I watched the IPL 2021 Finals last evening and it was a one-sided affair from the word go. Chennai Super Kings were in full control with the opening batsmen doing their job in a fantastic fashion. It was amazing to see that 50% + runs scored by CSK this season was contributed by the opening pair of Faf Du Plessis & Rituraj Gaikwad. That is a stunning feat.
But the moment that caught my attention was the post Match interviews. Moeen Ali displayed his hard-hitting style in the finals and was asked to share his experience with the CSK franchise. And he stated, “I could have been dropped a couple of games ago but when you get the backing as a player, then you want to give back to the team as much as you can.”
Isn’t this the source of excellence that players exhibit in their chosen sports? Isn’t the support system provided by coaches and mentors the backbone to one’s skill and talent to shine through? Every ‘Invest Like The Best’ podcast ends with Patrick O’Shaughnessy asking his guests ‘What’s the kindest thing that someone did for you?’. And time and again the answer is ‘that person believed in me or encouraged me or supported me or gave me a chance or took a bet on me’. Every guest admits that their life wouldn’t have been this fairy tale ride if not for Mr. X. This part is my favorite one from every podcast of Patrick.
In the bestselling book ‘Richer, Wiser, Happier’, the author William Greene shares something special about Mr. John Bogle, the founder of Vanguard Group, a 7 trillion dollars + Asset Management Company.
When I interviewed Bogle over the phone two decades ago, he spoke emotionally about what he’d learned from his mentor, Walter Morgan, a fund pioneer who embodied the old-fashioned values that Bogle championed, such as “discipline, honor, duty, [and] integrity.” The phone went silent, and I wondered if we’d been disconnected. I eventually realized that Bogle was too choked up to speak. Finally, he said, “Excuse me. It’s putting tears in my eyes. . . . I guess I loved him, and he did so much for me.”
Having a mentor or a coach is a blessing indeed. It could tip the scales in your favor. It could give wings to your flight. It could accelerate your growth and success. It could make you see the world in a very different context, allowing you to access profitable and high-impact insights. It’s exactly as they sayings goes “Seeing the world by standing on the shoulders of Giants.”
Moeen Ali had giants like MS Dhoni (CSK Captain) and Stephen Fleming (CSK Coach) on whose shoulders he could stand on. He had the backing and the support of the right people, and that was reciprocated with a smashing 37 runs of 20 balls in the Finals.
But what if you don’t have any mentors? What if you were not lucky to bump into one or get someone to believe in you? What if your environment doesn’t create a feedback loop for you to hone your skills or sharpen your game?
You could take it as bad luck and feel miserable about it. Or you go out in search of people you could learn from and get on a mission to absorb the lessons they could teach. These could be people alive and excelling at their trade. Or these could be eminent personalities that have passed away but left an indelible mark on fields of your interest.
These are the only 2 options. Wait and hope for some magician to stir up the dormant potential within you and give you a purpose to commit your energies to. Or you search for a teacher that guides your energies in the right direction. There ain’t a 3rd option. It’s wait or walk, simple.
As for me, I didn’t have the background of great mentors that held my hand and taught me to walk and excel in my field. I was a fish out of water in the corporate world and kept moving around companies in search of success and stability. Maybe, my constant moves between companies and countries also had to do with the lack of a mentor showing up in my organization. I come from a lower-middle-class background and hence jumped at every opportunity that dangled more dollars in front of me.
But I was constantly on the lookout for people whose achievements were inspiring and whose value system was worth emulating. Most of them were based in the west and few of them had passed away decades or centuries ago. That wasn’t a constraint since their teachings were available for me to submerge myself in.
This newsletter, my podcasts, my financial assets, my relationships, my career, my health, and the quality of my life is a function of these mentors that I found. They did not actively mentor me, but they had provided me with enough tools and experiences to draw my lessons from and execute from there.
Today, I will share with you about these personalities, who have laid a path for me to walk on. They have done what I aspire to do and are waiting for me to get to the other side. They cheer for me and encourage me to keep moving on. Every message of theirs i.e. text, audio, or video - is a call to action in some shape or form. Their presence in my life has been the compass I needed and my goals are the fuel that makes me move in the desired direction.
