Stop Looking For The Success Formula

Hello Alexa, welcome to Honest Talks. This is a series where we talk about things that we personally find interesting, and we think you might too. Today's topic is how to craft your own success formula.

So these numbers, they were worth millions of dollars last week; today they mean nothing. These were last week's lottery numbers, and it's the same with success. Just because someone found success in one way last week, it doesn't mean that it'll work exactly that way for you today. You see, people tell you there's no formula to success, but the reality is that there is, and not only one formula, but millions of them because there are millions of successful people out there.

But the thing is, there's no formula specifically designed for you. You've got to make that yourself, and in this video, we'll show you how. Welcome to Alux!

Now, there are many definitions of success, right? But our favorite one, and the one that we relate with the most, is this: success is when reality meets expectations. It's when you live the life you imagined as a kid, when you can sit back and smile at your life. This definition can mean different things for different people, and nobody can guilt you or shame you that your definition of success doesn't include having a Bugatti.

Now, since your definition of success is different, your formula will also be different. And here's the really interesting part about it: let's imagine for a second that you start to build a business. You put in the work, you do great things, the company's value skyrockets, and you sell it for millions of dollars. You can now safely retire wherever in the world you'd like, doing whatever you'd want.

Now, if you were to do it all over again, what do you think would happen? You see, it's extremely unlikely that you'd be able to replicate that another time with the exact same circumstances. The moment in your life will be different, the market will be different, you'll have other responsibilities. You see, not even your very own success formula can work a second time in the exact same way. Something's gotta change, and this is where the whole "there is no formula for success" thing comes in.

You cannot drag and drop someone's decisions into your own life and expect the same results, which brings us to the topic of this video: how to craft your own success formula.

So for most people, it all starts, or should start, with reading about other people's success and wisdom. Now, yes, we told you that you can't drag and drop other people's decisions, but you see, you're not looking for the whole solution; you're looking for nuggets of gold. Many people read business books and self-help books the wrong way. When you read about other success stories, you get inspired and motivated. You picture yourself just as a main character in the book, and then everything falls flat because A) you didn't do anything about it, and B) your circumstances don't apply.

You see, when you read a good book, around 80 percent might be completely useless for you. It's the other 20 percent of that book you're interested in. Think of it like a buffet of knowledge. This is one of the reasons why we enjoy how Tim Ferriss writes his books. They're not meant to be read cover to cover but are designed in a way to be easy to skim through, looking for things that appeal to you, things that are actually relevant in your life.

And when you do this long enough, you'll end up with a series of information that's true to you. Now, what do we mean when we say true to you? Well, you see, there are multiple ways of doing the same thing. Let's take, for example, selling a product. There are companies out there where the sole purpose is to build other products. They look out into the market, they find areas where there is a slot to be filled, and they leverage their big budget resources to create a product that fits in.

Think of skin care, makeup, and everything in between. That's why there's a brand new toothpaste like every 12 hours. Others create the product first and are really, really good at selling it to other businesses, and generally speaking, it's easier to sell a product to a business than to individuals because you can sell in bulk.

Others spend years creating an audience, and they make products specifically designed for that audience. That's what we did. We made free content on YouTube for five years before we had any products to sell. The point is all of these work, but they don't all work for you in the same way. For some, they don't have the resources; for others, they simply don't like doing it. So not all of these things are going to be true for you.

This is why it's important to keep yourself educated on how others manage to find success. It'll give you a broader horizon of what's possible, and it'll make it easier to pick what feels right for you. And now we actually get to the good part on how to actually design your own success formula, and it's pretty straightforward. You take all of these nuggets of gold you found in your self-education journey and you split them into the following categories.

First up, workflow! So the purpose of this category is to figure out what style of workflow suits you best. Some people wake up at 6 AM, some people wake up at noon, some work at night, some do the hardest work first thing in the morning. As a matter of fact, we made a video all about why this works for a lot of people. We'll link to it in the description; check it out to see if there are any nuggets of gold that you'd like to add to your bucket.

