6 Things I Wish I Knew Before Starting My Career

Sometimes I’m puzzled how I end up where I am. 

I came out of college with a less than subpar GPA: around C+ average.

The thing is: I was consciously slacking off school to focus on what I valued more: work experience and dating. 

After 2 years out of college, I am happily dating a girl I met in college for 3 years.

My net worth is heading north of $200K in less than 2 years! 

The funny thing is I never had a goal. Like “I need to do this at age 25”, etc.

I used to make goals, but I’ve found them useless.

Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.

Mike Tyson

What is more useful is having a system. 

Scott Adams has influenced me around this concept called, “systems vs goals”. 

When you have a system, you have a daily habit that gets you to your goal or (even better) beyond all the goals you could possibly imagine. 

We have finite resources and mental energy.  We look at things in a geocentric way, not in a heliocentric way. 

Meaning, we tend to think more about ourselves than what is happening around us that affects our life. 

That’s okay. I don’t think there’s anything bad. 

All I’m saying is that it is a great way to step out of the game we’re currently playing and ask “why”. 

Ask why. Why do I want to have a good GPA? Why do I want to pursue what I am thinking of? 

Sometimes “why” is too silly to admit. Often “why” seems empty. 

After asking “why”, we realize how ridiculous we are.

So here is the first principle for your career: have a system, not a goal. 

A system is something that you can act daily and it’s continuous.

On the other hand, a goal is something binary–it’s either you achieve it or not.

With a goal-oriented mindset, almost everything in life is either a win or lose.

But people with a system-oriented mindset, almost everything in life is learning and correcting our own errors.

To give you some examples, here are my current career-related systems:

1. Keep building skills 

Broadly speaking, I try to become top 25% of 3-4 different fields and combine them together

2. More skills we accumulate (early on), double our odds of success

To me, career success means doing what you are good at and getting paid to do what you love to do. It’s not about having a fancy car or a job title.

3. Think how luck plays a big role in our life. 

We can’t choose where we were born to what family in what kind of era. So (almost) everything is about luck. 

But here’s the thing. 

You can change your luck to your advantage. With conscious efforts, you can get 4 different kinds of luck that Naval Ravikant talks about

Type 1 luck is blind luck, type 2 is hustling luck, type 3 is luck by prepared mind, and type 4 is your-character- becomes-your-destiny kind of luck. 

Knowing this, our society tends to speak of type 1 and type 2 luck. There’s a survival bias on those two types of luck. 

On the other hand, we don’t talk about people in their 50’s or 60’s who became a success after decades of their professional achievements. 

Type 4 luck is even more interesting, your thoughts become your words, your words become your habits, your habits become your characters, your characters become your destiny.

4. Look at your career like your investing portfolio. 

At each stage of our life, we can take different kinds of risks. 

When we are young we can take the risk of moving to somewhere totally new with a low salary. You can take “salary risk”.

But this salary risk is great as long as you get something else that has high upside and low downside. A good example here is stock options.

5. Make sure you optimize for the right thing: a network of smart, hardworking, and ethical people. 

Early on, we don’t have much professional experience therefore we don’t know anyone. 

It’s important to note that many professionals find their next career move through somebody they already knew. 

Ask your colleagues most will say “Oh I knew this person, and she refers to this job at this company.” And the story goes. 

That’s how you get most of your job. So open your horizon. Be the whitebelt in every dojo. You are a beginner. Perpetual beginner who would like to learn. 

In a modern day where things change fast, it’s a great idea to be a permanent beta (keep updating yourself. Remember knowledge is about error corrections, not merely accumulating more facts.)

6. If you don’t have passions, follow your curiosity.

Let’s define what passions are: a passion is something that plays to you but works to others. 

To be blunt, passion is (mostly) bullshit when it comes to career. The popular mantra of “following your passion” might work if and when your career becomes your art: doing it for its own sake because it’s your personal expression to the world.

So it is okay if you don’t know what your passions are. Meanwhile, just follow your curiosity. 

What makes you curious? What makes you want to study or spend more time? 

It doesn’t matter what it is. Thanks to the Internet, it is easier to find some groups who are into what you are into. 

Don’t be shy away from your curiosity because you think you can’t make money off of it. 

See YouTube! So many people follow their curiosity and curiosity turns into passions, and a passion turns into businesses, etc. 

That is something you can’t directly aim at but something you gain as you move on with your life. 

That is how our Life leads us anyway. So follow your curiosity!

In short, remember systems vs goals: systems are for winners. 

  1. Keep building skills
  2. More skills you accumulate (early on), double your odd of success (roughly speaking)
  3. Remember how luck plays a huge role in our life and you can change it (if you want).
  4. Take risks. At each stage of life, you can take different kinds of risks.
  5. Optimize for building a network of smart, energetic, and highly ethical people.
  6. If you don’t have passions, follow your curiosity. 

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