This Is Not the End. Quite the Opposite.

Dreams are important. If you decide to put a deadline on your dream, then suddenly the dream becomes a goal, which is also important. Goals mobilize our focus toward the actions that force us to improve as individuals and become the kinds of people capable of achieving our dreams. But it all starts with just that: a dream. However, what is possibly more important than dreams (or goals) is having the power to achieve those dreams.

“All men dream, but not equally. Those who dream by night in the dusty recesses of their minds, wake in the day to find that it was vanity: but the dreamers of the day are dangerous men, for they may act on their dreams with open eyes, to make them possible.”

- T. E. Lawrence

Many of the young people today who hold dreams, goals, and ambition are lacking the power they need to achieve their desired end results. When this happens, they are at risk of losing the motivation needed to keep trying to achieve, because there’s another option: the easy way out.

Many teenagers are engaging in counter-productive, self-destructive, or irresponsible behaviors. A 2020 report by the Addiction Center revealed that, “1 in 5 teens have abused prescription medications, according to the Centers for Disease Control and 1 in 3 parents believe there is little they can do to prevent teen drug use despite evidence that shows parental involvement is the strongest factor in prevention.”[1]

It’s easy for young people to do drugs and engage in improper activities of the like. It’s easy for young people who were once dreamers of the day, fighting for their goals, to turn into people who only dream at night. This means that when there are even a few young people who decide to take the hard route toward the achievement of their own personal goals, it’s very important that they have access to the tools they need to stay on that positive path, so as to prevent them from falling into the masses of young people who possess no such ambition and make the easy choice.

This brings us to the root of the problem. Almost everyone knows that they need money to get to where they want to go in life, especially since most challenging endeavors and worthy goals aren’t cheap to accomplish. However, the younger generation chalks this up to money being the sole resource they need to bridge the gap between them and their goals.

While they’re on the right track in terms of acknowledging and showing respect for the importance of money, they recognize it as the only form of power able to bring them success. They start off on the right foot by getting a job, but most young people enter a job asking: “Where do I fit? What do you value in me?”[2] They ask these questions in the hopes that with the answer they’ll be able to thrive wherever it is that they believe they fit. They plan on doubling down on what others value in them so they can get that raise, promotion, etc.

That’s all good and well, but this leads to them forgetting about the other forms of power they could be using to reach their desired end result. They spend too much time appreciating their hard skills and give less thought to the importance of soft skills as well as other resources. There’s a great point by Dr. Tim Elmore, the president of Growing Leaders, on this:

“In American history, our public school system in our country was founded by a guy named Horace Mann. At least that’s what we attribute it to. Horace Mann first called the public school system the normal school because they were designed to help kids prepare for the norms of society. So I was just with educators yesterday and I said, ‘Are we doing that? Can you say what you’re doing in the classroom is getting them ready to have a successful career, to lead a good family, to thrive in a community, to make a difference, to change something before you die?’ And you know most of the teachers kind of go, ‘I don’t know.”[3]

In other words, our school system has failed to prepare young individuals for the real world. Chances are this isn’t news to you, the real question we must answer is in “how” the school system has failed our younger generation. By understanding that, we can take a look at what young people are lacking and, in doing so, provide them with the tools they need but were not given in school.

There are many things that could serve to be taught in school that would be of great use to young people, such as taxes, personal finance, logical and deductive reasoning, and even healthy skepticism. I believe the educators of today are doing their best, but the current educational system we have now often provides the hard skills that employers are looking for on resumes but does not spend nearly enough time developing the soft skills that help people move forward in life. “Success in the classroom is often 75% IQ and 25% EQ, emotional intelligence. You get out into the working world, it’s often the other way around, it’s 75% EQ. It’s your emotional intelligence.”[4]

Hard skills such as math, technology, and engineering are important, but if you can’t get along with a teammate, you’re not very good at communicating with your boss, or your emotional intelligence is low, your lack of these basic skills could cost you your job and ultimately sabotage your career, as well as your personal life. So, all the grades were right on your report card but, unluckily, you weren’t able to translate those calculus lessons into a real life situation.

