What Would You Really Do To Succeed?

What would you really do to reach your full potential?

I’m actually asking you to think about this question right now. While you think I want to talk about something a little bit uncomfortable…

There is a South African thought experiment that we sometimes discuss because our country is pretty violent. The experiment involves a scenario in which your home has been invaded and there is a gun pointed at your head. The thought experiment is: What would you do?

Many people respond that there is nothing you can do. Your hands are literally tied and there is a gun pointed at your head. You wait.

Not me. Not a fuck. No waiting.

I always answer that I would fight, head but, wriggle around, kick or scream and do whatever it takes, even if it means I get shot in the process. I’d fight.

I’d fight because with my last breath I want to know that I did something more than wait for death.

Kinda like life, I want to know that I have lived and fought, not waited for death.

So, what would you do?

There is a species of sea slug that when faced with internal parasites that would certainly kill them, simply behead themselves and regrow their bodies without the parasites. I love this.

Now, of course, they understand intrinsically that this is something they are built to do. It’s not that much of a sacrifice in the grand scheme of their lives. But I can’t imagine it’s a lot of fun to remove your own body from your head. Even if it would save your life and even if your head is meant to do that.

Success and life are relatively similar to the self-beheading of the sea slug; we know what it takes to be successful. We know we have it in us to do the work. We know life is there for living. We’ve seen others do it before, but more often than not it’s easier to not do the work.

In the movie Saw, at one point the main character is faced with a decision: die in the room handcuffed to a pipe or saw off his own hand and escape.

What would you do to survive? What would you do to thrive?

Of course, I am being melodramatic. But dying slowly and unhappily at the hands of indecision, unhappiness and a lack of ambition might be worse than dying quickly at the hands of a psychotic serial killer.

You get to choose what you fight for. You get to choose what you cut out, cut off and cut loose. Nothing is sacred. Nothing deserves to remain simply because it has always been there. Nothing should hold you back from the life you want, the business you need, the side hustle you’ve been dreaming of or the career you were destined for.

You are programmed to move forward, to progress and to survive just like the sea slugs. Yet we insist on collecting things that we know are slowly killing us.

Start cutting.