The Hustler’s Playbook: Paying the Price When It Is Unknown

You get to determine what you want. You can choose your goals instead of drifting. Some will tell you that you have to decide what price you will pay to have what you want, but this is not true. What you are willing to pay has no bearing on the price you pay.

Success doesn’t equitably dole out its rewards. Someone may pay a lower price than you for the success you want. You might have to work longer and harder for something that you want, even when it seems easier for others.

Others may have greater talent, or greater resources, or a greater hunger. Their talent may give them an advantage in producing the result you want. Greater resources can provide a tremendous advantage, especially when those resources are deployed in chasing down a goal. Hunger is a variable that is difficult to quantify, but can easily be seen and felt. When one is hungry, they start working on what they want as soon as their feet hit the floor in the morning.

Success tends to prefer intrinsic motivation and to shun those who need others to manage or lead them. Goals come faster to those who are motivated because they do the work diligently and without fail, without ever having to be reminded, coaxed, prodded, or forced to do it.

Those who are willing to pay the price, even when the price is unknown achieve their goals. Because they continue to pay, results accrue to them over time until, finally, they have what it is they want. At which point, the look off in to the distance and see something else on which to set their sights.