And people have different ways of staying organized, different ways of prioritizing their tasks. Some are digital nomads; others have their own office. The point is, you need to figure out what is the optimum environment where you can do your best work. Is it at home listening to the Lo-Fi girl, or is it at a buzzing coffee shop? You see, it's extremely important to figure out this stuff because there's no reason to have friction between you and the work that you need to accomplish.

Artists, for example, go to extreme lengths to get this thing right because the environment has a great impact on creativity. A while ago, we read a great book on leadership, and one of the golden nuggets that really caught our attention was this: if you want someone to do great work, you must allow them to do so. We're paraphrasing a little bit here, but the point is, having the right environment and the right tools will greatly impact the quality of what you can do, and it's your job to figure out what that looks like.

Next up, your favorite-ish sandwich! We learned this term from Mark Manson. You might have heard about his best-selling book, "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck." At some point, you'll have to do things that you don't like to do. Not everything is sunshine and rainbows all the time. The question here is, what kind of sandwich are you willing to tolerate? Because you will have to tolerate something eventually.

For everything worth having, there's a cost attached to it, and the answer to this question will give you a competitive advantage. In our case, our sandwich is a hectic schedule and a lot of things happening at the same time. That's just how it is in our context.

Next in your success equation is what are you good at or what can you become good at. This is all about proactive learning and execution. There's no person in the world who's bad at absolutely everything. Worst case, they haven't yet figured out what they can become good at. If you really think about it, there are some things that you can do which others find difficult, if not impossible.

And if you struggle to think of something here, well, maybe you haven't given your best to that many things yet. You really need to figure out what your strengths are, and a great tip to do this is to consider what seems easy for you to do. In most cases, if it's easy for you, it's because it comes naturally, and this part of the formula will give you a great direction.

Next up, we've got life requirements. So you're not going to last long if you don't like it or if you don't supplement your life with things that keep you excited. Something needs to excite you to make you want to dive deep and get lost in the unknown abyss. We call these things life requirements. You see, at the end of the day, you are a human being, okay? You're not a machine, and there are certain things that you need to cover first so they don't weigh down on you. Things like a roof over your head or healthy relationships.

If you ignore these things, you'll eventually end up miserable. Okay, and that is why we really put a lot of effort into our Alux app. The content on there will help you to become more self-aware, to build up healthy relationships, and achieve your goals and success. If you haven't already downloaded it, it's like a high-performance mentor right in your pocket, and you are missing out. Go to alux.com/app to start your journey today.

All right, now the final ingredient for your success formula is a good reason to do it and belief in yourself. You see, when you truly believe that you can make it, you unlock the closest thing to mind time travel. Imagine you're already living the best life you ever imagined. It took years to build it, but you made it; you're living it, everything is great.

Now, imagine you travel back in time for five or ten years, and you forgot exactly how you did it, but you know that you did. This is the present day. You know you'll make it; you saw it all happening. You just need to act. This mind exercise puts things into perspective, doesn't it? It gives you confidence and belief in yourself. If you don't actually believe this idyllic life is achievable, you're only going to half-ass it. You'll hide behind the idea of, "Well, I tried," and call it a day.

So, recap your Alux. Your own success formula looks like this: one, you need to figure out a workflow that puts you in the most optimal position to do great work. Secondly, leverage the things you're willing to do that others aren't, because it's going to increase your value. Third, find out what you're good at and get better at it. Fourth, keep your life requirements in check, or you'll burn out. And lastly, you gotta find a damn good reason to do it.

We promise you that if you get all of these five things right, your chances of finding your own success will multiply. We hope you found some value in this video. Aluxers, write "Honest Talks" in the comments if you'd like us to keep doing this every Saturday so we know what you guys are interested in. Also, let us know what we should talk about next.

Thanks for watching, Alexa! We'll see you back here tomorrow for the Sunday motivational video. Thank you.