Yuri Kruman, CEO and founder of Master The Talk shares with us on some of the lessons that one should definitely learn when in their 20s.
1. Nobody owes you a damned thing in life.
The sooner you get this, the sooner you can take responsibility for improving your life.
2. You are solely responsible for yourself, your actions, speech and thoughts.
Not your parents, not your friends, not your spouse or children. YOU.
3. Hell is other people
If you hang around people that are always negative, don’t want the best for you and otherwise hold you back from achieving your potential. Get rid of those people ASAP.
4. Sausage in, sausage out.
Be super careful about what food you put in your mouth, what music you listen to, what books you read, what movies you watch, etc. If you consume bad food or garbage content regularly, you will become garbage yourself.
5. You are not a special butterfly.
Every single person puts their pants on, one leg at a time, yourself included. Every person struggles from time to time. Every person wants to cry out.
6. There are no magic life hacks to become successful overnight.
You have to hustle constantly, sell yourself to everyone you meet, tell a good story and always know how to get your point across to every audience you encounter.
7. There is always someone smarter, more motivated, harder-working, prettier, richer, more precocious than you.
The worst thing you can do is to compare yourself to other people. Compare yourself instead to your own potential and you’ll be on the right road.
8. You will not know nearly the full extent of your potential until you are challenged to your core, repeatedly, and live up to your promise, time and time again.
Resilience is key, along with imagination, creativity and a glass always half full (even when it looks empty). Seek out the challenges first before they seek you out to drag you through hell.
9. Good intentions lead to one place and one place only, when unaccompanied by actions.
Be a man or woman of your word and you will gain instant value in the eyes of others.
10. Mastering a skill, job or career takes a lot longer than just becoming conversant, but often a lot sooner than 10,000 hours.
It takes patience, dedication, the motivation to always be the best, especially when you’re surrounded by other brilliant, motivated people that have been doing what you want to be doing for years.
11. People in business will help you (almost always) only after you help them first.
Don’t ask for something from a person before offering him or her some concrete value first.
12. It certainly helps to be good-looking and well-connected.
But if you’re neither, being well-spoken, motivated and passionate might just take you further in life than looks and connections.
13. Life is inherently unfair
(see #7 above). Your job is to find and exploit your own unfair advantage in this world better and faster than the others. Don’t bitch and moan. Be resilient and focus on the results above all. You’ll be surprised how far you’ll get.
14. You need more work as a human being than you can imagine - and are a better person than others would have you think.
Marriage will quickly set you straight about any delusions on this subject.
15. Your parents did a great job raising you - and still messed you up completely.
Everyone’s broken to some degree. A good therapist can help you put the pieces back in the right order.
16. The things you learned in school aren’t worth sh*t without life skills to go alongside.
It’s true what they say - universities don’t teach critical life skills like financial planning and management, negotiation, how to read and interpret a contract, how to read another person, etc. Without these, all the fancy degrees in the world are for naught - especially in business.
17. Oftentimes, the harshest events in life (breaking up, getting fired, going broke) can be the best stimuli for you to finally get your life in order.
Don’t let things get to that point before acting! But if you do, focus on solutions, not on the past.
18. Attention span is at its shortest in human history. GET TO THE POINT!
The one thing busy people can’t stand most is RAMBLING. Make your point and move on (and let me move on, too).
19. You are lucky to have even one true friend in (real, not virtual) life.
Don’t blow it! Cultivate your friendship regularly and buy your friend a gift, once in a while.
20. All the material goods in the world will never make you feel rich and satisfied.
Only EXPERIENCES can do that, including breaking up, getting fired, going broke, traveling abroad, making new friends, learning new languages, getting out of your comfort zones, taking internships in different industries, starting a business, changing careers, and so on.
21. The key to getting through the harsh lessons of one’s 20s is to…
REMEMBER, THERE IS ALWAYS A SOLUTION TO EVERY PROBLEM.
Yuri Kruman has worked with and consulted for seemingly every sector of the professional world, from VC-backed tech startups to multinational banks, pharmaceutical companies, law and academia - experience he now brings to help individual set clear goals towar career advancement.
