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  • Do you believe that hard work is what it takes to be successful?

  • I know this sounds bad, but I think it's one of the most bullishit

  • ideas that's emerging in the culturescape today. Hard work has very, very,

  • very little to do with success. But do this, if you just open up Instagram

  • and follow most entrepreneurial channels on Instagram there's this bullshit

  • simplistic motivational pictures that you see consistently about working

  • 100-hour weeks, about working harder than the competition. I mean,

  • check this one out. This one is apparently a quote from Elon Musk that says,

  • "Work like hell. I mean, you just have to put in 80 to 100 hours

  • every week. This improves the odds of success." The problem is it doesn't.

  • You see, science shows that after around 50 hours of productive time,

  • your productivity goes down. But what happens is,

  • if you continue pushing yourself, often due to lack of sleep,

  • due to lack of taking care of your health, you have failed relationships.

  • You have failed social connections. You have sleep deprivation which is

  • reducing your cognitive abilities, which means your performance

  • starts depreciating. You start aging more. And so, this whole idea of hard work as a

  • means to success is one of the most dumb ideas that entrepreneurs are putting out.

  • I used to believe it and it ruined me and it slowed down my growth.

  • Now, there's an alternate idea, and if you've read Michael Singer's book,

  • "The Surrender Experiment" he's at the whole other end of that spectrum.

  • In "The Surrender Experiment" Michael Singer, he, by the way,

  • is the guy who also wrote "The Untethered Soul" which is a

  • New York Times bestseller, but I prefer his book

  • "The Surrender Experiment." He built a billion-dollar company

  • through what he calls "The Art of Surrender," regular meditation,

  • getting into flow. So, what is going on here?

  • How do you have these two opposing thoughts from people who are building

  • massive businesses, who are massively productive, and one is about hard work and

  • one is about surrender. Now, I was thinking about this a lot for the

  • last five years because this matters to me. As an entrepreneur,

  • I want to be able to get a lot done but I don't want to break myself doing it.

  • And what I realized, and I shared some of this in my book,

  • "The Code of the Extraordinary Mind" is that it's not binary.

  • It's not about hard work nor is it about surrender. It's not binary rather there is

  • a layering to it. In my theory, I suggest that there are four different

  • levels of consciousness and if you're at the first level of consciousness,

  • you need hard work. But very rapidly you can move to the next level

  • of consciousness and at the secondary level of consciousness you start learning

  • particular tools that allow you to do more with less work. Now, you want to move up.

  • Now, there's a third level of consciousness which a lot of people don't

  • even know exists. At that third level of consciousness, your goals no longer even

  • become important. At that third level of consciousness, you're tapped

  • into something else. And there's a fourth level

  • of consciousness which is where some of the most remarkable people in the world

  • I've seen play at and they just seem blessed by luck and they are not breaking

  • themselves with hard work. So. in short, this binary idea, hard work

  • versus surrender is not really binary. You can flip it around.

  • And what you need to do depends on what of the four levels of consciousness you're

  • currently operating on. So, if you find this idea fascinating,

  • if you've wondered about this, this hard work idea as I have,

  • check out this master class I'm doing. It's about an hour and 10 minutes that I

  • go deep into these theories and I share with you the four levels of consciousness

  • and the protocols and the tools that I've been bringing in in these four levels

  • to maximize my impact in the world and I think you might find this

  • really interesting. So, as you guys know, I'm an ardent consciousness hacker

  • from teaching meditation for five years to launching meditation apps to putting

  • myself through a lot of different systems for playing with my consciousness.

  • I've tried to figure out how to access altered states to maximize productivity.

  • And really, this whole thing about hard work guys is rubbish.

  • It is absolute rubbish. It's a bullshit idea that needs to be

  • swept into the dustbin of history because it only applies to people who are

  • operating at the most basic level of state awareness. So, anyway,

  • check out this master class if you find this idea interesting.

  • I'd love to know your thoughts and I'd love to see what you think.

Do you believe that hard work is what it takes to be successful?

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