The reason you’ve been making progress on your goals so slowly is because you’re lacking the soft skills needed to go farther faster. As power dynamics expert Lucio Buffalmano put it:

“Tech skills give you job security. People skills give you board seats.”[5]

The obvious solution is to learn and develop soft skills. “‘People skills’ are just as important as ‘technical skills,’ because even in highly technical jobs, you have to work with others. Many outplacement candidates are technical superstars who’ve been fired. They knew their jobs, but couldn’t collaborate or get along with others. Average performers with strong people skills often last longer. It’s better to be a ‘people person’ with average skills than to be an abrasive expert who wins at the expense of others.”[6]

Skills alone are not enough. Knowledge alone makes you book smart, but applied knowledge will take you further in life than you could imagine.

“Remember, to learn and not to do is really not to learn. To know and not to do is really not to know.”[7]

Therefore, the next step is to apply those soft skills to your life and daily situations.

Before you can start networking to achieve your goals, you have to start with your why, which is why we spent so much time on it in Chapter Two. You have to know the purpose behind why you’re doing what you’re doing.

It was hard for me to find my purpose. It took a lot of self-discovery, because I was searching for a meaning in the pain I had endured. I was hoping that the answers behind the reasons for my pain would guide my path. Eventually, I had to accept that there was no real reason why I went through what I did. The hardest part of that was accepting the unfairness of having to grow up too fast. It was not easy going to school surrounded by people who actually got a better childhood than I did and had a family that loved them, but who would still complain about how they hated their parents.

Eventually, I understood something that changed the way I viewed my purpose in the world: you don’t ask life what your purpose is; life asks you. Whatever your response, life will agree. If you decide to make your purpose robbing banks, life won’t grow legs and hunt you down to stop you. The only thing I really knew about my pain was that I hated it. I knew that it wasn’t fair, and it was only because I grew up too fast that I was able to handle my problems like an adult at such a young age. What about the people who don’t have my strength of will that are suffering the same things I went through? What about people who are the same age as I was back then and aren’t sure how to handle the pain of the experiences that I already endured? The way I saw it, I could either share what I learned on my long, arduous journey so they can save themselves the time and unnecessary suffering, or leave those people to figure it out for themselves. I chose the first option, and that was one of my biggest motivators for writing this book.

Once you have your purpose—your “why”—you can start networking. But, as explained in Step One, you will have an easier time networking if you are high-value. In its most vulgar definition, being high-value means being successful in society’s definition of success (albeit, there is much more to it than that).

Chances are, in today’s world, you’d have a hard time finding someone who didn’t want to be friends with a powerful celebrity. Even if only for bragging rights, most everyone would be happy to have a powerful friend. They would enjoy having someone successful in their social circle. This is why it’s important to work on becoming high-power (high-value): to achieve the highest level of networking success. Not just so you can be that powerful friend that others want to be around, but so when you want to befriend other powerful people they see you as someone who brings enough value to the table to be worth collaborating with. If you don’t bring value to the table, they could view you as a taker. One way to be a high-value man is to be a high-quality man.

As explained in the first chapter, sticking to your values is an important trait to be a high-quality man. One of my values used to be “treat others as you would want to be treated.” It’s about putting yourself in the shoes of others and treating them how you would want to be treated if you were in their position.

I no longer follow this mantra, because I want to be treated with respect—but will only treat others with respect if I deem them worthy of it. This mantra implies that I should give respect to everyone automatically because I would want to be given respect in their position.

For example, if I walk outside and lock eyes with my neighbor, it’s only respectful to give a quick wave to acknowledge their existence. If I were in their shoes, I would want them to do the same, giving some sign that they acknowledge my presence. After all, purposely ignoring people that you made eye contact with and know personally is passive aggressive and rude (unless you’re joking).

However, if I walk outside and my neighbor begins to spew a series of racial slurs at me, I have no moral obligation to treat him with respect, even though I would want to be respected if I were standing in his shoes. The mantra “treat others as you would want to be treated” advises me to show him respect, since I would want to be treated with respect as a neighbor, but I feel it is illogical to treat a white supremist who tells me, “Hey boy, if we were in the 1800s I’d hang you from this tree in my front yard,” the same way I would treat my kind neighbors. (Thankfully, I’ve never had this issue with a neighbor, but this example serves to illustrate my point.)

