15 lessons, and the pain that taught them
What I've learned building across China, the UAE and the world
I’ve been building an online study abroad platform between China, UAE and working with universities around the world.
The industry is going through a period of accelerated change - AI is impacting students and universities and multiple ways.
Here are some of the lessons I’ve learnt and the pain that has reminded me of them.
Everything in your life is there to help you grow. Challenges are presented to you for you to overcome. Embrace those challenges. Its easy to fall into negative thinking or think in suboptimal ways without realising it, which can be very destructive because you don’t know what you are missing out on.
Mindset is everything. Visualise big goals and think positive and be optimistic and grateful. It changes the world and your experience with it. You can just try it and see how it changes your world. These are some lessons I’ve always known but sometimes forgotten when I’m busy or focused on something else.
Be More Uncomfortable - Do things that make you uncomfortable and push through it like running, or cold showers, or saying hello, and post what you think. I think sometimes we can just get stuck, or we naturally tend towards being comfortable which is why we need to constantly expand our comfort zones. When you do those things, you look back and see how it wasn’t that hard - what was I thinking before? and you’ve also grown.
Don’t Forget to Create and Expand - Create content, meet people - sometimes it feels like its not high value or there is something more important that you should be working on - helping a customer, or sending something, but creating and expanding your network compounds and brings advantages and opportunities that you never know about.
Set Big Goals that are yours - Listen to what interests you and you feel a pull towards, that you can do when you’re tired (writing, building, and a lot of things does that for me) - there’s some greater intelligence in there, and it gives you something others don’t have - rather than what you’ve been doing and think you should be doing.
I’m motivated to create something incredible. I can invest and I’m good at it, but it can’t take my creative builder energy.
Sleep is key to grow and perform at best. I’m reminded of that daily if I stay awake late and push through the day, Vs when I rest well and power through it with a completely different mindset. It’s worth the investment.
Exercise is so important - it helps with energy and positivity and thinking bigger, helps strengthen the mind, and sleep. It’s necessary to exercise everyday and it provides such a great return.
This stuff is not rocket science. None of these things are that hard if you do it enough times and just keep improving each time. Same with building a product - everything is just about trying, learning, applying the lessons, improving, knowing what to focus on, and doing what works repeatedly. I’m reminded of this lesson when I speak, meet or hear people who have done incredible things, which is why getting around these kind of people can be so empowering.
What you choose to work on is far more important than how hard you work. Don’t work hard in the wrong direction, and many directions are a waste especially now we have leverage - AI and content. I’ve learnt this when I’ve worked really hard, on something, and then found out there was an easier way. This is often hard to know without hindsight which is why being around talented people is so valuable.
Do less, but really well, is much better - because doing something at the highest level, if done well, is far more than enough. I’ve learnt this by working on many different things, and then learning which ways work the best and focusing on them. Simple is better just because it enables you to do more of the thing.
Attention is more important than effort, because if you focus on the right point, you can use leverage, you can unlock the bottleneck, you can find an easier solution.
Working with talented people is so important. If you hire someone and continually need to manage them then it’s a waste and the cost increases as you scale. The best management is no management - when people say they did it all themselves. It’s better to do it well yourself first then hand it over and build the right systems, find someone incredibly talented in the right position.
Have courage - don’t be afraid to fail, to take risks, to go for it. It’s why doing less is better, it’s why thinking more positively and exercising is important.
Listen to yourself, you often have greater information and wisdom, (while still listening to others too). I’ve learnt this through experience.
Your life can really change in a few months of the right actions.
I’m currently applying the above lessons and setting a 90-day goal with a singular target of reaching out to new 20+ new partners each day.