From: alexhormozi
For individuals focused on making more money, growing their business, and growing themselves, it’s crucial to prioritize action and growth over unproductive routines or short-term earnings. Instead of prioritizing routines, focus on productive work to achieve results [00:00:08]. The path to wealth and success involves working hard and sacrificing, not merely adhering to elaborate daily rituals [00:00:12]. For example, replacing a three-hour morning routine with three hours of work significantly increases productivity [00:00:52].
Instead of replicating what successful people do now, aspiring individuals should study what they did on their “way up” or during their “grind” phase [00:01:38]. This means understanding the actions that led to their success, rather than making mistaken correlations with their current habits [00:01:32].
Focus on Learning Over Earning in Your 20s
The idea that “30 isn’t the new 20” is an excuse to delay progress by a decade [00:02:42]. Assuming a long life is arrogant and can lead to wasting precious time [00:03:10]. Young people should avoid “dead-end jobs” that don’t contribute directly to their personal growth [00:03:22]. While not necessarily focusing on immediate earning, your 20s should be a period of setting yourself up for growth [00:03:32], particularly if you aspire to significant achievements [00:03:38].
Neglecting to invest in your skills and education during your 20s can leave you a decade behind those who start early [00:03:52]. For instance, individuals who begin their entrepreneurial journey in their early teens gain a significant time advantage over those who start in their mid-40s [00:04:04].
Paying Down “Ignorance Debt”
Life involves “ignorance debt”—the knowledge you don’t yet possess but should [00:04:26]. The most productive decades, such as your 20s, should be spent actively paying down this debt [00:04:32]. Failing to do so can create a substantial deficit compared to peers [00:04:39].
While the ideal time to start this journey might have been in childhood with supportive, entrepreneurial parents, the second best time is always now [00:05:03]. Choosing to give up because of past inaction or age is a self-defeating choice [00:05:05]. Taking action today, based on current knowledge, is the way to start making payments on your ignorance debt [00:05:42]. This approach highlights the importance of learning over earning for young people’s success.
Learning Over Earning: A Strategic Choice
Optimizing for earning potential in your 20s often means missing the point of long-term success [00:07:00]. A young person offered a high salary in a role that offers no growth, compared to a lower-paying role with a globally recognized brand and significant learning opportunities, should choose the latter [00:07:07]. This strategic choice prioritizes learning over earning, allowing for exponential skill development and future potential [00:07:32].
Choosing to earn rather than learn implies a halt in personal development, which is typically unsustainable for ambitious long-term goals [00:08:14]. When you stop learning, you limit your growth potential [00:08:30]. This principle is demonstrated by individuals who, despite having prestigious white-collar jobs, chose to take significantly lower-paying roles at gyms to gain valuable, non-traditional experience [00:08:35].
The Value of Education and Information
The true cost of ignorance is staggering. The difference between earning 1,000,000 is $950,000, which represents the value of the education needed to bridge that gap [00:09:27]. This emphasizes that education and information are the most valuable assets [00:09:47]. Highly successful individuals like Elon Musk can lose everything and regain it because they never lose their knowledge, education, and learned experience [00:09:51].
The most expensive thing one pays for is not a car or a house, but the crucial information they don’t know but should [00:10:19]. The value of such information, which could have materially changed financial, relational, or physical outcomes years ago, is borderline priceless [00:10:27].
Lessons on Product, Brand, and Compounding
Early in a career, there’s a temptation to focus on “fast money” through sales and marketing due to quick feedback loops [00:11:20]. However, this can lead to “playing the wrong game” [00:11:38]. The ultimate leverage comes from developing an exceptional product and a strong brand [00:11:59].
A high-quality product can generate its own marketing and sales through word-of-mouth [00:12:01]. For example, a book that was intentionally made exceptional, purely for internal purposes, sold out quickly and continued to sell thousands of copies daily with no paid marketing, simply because people told others how good it was [00:12:25]. This illustrates the principle of being “too good to fail” [00:13:25].
Instead of spending two months on a product and two years marketing it, it’s more effective to spend two years on a great product, then benefit from self-sustaining sales for the rest of one’s life [00:14:03]. The difference between “good” and “great” requires significantly more effort, often 10 times the work for each incremental improvement [00:14:28]. This requires consistent, unbroken focus and the ability to say “no” to distractions [00:14:45]. Putting in thousands of hours into a single task allows for a deeper understanding and refinement of a product or service [00:15:08]. In today’s market, where products are commoditized, being number one yields outsized returns, as social media amplifies word-of-mouth [00:15:43].
A strong brand is a learning tool—it’s about what people learn to associate with you [00:16:12]. Curating your brand like a garden, where anything not contributing to your desired image is a “weed,” is crucial [00:16:54]. Trust, built through reputation, provides immense leverage in business and sales [00:17:35]. When customers trust your brand based on past delivery, they will buy subsequent products without extensive marketing [00:17:50]. This shifts the focus from continually acquiring new customers to nurturing existing relationships, creating a compounding vehicle for sales [00:18:39].
This understanding of compounding, where initial effort on product quality and reputation yields increasing returns, is a key lesson [00:19:09]. Building a great product takes longer, and building a great reputation is a lifelong endeavor [00:19:42]. The exponential increase in sales for a second book compared to the first, due to compounding customer loyalty and word-of-mouth, exemplifies this [00:19:54].
Environment and Self-Perception
It’s vital to choose an environment that supports future growth rather than dwelling on the past [00:20:41]. Friends who only talk about past shared experiences, rather than future aspirations, may indicate a backward-looking mindset [00:20:19]. For growth-oriented individuals, seeking out those who focus on the future is a litmus test for a conducive environment [00:20:53].
Not listening to others’ opinions about your life is often the best course of action, as people often want a version of you that serves them [00:21:00]. While family might have more aligned interests than strangers, only “future you” has completely aligned interests [00:21:35]. Parental advice, often risk-averse, might aim to keep you safe (“play not to lose”), but to “play to win,” you often need to take different bets [00:22:54].
Younger people often get confused by talking about ideas instead of taking action [00:23:10]. Focusing solely on observable actions and objective facts, rather than intentions or feelings, simplifies decision-making and reduces noise [00:23:42].
Self-applied labels (e.g., “I’m bad at math,” “I’m not organized”) can limit action and behavior [00:25:07]. These labels often change behavior more than behavior changes the labels [00:25:59]. It is crucial to be aware of and actively break labels, especially those imposed by others, as they can perpetuate limiting beliefs [00:26:07]. Changing your environment can help alter behavior by not reinforcing old labels [00:26:48]. Instead of binary labels, focus on ideals and take daily actions to move towards those values (e.g., “how courageous is he?” rather than “he is courageous or not”) [00:27:06]. This approach to learning, self-improvement, and mastering skills fosters continuous growth.