00:00Imagine that you are lying right there on your deathbed, and standing all around you in the
00:05shadows are ghosts. These aren't the spirits of your ancestors. They are the ghosts of your own
00:11unfulfilled potential, the ideas you never acted on, and the talents you never had the courage to
00:18use. They look down at you, angry and upset, and they say, we came to you so you could bring
00:25us to
00:25life, and now we have to go to the grave together. So ask yourself, how many ghosts will be around
00:33your bed when your time comes? Taking your best unlived potential into the ground with you
00:39represents a final irreversible loss of what could have been. Whenever picking a major or applying for
00:46a job, you inevitably hear the exact same advice. Make sure you have something to fall back on.
00:52Constructing a safety net functions as a psychological preparation for defeat.
00:57It requires you to calculate your own failure before you even start trying. Nelson Mandela noted
01:03that there is no passion to be found playing small or settling for a life that is less than the
01:08one
01:09you are capable of living. Falling forward allows you to clearly see the ground, identify the impact,
01:15and use that momentum for your next move. Taking real risks carries a harsh mathematical certainty,
01:22at some point, you will embarrass yourself. You will lose, and you will suck at something.
01:27Take Reggie Jackson. He holds the Major League Baseball record for the most strike-ups in the
01:32history of the sport. 2,600 times he swung and missed. But the strikeouts are forgotten.
01:39People remember the home runs. Or look at Thomas Edison, standing in his laboratory. He conducted 1,000
01:45failed experiments before he finally got a single light bulb to turn on. Edison processed those
01:511,000 failed experiments as the necessary functional steps toward his goal.
01:56Consider a young college student who began his time at Fordham University as a pre-med major. He
02:02couldn't read the material, he couldn't pass the tests, and he eventually washed out with a 1.8 GPA.
02:09The university politely suggested he take some time off. Washing out academically forced him off a
02:15linear path and pushed him into unknown territory. There's an old IQ test that explains why this kind
02:21of disruption is so useful. You're given nine dots and instructed to draw five straight lines,
02:27connecting all of them without lifting your hand. If you try to stay within the boundaries,
02:32the puzzle is impossible. You solve it by drawing lines outside the box. These setbacks provide the
02:38specific friction required to push past the standard grid and find a true direction. Early in his acting
02:44career, that same college dropout auditioned for a Broadway musical at the Court Theatre. He felt it
02:50was the perfect role. Except for the simple fact that he couldn't sing. He failed. He walked out of that
02:57theatre and immediately started preparing for the next audition. And then the next. There's an old rule.
03:03If you hang around the barber shop long enough, sooner or later, you're going to get a haircut.
03:08Catching a break is the delayed result of refusing to quit after continuous public failures. From deep
03:14poverty in South Africa to the struggling neighborhoods right next door, the world requires the specific
03:20talents you have. Whether you're a business major, a nurse, or a sociologist, people need your help. On March 27,
03:281975, that failing 20-year-old college dropout was helping his mother in her beauty shop up in Mount
03:34Vernon. He was at his lowest point. An older woman in the shop kept catching his eye in the mirror.
03:40Finally, she gave him a spiritual prophecy. She told him he was going to travel the world and speak to
03:46millions of people. That failing 20-year-old was Denzel Washington. He fulfilled that prophecy by
03:54communitating to millions through his movies, an audience he couldn't see, who could only see him.
04:00Your life will never follow a straight line, except that the path is erratic. Give the world
04:06everything you have, and when you fall, fall.
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