Why Most People Will Remain in Mediocrity

Most people will never become truly successful.

“It’s lonely at the top. 99% of people are convinced they are incapable of achieving great things, so they aim for mediocre. The level of competition is thus fiercest for ‘realistic’ goals, paradoxically making them the most competitive.” -Tim Ferriss

Most people will never be truly successful.

The pull towards mediocrity is too strong. As David Schwartz once penned, “All around you is an environment that is trying to pull you down to Second-Class Street.”

Most people will never escape the pull.

Much of the thinking around us is small-minded. Most people are overly concerned with “beating the other guy,” usually through manipulation and politics. As a result, they’re left fighting for scraps with the other 99%.

It doesn’t have to be this way.

A life of your deepest dreams — 100% financial independence, being your own boss, traveling the world with your family, whatever — is available, if you know where to start.

But most people will never turn away from the safety and security of the crowd to realize this.

“All of us, more than we recognize, are products of the thinking around us. And much of this thinking is small.” -David Schwartz

Most People Are Not Willing to Fail

“We can be truly successful only at things we are willing to fail at.” -Mark Manson

Most people hate failure. They run from it.

In their eyes, if they suck at something, it means they suck. Since their self-worth is tied directly to their performance, any failure is proof they aren’t good enough.

But this is exactly why they’ll stay in mediocrity. If they aren’t willing to fail, they aren’t able to learn from their mistakes. If they never learn, they’ll never grow and develop into something more.

“Would you like me to give you a formula for success? It’s quite simple, really: Double your rate of failure. You are thinking of failure as the enemy of success. But it isn’t at all. You can be discouraged by failure or you can learn from it, so go ahead and make mistakes. Make all you can. Because remember that’s where you will find success.” -Thomas J. Watson

If you’re not willing to fail, you guarantee you’ll stay average-at-best.

If you want to grow into an extraordinary version of yourself, you must be willing to fail — a lot.

Failure brings humility. It develops your character. It helps you laugh at your mistakes and not take things so seriously. Like a plant placed from the shade into sunlight, your growth rate will accelerate 10x.

When I first started blogging, I was terrified of one thing in particular — negative feedback. I still remember to this day a comment from an early article that read, “This is the worst article I’ve ever read.” I was broken up about it for months.

After that, I made all my articles as vanilla and non-controversial as possible. Before I hit “publish,” I would ask myself: “No one could criticize this, right??”

I was terrified of failure and rejection. As a result, my writing stayed mediocre and average for years until I finally started to embrace the possibility of failure.

Benjamin Hardy put it this way: “Don’t seek praise, seek criticism.”

If you embrace the possibility of failure, you open yourself up to enormous success you’ve never seen before.