Cover Photo by Tom Parsons on Unsplash (adapted)
“If I had to choose one person to call my hero, that would be you” — Kakoli Das
Damn, hearing that boosts one’s self-confidence!
It’s not the first time I hear that, yet it always brings me so much joy to hear it. It never gets tired. And I don’t pretend to be the only one receiving these comments, non-fiction writers hear that frequently.
But I’m no hero to everyone. No one will ever be. Some people want to model their life after me, some people think I’m wasting time pursuing futile endeavours.
Truth is, I’m really no hero at all. And I’m not trying to downplay myself or go full-on imposter syndrome. The difference with me is that I don’t accept the status quo. If something needs to change I make it change, fast. I guess that’s my superpower.
I saw a tweet from Dave Schools the other day asking about what is one thing that is simple that you don’t find easy. His answer was Nike’s slogan: “Just do it”. I’m the opposite of that. It’s hard for me not to act. Now, I’m asking you the same question:
What is the one thing that is simple that you don’t find easy?
If you knew me four years ago, you’d know a different me. I was like most, working 9–5, five days a week. I went to school to become a programmer, and even though I had started multiple businesses in the past, I was always working for someone else’s company, building software for a living.
Ask me today what I do and my only short answer is: I help people grow in a better world. Two things stand out: 1. I legitimately want to help make the world a better place, and 2. I really want people to thrive in this new world.
Sounds more glorious than it really is though.
People tend not to take action towards such ambitions because they think it’s impossible. The truth is that if this farm-boy metalhead programmer can do it, what makes you think you can’t?
When I tell people how different I was back then, they always ask me:
“What changed? What was the trigger for that change in your life?”
I changed my environment. A lot.
I started truly giving (never expecting anything in return).
Let’s expand on those two.
It’s hard to imagine I haven’t traveled my whole life. When people think of me, they think nomad or traveler. However, I actually hadn’t even flown until I was 24 years old. I went on a trip to Cuba in a resort.
For me, going to the United States was considered traveling (I’m from Canada). I did a few trips to the USA and even got married on the Grand Canyon, but I wasn’t yet a traveler.
When I started catching what people call the “travel bug”, I knew I had to travel longer-term. So, four years ago, my wife and I filled our backpacks, gave everything away, and left our jobs to travel for a year.
That’s when my environment started changing a lot. We ended up visiting 32 countries on that single trip, experiencing more things than most people do in 10 years. But the highlight was always the people.
We did volunteer experiences in India, Cambodia, and South Korea, crashed a couple weddings in Turkey and Jordan, got invited for tea more times than I can count, and more. It was totally amazing!
The generosity we received from perfect strangers abroad made me realize how self-centered I was. I can’t take the whole blame since this is very much a society problem, but still…
From my first volunteer experience to now, I have become a giver. The world no longer revolves around me, but rather around a collective good.
And that, my friends, is damn liberating and motivating!
Why do I need to be better at “x”? Because “y” and “z” need me to be. If I can’t do “x”, they might suffer and I don’t want that.
But there’s a bit of a selfish ambition here as well.
In his book, High Performance Habits, Brendon Burchard talks about six habits that make one perform better than most. The six habits are:
Seeking Clarity;
Generate Energy;
Raise Necessity;
Increase Productivity;
Develop Influence; and
Demonstrate Courage.
There’s also a cheat: Confidence.
While in the book, Burchard mentions being a giver to be a prime way to develop influence, I’d argue that it is, in fact, a key solution to all six habits and confidence.
Why do I think that?
Let’s start with the cheat: Confidence. Burchard mentions that confidence is the one thing that brings all six habits together. The more confident you are in your ability to deliver, the more you’ll perform in the six habits. This is based on surveys of more than 200,000 people.
Read that message I got again from Kakoli Das at the top of this story. Wouldn’t that boost your confidence?
At first, it’s hard to accept that you can indeed change someone’s life, but once you go over the imposter syndrome, you will indeed become more confident.
When I started learning three new skills a month 16 months ago, it was a completely selfish ambition. I wanted to be more skilled, if only to be able to do more things for myself. But I was wrong.
Learning all these new skills turned out to be a way for me to help a wider range of people more effectively. Essentially, that allowed me to give more. No longer can I just help you with your logical engineering problems, but I can also help you in any of the 45+ skills that I’ve learned since then.
The more skills I learned, the more I could give back. The more I gave back, the more confidence I got. The more confidence I got, the more I performed. The more I performed, the more I changed people’s lives.
“If you’re the one who appreciates people the most, you’re the most appreciated.” — Brendon Burchard
So you think you can’t change people’s lives? You think there’s nothing special about you?
You couldn’t be more wrong!
As a high school student, there’s nothing I wanted more than to just be a regular guy. That’s exactly what people saw in me. If you ask any of my high school classmates, there’s no way they could have guessed that one day I’d be someone’s hero. “I was average at best”.
If that’s how you think about yourself, think again.
Prithviraj Pillai thought the same of himself until I accidentally changed his perspective. While he thought there was nothing special about him, it turns out he managed to change other people’s lives by getting more skilled and giving back.
And I see that all the time. People feel so powerless, yet all they have to do is truly give. Sometimes all it takes is a simple, well-timed, thank you. When I talk about giving, I’m not saying spend all your waking hours giving. I mean to make this a habit. Make it effortless to give.
It starts by being aware of people’s needs. When I sent an email to my weekly newsletter’s subscribers asking them what it is exactly I can do to help them, I got tons of replies. I made it my mission to reply to every single one of them myself, even if I was bedridden at the time.
People were surprised by how deep in I went in my replies. The reality is that I only took two hours to reply to them all, I was used to it. Two hours to potentially have an impact on someone’s life is freaking nothing!
You’re too busy to do that? Seriously? Turn off Instagram and Netflix and see how much time you have to give back!
What do you think is more fulfilling?
The more comments I get like the one from Kakoli, the more pumped I am. The more pumped I am, the more productive I get. The more productive I get, the more impact I have on this world, leading me to my goal if helping people grow in a better world.
But whatever goal you have in life, giving is a pathway to success. It works for love, health, wealth, happiness, and most other things.
I have better relationships, I’m healthier, I make more money, and I’m definitely a lot happier now as opposed to four years ago when I was just following society’s norms.
Remember this:
“Whether you think you can or you can’t, you’re right.” — Henry Ford
Dare think you can. Most don’t. You can be someone’s hero, and the truth is that it’s really not that hard. Stop being selfish and give back. Realize that people have given to you in the past and remember how that made you feel. Don’t give to be a hero. Give to give. It’s that simple.
You can do this!