If you ask me, this doesn’t give me the moral right to disrespect this racist neighbor (cursing them out or throwing racial slurs back), but I have no obligation to treat them with respect by giving them a kind wave as I would my other neighbors. I can simply walk away. Walking away when you notice someone’s presence without giving a sign of acknowledgement is rude and not how I would want to be treated, but for this neighbor I make the exception. For me, respect is no longer given. It’s earned.

I also used to believe that all motivations had to be noble. It felt strange to say that selfish motivations like wanting that sports car and mansion were okay. However, as I grew, my values changed in this regard as well. I began to understand that the motivations didn’t matter—at least not the motivations themselves. What did matter was how you applied your motivations. If you apply your motivations in a positive manner, the motivation goes from being a self-centered source of fuel to a driving force for good. What do I mean?

If a man decided he selfishly wants to be the richest man in the world and is motivated by acquiring as much power as possible, but decides that the way he wants to reach the top is by giving every dollar in his name to charity and expecting karma to help him achieve his goal, I won’t stop him. As selfish as his desires may be, his actions are the actions of a selfless man. He has applied his motivation positively.

I’ve heard some argue, when I claim the pillars to “the good life” are health, wealth, love, and happiness, that I had left out a key component: faith. My reasoning in omitting faith is that faith cannot be a pillar to the good life, because otherwise the good life would lose its ability to effectively remain. Faith is the foundation on which the good life is built, because faith, at its most basic definition, is simply trust.

I used to feed into the idea that to become successful you needed to believe in yourself. The logic behind that reasoning was that if you don’t believe you can do something, your chances of being able to do it are slim to none (since there are already enough forces in the world that are against you). The fact that you are also against yourself reduces your chances of achievement so significantly you may as well give up. However, this is where the power of a network also comes into play.

If Brian doesn’t believe in his ability to become a millionaire, but he has a mentor who repeatedly guides him to making six figures a month, he can argue with the mentor that he can’t become a millionaire and he can argue with himself, but he can’t argue with the results. Every month he’s building the wealth pillar of the good life. Eventually, with the guidance of his mentor, he becomes a millionaire. You don’t need to believe in yourself, but you do need someone who does believe in you. The key to this working is faith.

If Brian didn’t trust the process (have faith in the process) and ignored his mentor’s instructions to where he only made a few thousand a month, then he would have never been able to reach his desired outcome and the wealth pillar wouldn’t have been able to effectively grow strong. This concept of the necessity of faith applies to all aspects of life—and it is why I said if you don’t have a growth mindset you shouldn’t bother reading this book. If you don’t trust the process or your ability to learn, grow, and develop your happiness, health, or any other aspect of your life, then it won’t happen. You don’t need to believe, but you need to have trust. Without trust—without faith—the whole temple of the good life comes crashing down.

This is the same concept as the man on the bench press who is struggling to complete his set and doesn’t believe he can finish strong. With the encouragement of his personal trainer who stands over him, he’s able to do what he wasn’t sure he could. He trusts his trainer when he says, “You can do it.”

Eventually, you should believe in yourself. However, you shouldn’t use it as an excuse not to get started or not to work on yourself. You especially shouldn’t use it as an excuse not to network your way to success. You have no idea what you’re actually capable of until you take the first step. You will need belief for lasting success, even if that belief doesn’t start out coming from you.

As a final note, your self-talk is important. Negative self-talk will hold you back. Some will label their negative talk as just “healthy realism,” but at that point it’s realistic self-talk and not negative self-talk. There’s a difference.

Negative self-talk would be telling yourself you should quit. Maybe you should. I believe in quitting, but only if you’re quitting something that’s holding you back or distracting you from your main objective. If you know that you shouldn’t quit, don’t tell yourself that you should. That’s negative self-talk.

Develop into a high-quality man and use constructive self-talk to help you along the way toward getting what you deserve in life. You don’t have to settle for disrespect or abuse, and you certainly don’t have to settle for less than the success and respect a high-quality man receives. We all have the ability to work on ourselves. We all have the power to become more than we are today. We all have the power to fight our personal demons. We can all try to turn our pain into something good. We can all climb out of hell.