The Hustler’s Playbook: Why Hustlers Succeed

Hustlers succeed where others fail. There are a few difference that make the difference in their results, all of which are worth noting (and emulating).

Not Lazy

Hustlers aren’t lazy. They don’t try to avoid work or working. They don’t try to hide from the tasks and outcomes they need to produce in order to move things forward. They aren’t always looking for ways to take it easy. They don’t sit in front of the television (or any other screen) avoiding what they should be doing.

When hustlers do relax and kick back, they meticulously schedule it and avoid working, knowing that the hustle gives them the freedom to get away from work when they need to.

Hustlers are never lazy.

Always Taking Action

A hustler has a strong bias for action. The reason hustlers succeed where others fail is that they take more action, more deliberately, over a longer period of time. This strong bias for action let’s a hustler stack outcome on top of outcome, producing more results than those who wait and wonder what to do next.

Results are produced by action. Hustlers count outcomes, not hours. They keep moving.

No Fear of Failure

Hustlers don’t fear failure. The hustler is very different from the non-hustler when it comes to failing.

The non-hustler sees failure as something negative, something bad, something to be avoided. The non-hustler is prone to believing that the event we call failure is really an identity, that it is something they will become when they fail.

The hustler sees failure as a learning process. Because the hustler takes action without the fear of failure, they have the benefit of gaining experience and feedback. Failure equals learning. Ask any entrepreneur what they learned from their failures and they’ll recite a long list of their real life experiences and the lessons they learned.

The reason hustlers succeed where others fail has nothing to do with how smart they are, how well or poorly educated they are, or the resources they were or were not born with. The belief that they succeeded because of one of these factors is terribly unhealthy and debilitating.

Hustlers succeed because they aren’t lazy and they don’t seek comfort. They succeed because they are always taking action. And they succeed because their failures don’t prevent them from taking future actions.

Questions

What work are you avoiding?

What actions should you be taking right now?

Are you taking enough action deliberately to produce your best results?

How do you define “failure?” What transforms the word failure from an event to an identity?