Since the early age of something like thirteen years old, I participated in many commercial and not commercial projects, but money itself was never a priority for me. I did not feel it was important.
I remember being a 21-years-old visiting student and walking at around 5 am with my supervisor on Main Street in Cambridge, MA, after a productive night of research, and saying something like “I think the scholarship (around 2 thousand dollars which were quite generous to cover a good room, food and other important student expenses) is totally enough and I don’t understand why I might need more money than that”.
I had never thought that money is significant and that it should be a goal to make more money.
I did 2 start-ups in my life, but again I did them just because I felt it is something interesting and useful but not because I desperately needed money.
I studied for 7 years for my Bachelor’s and Master’s very hard, and again I neither felt that I was doing it for money nor I had the strong desire to get money.
It changed about four years ago. Maybe it was because I grew up and become an “adult”. Maybe it was because of the understanding that I need to care about myself and the people I love. Maybe, it was the understanding that money is a valuable resource. I think it was the combination of all three. But in any case, I got a powerful desire to get more money.
I have been curious about how I could get £80k, £100k, £150k, £200k and more of income per year. I am curious how I can get £10k millions of capital to feel more secure and to invest this capital into the projects I care about (both commercially and non-commercially). I know of people who have achieved it, and it is possible indeed.
There are the Points of Attention aka Tools to Achieve The Goal:
- Focus.
- Meditation and awareness of the world.
- Network and people.
- Knowledge and skills. Support and mentorship.
- Smart and hard work.
- God and Goodness. Honour and respect.
- Love yourself. Care about yourself (good health, proper rest, good states of mind).
The Focus is the most important. It allows you always to remember what your goals are. It glues everything else together, including all other tools. The ultimate Focus is to be aware at every moment who you are, what you need, what you are doing and how you are doing this.
The Meditation, along with the Focus, allows you to be mindful about yourself and the world. It allows you to be aware of what is happening right now, why it is happening, what were the causes of it and what the possible scenarios of the future are, and how you can navigate in them and choose what you need. The Meditation is the peaceful and focused state. There are definitely different approaches and interpretations of the Meditation. However, for me, the ultimate goal is to be meditating 24 hours, all the time. It is bliss to be always mindful. I also see the meditation as something that should be by default very simple and easily achievable, although it is hard indeed to always remember to be mindful and aware. The Focus helps though.
It is impossible to do anything without others, hence People do help. The more people you know, generally the more opportunities you have. The Network of People you know is an essential resource. Alone you can do X, together with 100 good people you can do 100X or even more thanks to synergy.
Knowledge and Skills, Support and Mentorship are apparent components. The more knowledge and skills you have, the more you can do, assuming the substantial amount of those are practical skills. The most efficient way to acquire those is through support and mentorship from other peoples who already have them. Then, you can pass the knowledge.
Your work should be hard, but most importantly smart. You can make 2x income if you work twice the time (e.g. you can earn £60k if your regular salary is £30k). However, it is not sustainable at all long-term. The health, brain and other resources are easily tearing and wearing. The smarter you work, the more you can achieve.
God and Goodness are crucial. They probably deserve the first place; however, they are useless if you lose the focus (and hence forget how essential Goodness is). It is also hard to appreciate these concepts without the society (thus the People). No matter how much money you make or intend to make, if your business is not fair, it won’t be worth it, I believe. It is okay to make really a lot of money, but it should be in line with doing good and right things and keeping the honour.
Finally, the Love to yourself helps you to keep your mind, body and soul in the right state, without overworking or any getting any craziness. I believe the love to others starts after the love to yourself and after you begin caring towards yourself.
The Source of Success Is Transformation
While the happiness starts from the acceptance of now, the road to success begins with transformation.
There are so many opportunities for everybody on this planet. So many things we can do, each of us. It is just a question of how to get the skills, experience, and how to start using them. How to stay focus. How to transform yourself and help others to change themselves if they wish.
There are so many things we can work on together to get a better life for all of us. These include the applications of technology, meditation and mindfulness, art, space exploration, medical applications, food and shelter provisions, safe environments, education opportunities for everyone. All of this is achievable if we cooperate and work together.
One way to summarise what I mean to myself and remind myself constantly, in line with the above, is as follows (I call it a “personal manifesto” sometimes):
“I, Yura, take responsibility for my life. I focus on important things, such as being mindful, loving myself and caring towards myself and others reasonably, being a good professional and improving my skills. I am a responsible citizen, and I care about the environment, fairness in society and humankind development and sustainability. The evolutionary growth is definitely better than any revolution; the peace is better than a war no doubt, and development is better than stagnation. I appreciate the myriads of opportunities which exist, and I use them. I study and improve my knowledge and skills in order to apply the technology and create and use art for the sake of humanity. I appreciate it is important to think and be mindful and wise and do good things. I am in control of my life.”
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