It's the way you went about it. Did you have to lie? Did you have to cheat? Did you compromise who you are? There are a lot of ways to be successful, but there's only one way to be you. Were you true to that person? When you focus on the journey, it becomes the outcome. And that outcome will often surprise you.