Jackie Chan (the one with his hands on my shoulders) has been my hero since childhood. I still remember watching Half a Loaf of Kung Fu or Armor of God or Fearless Hyena and being inspired by him. He went through 10 years of grueling martial arts practice for nothing much in return. He was willing to be the punching bag for Bruce Lee and could take more hits than the others. He was willing to do stunts that others didn’t wanna dare. His stunt of falling down the roofs almost broke his neck. It’s a trademark feature of Jackie Chan movies to end with the bloopers on the film sets. You cannot walk away without a smile.
My Lessons -
Get tough and be willing to take the hits.
If you work harder than others, serendipity will find its way to you.
Live, Love & Laugh (I even got it tattooed on my arm)
Elon Musk (bottom right) is considered a genius and a path breaker. He has redefined multiple industries and keeps surprising us with his knack to disrupt set beliefs and business structures. His story by Ashlee Vance is a must-read and I so look forward to Walter Isaacson’s book on him. But what inspires me the most is his belief in his ideas and his single-minded focus on making them happen. In one of the podcasts, Ken Griffin mentioned that a few of the friends caught up for dinner, and Elon was immersed in a Rocket Engineering book while everyone else was busy doing general chat. That’s when they realized Elon is dead serious about building rockets for his mission to Mars. He bet all his fortune on TESLA & SPACEX and almost risked bankruptcy. He would have sold his house too to make this dream come true. Fortunately, he hustled and managed to barely stay afloat while these bets worked out.
My Lessons -
Commit to a Vision
Follow on Course until Successful
Become a Learning Machine
Patrick Bet David (white hoodie) is the Founder of PHP Agency, Valuetainment & Vault Academy. He also is a very successful social media influencer, podcaster, and keynote speaker. He has turned his Selling ability into a multi-billion dollar Insurance and Media empire and is committed to turning many people into entrepreneurs or at least to think like entrepreneurs. His ability to rally people behind a mission is legendary and his ideas about Priorities and Execution are worth learning about. I have consumed his content for years and his messages have stuck with me.
My Lessons -
Think like an Entrepreneur. If at a job, then create a personal brand at your organization. Become the Go-To person for the subject that you're passionate about. Be the Best at what you love to do. Don’t half-ass things.
Multiply leverage in every possible way (capital, time, people & processes). Increase your output in relation to the input.
Focus on what matters and ignore the noise. Be brutal with saying NO to the inessentials.
Gary Vaynerchuk started working in his father’s wine distribution business in his early teens and would record videos on YT about wines. He went on for months on without much traction on his videos, but the trickle turned into a storm over time. Today his is the owner of Vayner Empire, a social media influencer, an author, podcaster, speaker, and a torchbearer for the creator community worldwide.
I heard him speaking about NFTs/Baseball cards 3 years back and today these have become billion-dollar industries. His insights into digital businesses have been spot on. He has millions of fans globally and he is the one who inspired me to use Twitter, IG, FB, Slack, and many other communication tools. His books Crushing It & Jab, Jab, Jab, Right Hook are my favorites.
My Lessons -
No one cares about what struggles you are up to and No one’s coming to rescue you. Just take charge and move with velocity.
Ship your product, daily.
Express, Comment, Create, Publish, Engage, Connect.
Always Always Always add more value than what people expect or pay you for.
Dave Asprey (in black on the extreme left) is the Founder of Bulletproof brand of products, host of the leading Health & Wellness podcast, and very influential on Social Media. He turned himself from a burnt-out and overweight Silicon Valley geek to a highly energetic and youthful personality. His research into nutritional science has been expansive and he has made a huge difference to millions of people like me. If not for him, I might still be suffering from hyperthyroid and gorging iodine tablets for the rest of my life. His Bulletproof Coffee & Brain Octane Oil are my favorite products. His book Bulletproof Diet is my go-to recommendation to anyone suffering from an ailment or a deficiency.
My Lessons -
Fat is good.
There are foods for muscles, foods for the brain, and foods for vitality. It’s important to distinguish what’s food and what’s not.
