- [Instructor] If you want
to be successful in life, then you need to understand
this one mindset. People like Joe Rogan,
Bill Gates and Elon Musk have all talked about how important this single mindset is for success. And no, it's not something like
work hard or be disciplined. This is something that very
few people actually talk about. Back in the sixth grade,
everybody in my class had to take this exam that was supposed to test
where our reading level was at. And I felt really nervous for this test, because I was somebody at that time who didn't really read very much at all. In fact, I think I had read like one book up until that point in my life. And I really didn't want to get a grade that said I had like a
grade two reading level, because that would be very
hard on my self-esteem. But unfortunately,
because I was so nervous, I ended up doing pretty
poorly on that exam. So from that point on, I labeled myself as somebody who had very
poor reading skills, because that's what my school told me. And at that time, I
thought that everything that my school told me or my parents and my peers
told me was the absolute truth. So I went through middle
school, high school and even my college years
only reading the books that I have to read for school, because I told myself that
I wasn't the book guy. When I got to college, I had to take this creative writing class. And in that class, I had a professor who really didn't like
my writing very much. He also didn't really
like me very much either. And I ended up getting
something like a B minus in that class. But this didn't really surprise me because I had it in my head
that I was a poor reader. So it makes sense that I would
be a poor writer too, right? But one day I came across a guy on YouTube named Elliott Hulse, who introduced me to the
idea of personal development, which is basically the idea
that we all have the power to improve ourselves if we want to. I began reading books that he recommended, like "The Alchemist" and "Deep
Work" or "The Power of Now", which are all books that talk
about the idea of improving. And for the first time in my life, I was actually enjoying reading books. And then when I started
listening to audio books, I really started to enjoy reading, so much so that I would
read or listen to books for about an hour every single day. Fast forward another year, and then I became interested
in the world of YouTube and I started sitting down and typing out all of my own
ideas about personal growth. And the more I wrote, the more ideas started flowing out of me. I started to write these elaborate stories with real plots and real
character development. And then I would try to weave some sort of self-development
topic into the story in order to make it more relatable and interesting compared
to traditional self-help. Fast forward another year, and now I've created a real business that is pretty much centered
around my writing skills. And on top of that, I
usually get my video ideas from all the books that I read,
petty interesting for a guy who did poorly in reading and writing. The reason why I'm telling you the story is because I did something
that pretty much all people do, and it's called having a fixed mindset. People who have a fixed mindset, think that having certain
traits or talents are fixed, and they cannot be learned. They will often say things like, oh, I'm not a book person, or a creative person, or a math person. And they think that these traits are the ones that make people successful. So therefore, they can be successful because they don't naturally have them. But somebody with a growth mindset believes that new abilities can be developed through practice, and that anyone can become successful if they're willing to put the effort in. This mindset creates a love for learning, and having a love for
learning is something that pretty much all great
leaders have in common. In order to cultivate this mindset, you need to stop celebrating and focusing just on the results, and you need to start
celebrating the effort that is being put into
getting the results. Now, just to be clear, I'm not saying that
results don't matter at all because obviously they
do, but what I am saying is that you have to
start viewing your brain like it's a muscle. If you work certain parts
of your brain up more, whether it's the math
part or the creative part, the stronger that part will become. It's just like how some people out there are naturally very muscular, and that other people are
naturally very skinny, just because that person is skinny, doesn't mean they cannot one
day become as big or bigger than the naturally muscular person, it will just require more work. I'm also not saying that
you should just ignore what you're naturally good at, or what you're naturally bad at. In fact, a lot of times,
it's actually a good idea to pursue the thing that
you're naturally good at. But the way society and the way
the school system is set up, you're not really given a
healthy opportunity to discover what we are naturally good at, or what we're naturally bad at. Here's a really basic example. I have a friend in high
school who hated math class, and he labeled himself as not a math guy, but now he actually makes a
lot of money in sports betting, which is essentially
just being good at math and probability. But the difference is,
is that he loves sports. So under the right circumstances,
he can be great at math. When you start doing something that you are passionate about, you'll be shocked at what hidden talents that passion will bring up within you. And once again, if you actually want to discover your passion, you
have to go out and find it. And the best place to find your passion is a website called Skillshare. Skillshare is an online learning community that can teach you any skill you want. And they have over
25,000 classes in design, business, technology, they can even teach you
how to make money online, like how to start an e-commerce store, or social media marketing agency. And the first 500 people who sign up using my link in the description will gain access to all of this 100% free for the first two months. And I promise you that
if you go to that website or not even that website,
if you go on YouTube and you actively try and
discover what your passion is, you will be shocked at what
hidden talents lay within you. Thanks for watching,
and I'll see you soon.
