I think, we all have something in common.

We all want to be successful, we all want to be the best, most renown and most validated human we can be, right? Who doesn't?

In the last months however, when searching for cofounders, partners, like-minded people, I have come to a shocking realization; most people think their over-averagely good and most people have various different interpretation when it comes to work, dedication and passion.

You will find people doing 30 % of their capabilities, and saying they are “obsessed to start their own venture”. People will spend years not living up to their potential and still call themselves talented, hardworking and passionate.

The trap is serious, and I warn the reader to make sure, to never fall into it. The severity does not lie in the view that you're the best (we are humans we think that all the time). The severity lies in limiting yourself because you think your work is good, even great enough. Once accepting that, the mindset of these people becomes a fundament of their view. They never become overachievers, simply because they never reach for that.

I asked in a post once for the most obsessed and passionate people, the replies I got where sobering. People with the most underaverage passion and drive wrote me. I was shocked. I had asked for the most obsessed people with drive for success, what I got where people who had absolutely 0 % passion for their work, their field, or their essence. I had people write me their obsession with startups, their academic success, and their persuade of a master’s degree, just for me to find out, that the person has almost zero coding projects build, and achieved nothing career or building wise. I would and will always prefer a bachelor student with 100 nerdy, quirky, and awkward coding projects, over a master student with zero. Same as I will always prefer a student who dropped out of university with great obsession for code, over a bachelor student who hasn't coded any projects or build anything interesting.

Your degree or your papers mean nothing to me, your action matter to me the most. If you display yourself as an academic or generally a domain expert in your field, you should be shining with hobby projects or side projects in that field. Why? Because if you love your field or work so much, you would naturally be interested and obsessed with it. You would work on projects or on concepts about your work even in your free time, when you're not even getting paid for it.

Richard Feynman discovered a physical concept, he would later receive the Nobel Prize for, while having lunch in the cafeteria. He had noticed an odd motion, by a kid, spinning a plate.

Now the million-dollar questions: how come, that when I had asked for the most talented and obsessed people, the replies were so poor? And also, what can you do, to never fall into the trap, of becoming simply bad in your field without realizing?

Failure to evaluate your own work

Well first of all the most important but also the saddest fact is that the people just never realized, that their work was average. They had simply never judged their own work from a neutral perspective or from the perspective of a perfectionist. That's why they assumed, that they were so good. That creates a cycle of entrapment. You think you're the best --> you think you're giving 100 % --> you never improve to become better.

Lack of passion and interest

Secondly and you wouldn't believe this when I would tell you this, but there are lots of people who might have master degrees in their field but simply have totally 0 % passion for there work. They will call themselves passionate, dedicated, talented, but will never realize that this is what they lack the most. If you don't love your work so much that you are working on it, even in your free time, you are not passionate about it, nor do you like it.

Not reaching for the stars

Lastly, people never push their limits. They simply enjoy comfort in their current environment (your comfort zone), the zone where effort in any way does not trigger the feeling of inconvenience.

That's why to save you from this trap, please be honest with you and if you do something, go “All in” on it or go home.

But please for the love of god, don't tell me how obsessed you are about it (reminder: obsession is a strong word, it's like an addiction), when you don't even spend time with it, in your free time. If you don't spend your free time doing what you allegedly love and your obsessed about, how do you expect me to be convinced by those empty words? You can't even convince yourself.

If you work on something, go “all in”, or just don't bother with it and go home.