A life of vitality and energy is a responsibility if one cares for one’s family and making dreams come true.
Tim Ferriss has been described as the one-man army by Forbes. The Tim Ferriss Show is one of the most popular podcasts in the world with more than 700 million downloads. It has been selected for "Best of Apple Podcasts" three times. His books have been international bestsellers and my favorite is ‘Tools of Titans’. If you get a gift from me on your birthday, it’s very likely to be this book. Tim Ferriss is an experimenter with very high standards of operating performance. My Twitter profile reads as ‘Experimenter’, inspired by Tim Ferriss.
My Lessons -
Every domain has its Minimum Effective Dose (What is the minimum that gets the maximum leverage). Focus on figuring that out.
Being radically open to feedback works like magic in relationships and performance.
Journalling everything - thoughts, ideas, execution, analysis, habits, routines.
Tracking the progress like a hawk. What gets measured, gets managed.
Steve Jobs (on my right) needs no introduction. But what people could learn from his life is his contextual understanding of everything. I still remember when I unboxed my iMac, it was the most elegant experience with a product. The material used, the richness of the red color on the box, the crafty way to enclose the device, and the ease with which it got set up and functional. The whole experience is an expression of Steve Jobs's insistence on purity and elegance in everything Apple did.
My Lessons -
Set higher standards in quality and execution.
Don’t cut corners even if no one is seeing.
People don’t really know what they want. So build quality and they will come.
Richard Branson (top right) is one the richest man in the UK and enough has been written about him. But his instincts are legendary. When the german designer (Lindstrand) planned the hot air balloon ride in 1991 and was discussing the technical details with RB, RB couldn’t get much of what he was saying and hence stopped the technical bit and asked the engineer “Do you have kids?”. The engineer said yes, to which RB replied “Then you will do everything to get us both back. Let’s fly”. These 2 successfully crossed the Pacific Ocean and set a distance record of 6,700 miles. That’s the story of this remarkable human being that repeats again and again through his journey.
My Lessons -
Experiment in life.
Multiply the PLAY factor in every endeavor of mine. Everything is a Game.
Trust People and they will do wonders.
Warren Buffet (the one in the red tie) is one man I have written the most about. There is a whole substack on my lessons from him. But I will always be grateful for the teachings he has imparted through his articles, annual Berkshire meetings, videos, and books written on him. I aspire to emulate his clarity of thought and his ability to focus on the most important thing and ignoring everything else. This ability is rare and no wonder he is considered as the G.O.A.T.
Mahatma Gandhi is also there and so is Seneca. Former taught me the value of patience and the latter taught me to focus on things in my control and to embrace everything else that is not. The virtues I aspire to live my life by have mainly come from these two. They serve as role models for thinking long term and having a great work ethic.
The green table with the dice signifies the uncertainties, unknowns, and unknowables in life. It’s these three that add to the risk component in one’s journey. And the only thing one can do is play his turn and move. Sometimes the throw of dice is in your favor and sometimes it’s not. But one got to move. No other industry except for Investing is fraught with these elements. Hence, Investing is considered more art than science. There cannot be precise models or forecasts that one can bet on. There is always incomplete information and a hazy view of the future. How you navigate decides the compounding of wealth or its destruction.
But if one has role models to derive values and mental frameworks from, then the journey becomes relatively easier. Since these role models do not spend time with me, I chose to spend time with them. Their pic in my hall serves as a reminder to shape up, daily. Get better, daily. Work hard, daily. Create more than consume. Give more than expect.
Turning my savings into a multi-million dollar generating machine is going to take a lot of skill, luck, time, energy, and other resources. I am a work in progress and committed to getting my compounding machine up and running. This picture helps me in my endeavor. I may not have had mentors by my side, but I always will have mentors on my side.
“There is no more important aspect of our education as investors, business people, and human beings than to find these exceptional role models who can guide us on our own journey. Books are a priceless source of wisdom. But people are the ultimate teachers, and there may be lessons that we can only learn from observing them or being in their presence. In many cases, these lessons are never communicated verbally. Yet you feel the guiding spirit of that person when you’re with them.” - Gautam Baid