Here’s an unpopular truth: Your income isn't a measure of how hard you work. It's a measure of the problem you're brave enough to solve.
If you’re like most people right now, you're grinding harder than you ever have. More hours, more skills, more discipline, more energy drinks. And the number in your bank account has barely twitched.
So you reach for the only lever you know: grind harder. Hustle more. Bolt on another skill, another side hustle, another sixteen-hour day fueled by ambition, fear, and spite.
Wrong lever.
This convo actually began with this post, where I told you that bigger problems equal bigger income. Judging by the responses that followed, I should've made a whole post just on that insight. So here we go…
Because there’s a huge difference between busting your ass for table scraps like millions do…and actually getting rich. I posit that it’s highly likely you're not underpaid because you're doing too little. You're underpaid because you're solving problems that are too small. Or — and I hate to say this, but someone has to — you’re trying to baffle people with your bullshit and you’re not actually solving any problems or adding any value.
If you want a participation trophy, join a Toastmasters Club. If you want to make some serious dosh, you’ve got to solve problems or add value. Or ideally, both. Because:
The market doesn't pay for sweat.
Nobody — and I mean nobody besides your mother or spouse — has ever cared how hard you worked. The market pays you for exactly one thing: the size of the problem you take off its hands. How much pain you erase, times how many people feel that pain.
Solve a small, cheap, anybody-can-do-it problem and you'll pull small, cheap, anybody wages. (No matter how many hours you bleed onto the floor.) Solve a big, expensive, screaming problem and the ceiling jumps overnight. Same you. Same twenty-four hours. Bigger target.
Small problems are the hiding place where your dreams go to die.
Here’s the truth about why people aim low. It's not a strategy they mindfully attempt. It’s their Inherited Memeplex Encoding (limiting mind viruses they don’t realize are there) subconsciously misdirecting them toward behaviors that cause self-sabotage.
A small problem is cozy. You already know how to solve it. Nobody can call you arrogant for chasing it. Remember the prosperity thermostat from a few posts back? Aiming small is that thermostat doing its dirty work: keeping you busy, keeping you safe, keeping you exactly as broke as you secretly believe you deserve to be.
Here's where the math ain’t mathing…
Everybody can solve the little problems, so everybody does. That stampede of competitors drives the price straight through the floor.
The big problems? The scary ones, the ones that turn your stomach and keep you up at night? Almost nobody will go near them. Less competition. More value. Premium prices. The exact discomfort you keep running from is the vault where the money's been hiding the whole time.
Solve the problem behind the problem.
Want to aim higher without blowing up your life and starting over? Go upstream. Don't sell the medicine, cure the fucking disease. Don't answer the question, obliterate the reason they had to ask it.
Every problem is standing on the shoulders of a bigger, more expensive one. The person who solves “help me create an Instagram story” earns lunch money. The person who solves “help me create build signal so the whole market chases me” earns a fortune. Same field. Different altitude.
If you feel a little tinge of imposter syndrome... Frequently question yourself... Feel like you may not be "quite" ready... Perfect.
Any problem big enough to actually move your income is going to feel one size too big the first time you grab it. That's not a stop sign; that's the Universe letting you know you’re finally stepping up.
You don't wait around until you feel ready to solve big problems. You grab the big problem, and it drags you kicking and screaming into becoming the person who can. Same move I gave you with the thermostat: act above your old setting, and your self-identity scrambles to catch up.
You're not too small for the ideal life you desire. You've just been aiming at problems too small to pay for it.
Peace,
– RG
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Randy, I KNOW you're right here. But I also can't help but picture the person who sells crayons(not solving a very big problem), but sells so many of them (the volume game), that they become millionaires. Is it solve a big problem and do well, or solve a very small problem multiplied by volume and do well? I know both exist... How can I join these two ideas together so that they don't seem to compete with each other so much? Thanks in advance.
Joe, I LOVE your question! Not everyone needs to cure cancer or bring peace to the galaxy. True prosperity is created by doing one of two things, or both: 1) Solve Problems. 2) Add Value. The idea of simply selling crayons sounds appealing to me. In fact, I'm thinking about reinventing my life right now and doing just that. (Kinda.) Crayons boost imagination, curiosity, and creativity. They provide hours of enjoyment, and are vastly superior to plopping a child in front of a tablet. Selling crayons may not save the world, but it's still a prosperous profession. And if you do it at a high enough level to become a millionaire, you're certainly adding massive value. You could also sell enough crayons to create a nice lifestyle business for yourself (without making you a millionaire) that provides you with the quality of life you seek. Or you may start out selling crayons, and that leads you to starting an Instagram account for parents and schoolteachers who want to develop creativity and that leads to having 40 million followers, which leads to an online education company that makes you a billionaire. They're all wonderful options.
By the way, that doesn't mean being a dishwasher in a pancake restaurant, working construction, or delivering newspapers aren't prosperous occupations. I've done all three. And worked to solve problems and add value at those jobs, which led me to yet more prosperous ways to earn a living.
