You are the average of the five people you spend the most time with
–Jim Rohn, motivational speaker and early Tony Robbins mentor.
This rule borrows from the law of averages, the theory that “the result of any given situation will be the average of all outcomes.” You may have loads of friends, acquaintances and colleagues, but the few you interact with the most have the greatest impact on your way of thinking and your decisions.
A recent Business Insider article explained “when it comes to relationships, we are greatly influenced – whether we like it or not – by those closest to us. It affects our way of thinking, our self-esteem, and our decisions”.
Of course, we all have free will but research has repeatedly shown that we are greatly influenced by our environment without even noticing it.
Every artistic movement, technological advancement, every successful person was part of a group.
Andy Warhol and Roy Lichtenstein bounced ideas off each other.
Jack Kerouac, Allen Ginsberg, and William S. Burroughs sat around Columbia University together then helped each other and friends write books, get published, art sold, poetry read, picked each other off the floor (literally in the case where Ginsberg found Burroughs sick from drugs in Morocco amongst strewn scraps of writing, put them together, edited them, and got it published as the “Naked Lunch”), and created The Beat Movement.
Meanwhile, unknown artists Jasper Johns and Robert Rauschenberg lived together and befriended dancer Merce Cunningham and composer John Cage. One day they met Leo Castelli who eventually sold their works for millions.
More recently, Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak, Bill Gates and Paul Allen pushed each other to make better and better software and dominate their industries. Jobs wasn’t a loan wolf genius. He worked with a group of guys and they all grew up together.
In Silicon Valley, the “PayPal Mafia”, – former PayPal founders and employees – founded, developed or funded additional technology companies such as Facebook, Tesla Motors, LinkedIn, Palantir Technologies, SpaceX, YouTube, Yelp, and Yammer. Most of the members attended Stanford University or University of Illinois at Urbana–Champaign at some point. Five members, Peter Thiel, Elon Musk, Reid Hoffman, Luke Nosek and Ken Howery have become billionaires.
Several successful TV networks like Showtime, Viacom, Starz, FX, Universal, and shows like “Mad Men” and “House of Cards” were all launched by colleagues originally at HBO.
Comedians Louis CK, Jerry Seinfeld, Larry David, and Chris Rock all worked bills together in backwater clubs for years, until they ‘made it’ one by one and pulled their funny buddies along with them.
Even this blog is intended to contribute to a scene of physical, mental and spiritual human performance optimisation.
Back in 2004, when I first moved to London, I had an Aussie housemate who was in his early 20s but already had a couple of properties back in Melbourne. I’d just scrapped all my savings together to make the move to the other side of the world, half of which had evaporated in the fare and rent. We were similar in many ways, coming from humble, hard working families and professions, except that, being an elite shot putter, he had received a full scholarship to one of the most exclusive high schools in Melbourne where his friends’ parents, who could afford the school fees, had mentored them in looking after their financial futures and how to make money work for you, not the other way round – a principle I mentioned in my yesterday’s post, “What I’ve Learnt From Matt Mullenweg“.
But, as the eclectic examples of groups who helped each other show, it is not just about making money; creativity breeds creativity; breeds flow.
However, it is why the rich get richer and the poor get poorer. They look after each other, but not in a necessarily malicious way (depending on your political opinion).
Amazingly successful people meet other amazingly successful people at work and social gatherings. They send each other notes. Call each other and hang out to discuss ideas. They promote each others work. Or make introductions to each other. They buy and like each other’s stuff. They take time out from our own work to help each other. Everyone helping everyone where they can, if they can, in the only ways they can.
“Tools of Titans” author and podcaster Tim Ferriss regularly asks his guests, “What would print on a billboard if given the chance?”. When this was reflected back to him on a recent book tour pit stop, he unflinchingly gave his version of the Jim Rohn quote at the top of this post.
At the headquarters of e-book and audiobook service, Scribd, Tim said,
I was given that advice probably when I was 15 or 16, which has impacted a lot of my decisions since… And each year, I think it is more and more important
Who is Tim’s Big Five? In an interview with Business Insider, Tim listed:
- Matt Wullenweg
- Kevin Rose
- Kevin Kelly
“true world’s most interesting man.”- Maria Popova
“Her ability to consume high quality information and distill it, and then put out beautiful prose gives me something to aspire to.”- Tony Robbins
“The more I get to know him, the more impressed I am.
Your list does not have to be static or universal. You can have different influences depending on what you want to work on – physical, emotional, psychological, or financial – just make sure the right persons are influencing you in the right areas.
If I feel like I need more work in the physical realm, then I’ll modify the group to reflect that. It’s not always the same five.”
You can learn more of Ferriss’ life hacks in his book, “Tools of Titans.”
How Do You Build A Better Scene?: Finding Your Five
So, what do you do if you don’t have access to billionaires and thought leaders like Tim Ferriss does?
James Altucher has this advice:
When you do something you love, or even just something you’re good at (you will learn to love what you are good at) or even something you do with authenticity and integrity (because then you become the trusted source of a scene) then people will gravitate towards you.
Reading Dale Carnegie’s book, ‘How To Win Friends and Influence People‘ would help out a lot in this area, but here are some ideads from me…
Find persons whose attitudes and work inspires you. Then offer to help them. How can you help them? Offer them ideas. Make them look good. Share your own work with them. They’ll likely offer feedback and you are in your way.
Give time to those who are genuine in their interactions.
Try to interact and meet the people who inspire you. Follow them on social media, engage with them there. Once again, offer some value. Go to conferences and meet them.
Every day work, create and share.
Never stop giving and helping. Adam Grant wrote an excellent book based on his PhD work called ‘Give and Take: Why Helping Others Drives Our Success‘ that reasons those that are Givers eventually outperform those that are Takers and Matchers. Build each other up. Keep making introductions (with permission from each side before you make an intro). Deliver value into the Scene.
21 University’s Tanner Guzy had this advice on how you present yourself. He discusses the philosophy of masculine style and why your appearance matters.
In this presentation you’ll learn…
– The difference between men and women – visual appeal vs visual power
– Embracing both a developing and deliberate approach to style
– Dressing to your tribe and using the Three Masculine Style Archetypes to start the proces
James Altucher wrote,
The more powerful the Scene, the more likely it is you will have fun doing what you do, make money at it, succeed at it, live off of it, love it, and make friends.
Also, make sure your Scene is varied. Not just so that you can learn different parts of you as Tim points out – physical, emotional, psychological, financial or sociological – but also so that you have more fun, get different perspectives and be more successful.
Watch the below video to see what the different members of ‘Love Coach’, James Marshall‘s ‘Five Influencers’ are like.
The ideal group is like the X-Men, it has multiple characters in it.
Together, we can create something amazing.
Cheers,
Scott
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