Seth Godin, Malcolm Gladwell and Success
BySeth Godin Blog
Long work is what the lawyer who bills 14 hours a day filling in forms does.
Hard work is what the insightful litigator does when she synthesizes four disparate ideas and comes up with an argument that wins the case–in less than five minutes.
Long work has a storied history. Farmers, hunters, factory workers… Always there was long work required to succeed. For generations, there was a huge benefit that came to those with the stamina and fortitude to do long work.
Hard work is frightening. We shy away from hard work because inherent in hard work is risk. Hard work is hard because you might fail. You can’t fail at long work, you merely show up. You fail at hard work when you don’t make an emotional connection, or when you don’t solve the problem or when you hesitate.
I think it’s worth noting that long work often sets the stage for hard work. If you show up enough and practice enough and learn enough, it’s more likely you will find yourself in a position to do hard work.
It seems, though that no matter how much long work you do, you won’t produce the benefits of hard work unless you are willing to leap.
Malcolm Gladwell in “Outliers” paraphrased
And if you add born in the right year and took advantage of the right opportunities you would have the life of Bill Gates and the Beatles. They were always willing to do the long work and the hard work. They were also born at a time that at the right age they could take advantage of some unique opportunities.
Those opportunities placed their long and hard work in competitively advantageous position to become rich and famous.
The Chinese and Japanese students go to school more days than Americans. Chinese don’t have summer vacations. Consequently American poor lose reading capability over summers while advantaged kids pick up reading capability. Chinese have an easier math system and like math. So more school days, a better math system, liking math places them ahead of American students.
As a parallel the Chinese work long hours growing rice which is a very precise discipline. They grow crops three times a year because the more they do the richer the soil becomes. They believe in starting 360 days a year before 6 a.m.. The Americans have to give the land rest when growing corn and other crops. They take off summers after harvest and rest land another year or two. Americans in the 1860’s thought too much education was dangerous for the mind. They thought children should have the summer off.
The reason Japanese and Chinese outwork Americans could be tied to their attitude of what it takes to survive and prosper starting with their attitude about agriculture.
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Read Outliers, The Story of Success by Malcolm Gladwell . How being born in the right year, working hard, and having unique opportunities has lead to success like Bill Gates, Beatles, hockey and soccer stars, and several other unique examples. Why the Chinese and Japanese are better at math.
Read “Awakening to Your Life’s Purpose” by Eckhart Tolle
See Resources for books to explore your potential
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See Life Management to explore your personal potential and happiness.
See Organizational Peak Performance to accelerate achievement
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