It's not my job to set the standards for you, or tell you what will make you happy, and I don't try to. I believe the best authors, coaches, and thought leaders are visitors from the future, showing the way to transformation. Simply demonstrating some principles that have worked, and inviting others to experiment with them in their lives. My goal here is to create some new ways of thinking and looking at things. And hopefully from that, some will be inspired to do, have, and become more. -RG
Ok, thank you for your response, and thank you for making yourself so accessible to your long-time followers. And in the short time since I asked you this question, I came to the conclusion that almost anything (including selling crayons), can be prosperous... and that it's far more about putting a prosperity mindset behind what you're doing, as much as anything else. Lastly, as I tried to answer my own question, I came up with this - value seems to have a few components to it - Depth, being what you were suggesting, Reach, or volume, and Leverage, which lowers or eliminates how hard you work. It seems to me at this point that you could pretend that Depth, Reach, and Leverage (in terms of value) could be viewed as a bunch of knobs on a professional sound mixing board... it's up to us to tweak the knobs and levers how we see fit to get the effect we want. Sorry for the wordiness, but I have a philosophy degree so it come with the territory. Been following you since 2012, will prob be reading your content to the end!! -Joe
Just since 2012? Where were you!
Love this
Yes! This is right on target or right to the core (root) of the problem!
This is a fascinating topic that I have struggled with, Randy you have been a witness of my process. I have learned to add value in every stop in my career path. First in a music store, then as a music critic or journalist and then now as a coach facilitator. Now my next leap is to become a fully independent creator of my content that will extend from writing, coaching, consulting and speaking. My struggle was more about not wanting to sound like another coach (cog) in the business and now I feel that what I am working on what will be the line of demarcation of this.
Randy, I KNOW you're right here. But I also can't help but picture the person who sells crayons(not solving a very big problem), but sells so many of them (the volume game), that they become millionaires. Is it solve a big problem and do well, or solve a very small problem multiplied by volume and do well? I know both exist... How can I join these two ideas together so that they don't seem to compete with each other so much? Thanks in advance.
Joe, I LOVE your question! Not everyone needs to cure cancer or bring peace to the galaxy. True prosperity is created by doing one of two things, or both: 1) Solve Problems. 2) Add Value. The idea of simply selling crayons sounds appealing to me. In fact, I'm thinking about reinventing my life right now and doing just that. (Kinda.) Crayons boost imagination, curiosity, and creativity. They provide hours of enjoyment, and are vastly superior to plopping a child in front of a tablet. Selling crayons may not save the world, but it's still a prosperous profession. And if you do it at a high enough level to become a millionaire, you're certainly adding massive value. You could also sell enough crayons to create a nice lifestyle business for yourself (without making you a millionaire) that provides you with the quality of life you seek. Or you may start out selling crayons, and that leads you to starting an Instagram account for parents and schoolteachers who want to develop creativity and that leads to having 40 million followers, which leads to an online education company that makes you a billionaire. They're all wonderful options.
By the way, that doesn't mean being a dishwasher in a pancake restaurant, working construction, or delivering newspapers aren't prosperous occupations. I've done all three. And worked to solve problems and add value at those jobs, which led me to yet more prosperous ways to earn a living.
It's not my job to set the standards for you, or tell you what will make you happy, and I don't try to. I believe the best authors, coaches, and thought leaders are visitors from the future, showing the way to transformation. Simply demonstrating some principles that have worked, and inviting others to experiment with them in their lives. My goal here is to create some new ways of thinking and looking at things. And hopefully from that, some will be inspired to do, have, and become more. -RG
Ok, thank you for your response, and thank you for making yourself so accessible to your long-time followers. And in the short time since I asked you this question, I came to the conclusion that almost anything (including selling crayons), can be prosperous... and that it's far more about putting a prosperity mindset behind what you're doing, as much as anything else. Lastly, as I tried to answer my own question, I came up with this - value seems to have a few components to it - Depth, being what you were suggesting, Reach, or volume, and Leverage, which lowers or eliminates how hard you work. It seems to me at this point that you could pretend that Depth, Reach, and Leverage (in terms of value) could be viewed as a bunch of knobs on a professional sound mixing board... it's up to us to tweak the knobs and levers how we see fit to get the effect we want. Sorry for the wordiness, but I have a philosophy degree so it come with the territory. Been following you since 2012, will prob be reading your content to the end!! -Joe
Just since 2012? Where were you!
Love this
Yes! This is right on target or right to the core (root) of the problem!
This is a fascinating topic that I have struggled with, Randy you have been a witness of my process. I have learned to add value in every stop in my career path. First in a music store, then as a music critic or journalist and then now as a coach facilitator. Now my next leap is to become a fully independent creator of my content that will extend from writing, coaching, consulting and speaking. My struggle was more about not wanting to sound like another coach (cog) in the business and now I feel that what I am working on what will be the line of demarcation of this.