Lack of Direction is the Problem Not Lack of Time or Funds

“Lack of direction, not lack of time, is the problem. We all have twenty-four hour days”. Quote from Zig Ziglar. Hilary Hinton "Zig" Ziglar (November 6, 1926 – November 28, 2012) was an American author, motivational speaker and salesperson. He popularised the beforementioned quote. However I would also add not lack of Funds to the quote.

My version or enhancement to the quote would be ”Lack of Direction is the Problem Not Lack of Time or Funds”. This is because many traditional lenders or source of funding are increasingly being overshadowed by newer sources of funding like angel investors, venture capital, crowdfunding and so on.

Facebook Does Not Lack Time

Mark Zuckerberg of Facebook fame was only 20 years old when he created Facebook. He was still attending college but was a fully fledged computer programmer taking in contract programming jobs. He was doing college and working in a high tech field and this two activities are already a good path to a promising future.

However with his creation of Facebook his direction in life changed. He saw its potential and with it dedicated his future to making Facebook a success. He left college and by 2012 Facebook reached a billion users. He also became the youngest billionaire. As can be seen time has never been his problem and to a lesser extent funding is also not a problem for him.

You can argue that the idea for Facebook is one in a million or even a billion but there are already several social media platforms before Facebook. None of them offered the sleekness and the user friendliness of Facebook which made it into success. Since Facebook was his creation he has a vision for it which solidified the direction of Facebook.

Does Your Childhood Have Direction?

Like most children when I was young I dreamed of doing extraordinary things. I dreamed of constructing huge extraordinary buildings, being able to find cure for cancer, end world hunger, being a space traveler, a famous actor, singer, dancer and so on you know the things the many childhood dreams are made of. However most people including me only dream and not work for it.

So how are most childhoods made of? Firstly for most of us our parents pampered us and many of our parents cheered us on when we told them about our dreams and aspirations. However very few of our parents actually guided us or even discussed with their children about how to achieve their dreams and aspirations.

But there are children whose skills have already matured at a very young age. For example Mozart (Full Name: Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart) learned to read and write compositions by the age of five (5) and could write music compositions by the age of 6. As can be seen Mozart already knew he liked creating music even at an age when most children are still playing.

There are children who are making good money even millions by appearing in digital media. For example the richest YouTube child earner earns approximately $22 million per year by being shown in videos where he is unboxing and playing with toys. Though these may not be the original ideas of the children the parents of these children are already guiding their children towards a prosperous future.

There are many parents around the world who are training their children to have future skills that could one day be useful to them and even lucrative. There are children being given advanced lessons in mathematics, science, dancing, singing, acting, cooking and so on. There have been many documentaries about this especially showing Asian parents putting their children in special schools.

Many parents of today are also already building the social media presence of their children. I know of a child who became a famous showbiz celebrity because his parents shared social media content about him which made him viral and famous. As a result a noontime television show made him a child host on the show.

The important thing however is that parents do not force their children in the direction they want for them but rather let their children find their passion and direction in life early. There are already way too many parents who try to make their children follow the aspirations which they did not achieve themselves. Be careful of this.

Children unlike working adults have plenty of time in their hands to learn about what direction they want to take in life. Parents play an important part in guiding their children towards the direction they want to do in life. However children must decide for themselves what they want to do in life.

Parents should not dictate but guide their children. There are parents who either approve or disapprove their children’s career goals and tells them usually the advantages and disadvantages of such careers but do not inform or even assist them to know how to have success in their chosen career.

Start Knowing Your Direction Early

Even without the help of your parents or anybody you should learn to be responsible early enough to figure out your direction in life. The earlier you decide and learn how to go about chasing your aspirations the better. As I have previously mentioned even at a very young age one can find his aspiration in life like Mozart.

I am a perfect example of this. Coming from a poor family I always envied the rich when I was young with their beautiful and expensive possessions like clothes, cars and houses. I like to be rich and famous but do not know how. So I studied books about people and companies who became rich but I only studied and never took any action.

Why did I not take action? Because I read from these books that to become rich it takes a lifetime working hard and you also need a lot of capital to start. I was being entertained by these stories which made me dream but never taught me anything to reach my aspirations. I kept telling myself if only I had the time, capital and connections then I can succeed too.

Things however have changed and business is being levelled especially digital business. There are many online resources now on how to start a small business with little capital or no capital at all. There are many young people of today who are growing up tech savvy and information rich that they start businesses even at a young even not waiting to finish college. Do not fall behind these young people!

The younger you try to all sorts of things the more you know which one is for you. It could be many of them or none at all. For example there was a man who has unhappy with his job. Being a young man he decided to try more than a hundred jobs each lasting from a day to almost a week at the most.

In the end he never chose any of the jobs he tried. What he got however was a wealth of information about a lot of jobs including the pay as well as their advantages and disadvantages. He became an expert on jobs and earns good money as a consultant. Many people usually settle early on in life for the most profitable and stable job that they can find.

Many even settle for careers that they do not like and ones with terrible work conditions in exchange for financial stability. Though behaving this way is understandable for people with family responsibilities and maturing age young people who settle might lose out on missing on their passion in life of which they would not exchange money and stability for.

Your Directions Can Change

The more you work on your aspirations the more you know what is on the other side. I for example have always been interested in creating an income based from digital products. I’ve tried a couple of them. At first I would be interested by the perceived big income and independence of these people involved in the digital business.

However as I slowly learned there is no magic formula to success and failure either. You learned the positives and the negatives of your career decisions and pick the ones that you can stand doing for a long time even with its negatives. Do not be afraid to change directions in life especially if you see that there is no good future for you in it.

Experiencing the truth is no waste of time. I for example spend months learning and experiencing certain career direction in life. If I had just counted my time then I would not have given up on certain career paths which were going nowhere because of time spent.

The Starving Manga Artist

There was a featured Japanese manga artist who was so underpaid that she cannot afford to pay her own rent and has to be housed by charitable agencies. She also often has to skip meals because of her pay and work hours. She cannot even afford to buy common things for herself which less talented people can afford.

She states that she might be poor and lives a hard life she nevertheless would not quit becoming a manga artist because that is what she wants to do in her life. Did she even consider her future? She has no savings and her sight and drawing skills will diminish with time. When she becomes relatively old she will not be able to do the thing which she wants which is to draw manga.

In terms of destination in life she has reached her peak which is not a good state at all. There are other manga artist who enjoy better lives than hers despite being in the same career. In this case she uses up all her time by burying herself in work and not asking much for it. Are you like this starving manga artist who knows her future is not good yet buries herself in work and not do anything about it?

She can easily draw a manga image in a few minutes and collect copyright income from it if she devotes a bit of time to it. I see YouTube drawing channels where artists upload their videos which shows them drawing starting from scratch to a full or semi-finished drawing. She can do the same. She can even teach students how to draw on her apartment. There are still other things she can do to earn more while still enjoying her craft.

Conclusion

People who lack direction in life usually squander the time and funds they have and waste it. People who have a clear direction in life make time for it no matter how busy they are with their other responsibilities. They keep working at it and might even change directions from time to time but never deviate on their true goal.

As exemplified by the many children already studying, learning and achieving their goals age is not a factor. Financing too is not a problem anymore as there are many organisations that would willingly give you financing as long as you prove you are worth it. Also do not hesitate to change course until you find out which is right for you especially if you are still young.