7 THINGS Really RESOURCEFUL People DO!

And so you're telling me I failed because I didn't have the resources, and I'm here to tell you what you already know: resources are never the problem. It's a lack of resourcefulness is why you failed.

6 people share $7 a month. We can only eat 1 chicken a year. It was terrible.

Some people see the thing that they want, and some people see the thing that prevents them from getting the thing that they want.

What's up, Believe Nation? It's Evan. My one word is believe, and I believe in you. I believe you have an amazing gift inside you that I want to see explode out onto the world. So to help you on your journey today, we're going to look at the 7 things really resourceful people do. Enjoy. All right, kicking us off with rule number 1 is they burn their ships with Tony Robbins.

Everything you people have told me— I didn't have the technology, I didn't have the right contacts, I didn't have the time, I didn't have money— everything you've told me, I didn't have enough Supreme Court justices, those are resources. And so you're telling me I failed because I didn't have the resources, and I'm here to tell you what you already know: resources are never the problem. It's a lack of resourcefulness is why you failed. Because the ultimate resources are emotional states. If you're creative enough, can you find the answer? Yes or no? If you're determined enough, can you find the breakthrough? Yes or no? If you're passionate, loving enough, can you get someone to help you? Yes or no? If there's no way that you're committed, can you find the money even if you don't have it, yes or no? So I said, creativity, decisiveness, passion, honesty, sincerity, love, these are the ultimate human resources. And when you engage these resources, you can get any other resource on earth. And I said, so you told me all the resources you're missing and you hypnotize yourself into believing that you don't have what you want because you don't have the resources, when the most successful people in history had no resources, but they were incredibly resourceful so they could I got the resources. Resourcefulness is the ultimate resource. And if you don't have what you want, stop telling yourself the story because you don't have the money, you don't have the time. That's bullshit. It's because you haven't committed yourself where you would burn your boats. If you want to take the fucking island, burn your fucking boats, and you will take the island. Because people, when they're gonna either die or succeed, tend to succeed. But most of us give ourselves a way out, and that's why we don't have what we want.

Rule number 2 is that they seize every opportunity. Jack Ma.

I was born in a very normal family and poor family. 6 people share $7 a month. We can only eat 1 chicken a year. It was terrible. Nixon visited my city, 1972. China, USA signed— Mao Zedong, Nixon signed the agreement. So China become open door. My city Hangzhou was one of the first cities that opened to the West. We got a lot of American tourists. Is to visit my city.

What he would do is he would befriend foreign visitors who came to Hangzhou to walk around the West Lake there.

And I learned English by being the free guide for tour guide.

You know, more than the language, Jack was learning about the culture.

The things I learned from books from China are so different from the things I learned from the American visitors, so I start to think differently.

Rule number 3 is they bend the rules. With Simon Sinek.

Let me tell you a story. So a friend of mine and I, we went for a run in Central Park. The Roadrunners organization, on the weekends, they host races. And it's very common at the end of the race they'll have a sponsor who will give away something— apples or bagels or something. And on this particular day, when we got to the end of the run, there were some free bagels. And they had picnic tables set up and on one side was a group of volunteers, on the table were boxes of bagels, and on the other side was a long line of runners waiting to get their free bagel. So I said to my friend, "Let's get a bagel." And he looked at me and said, "Ah, the line's too long." And I said, "Free bagel." And he said, "I don't want to wait in line." And I was like, Free bagel. And he says, "Nah, it's too long." And that's when I realized that there's two ways to see the world. Some people see the thing that they want, and some people see the thing that prevents them from getting the thing that they want. I could only see the bagels. He could only see the line. And so I walked up to the line, I leaned in between two people, put my hand in the box, and pulled out two bagels. And no one got mad at me, because the rule is you can go after whatever you want. You just cannot deny anyone else to go after whatever they want. Now, I had to sacrifice choice. I didn't get to choose which bagel I got. I got whatever I pulled out, but I didn't have to wait in line. So the point is, is you don't have to wait in line. You don't have to do it the way everybody else has done it. You can do it your way. You can break the rules. You just can't get in the way of somebody else getting what they want. That's rule number 1.

Rule number 4 is they adapt and improvise with Julius Yego.

By then, nowhere in Kenya you can have a place for javelin training. I didn't have any coach. I was doing training alone. I saw it as like life was going against me. It was the lowest point of my life. But I didn't give up. Something came into my mind to watch the YouTube videos. I could go to the cyber, look at the great javelin throwers, see what they do in their normal training. And I will come and practice the following day. When you don't have the facilities, you try on yourself to improvise what you have. The past few years when I was doing training alone, it's a big challenge. But now I have partners, we train together. It makes your training easy and it's fun. I like being with them.

Wah!

The videos of these guys really helped me a lot. In 2010, I throw 75. After that, I keep watching those videos. In 2011, I won the All African Games. It was the first time that Kenya was winning a gold medal in javelin.

In 2012, when I I threw it 181m.

I screamed because I couldn't believe that I was making the Olympic finals. For the first time, somebody in the finals from Kenya and Africa as well. I didn't stop from there. In 2014, it was a big thing. I won gold for the first time in Commonwealth Games. 2015 is a special year for me. The World Championships, 92 meters, you know, a big throw and winning a gold medal. I will never forget that forever. Now I am the world champion. It's like a dream.

Rule number 5 is they grow their social network with Mark Zuckerberg.

But the students around me were really important as well, right? And both in high school and in college, I mean, the people who started Facebook with me and a lot of people who are still with me running the company today are people who I met when I was at Harvard, and some of them were my TFs at Harvard, right? And, you know, when the professors were off writing papers, these were the people who actually taught me, and then we hung out and we had like social bonds and academic bonds. And I just— I wouldn't understate the importance of that. And I mean, it's very tied into my whole philosophy and the product that I spent my life building, Facebook, because We just believe that social bonds are critical. And, um, you know, one way that I think about the, the value that Facebook is filling in the world is that, you know, you go through school and at least when I did, people just focused on, you know, academics, like achievement, different areas. And one of the things that no one really ever taught me was like, having friends is really valuable. No, not that I didn't have friends, but, but like, Although, you know, the movie might make it seem that it is. But for sure, I don't think anyone is like— it's not like, okay, third grade, we're going to like— now we're going to like teach you that like hanging out with people is a very important development, right? And I don't know, I actually think that that is. And I think that's part of the reason why sometimes people view Facebook as a waste of time, but I actually think it's this extremely socially valuable utility. I know that I wouldn't be where I am today without that aspect of my life being as developed as the academic part.

Rule number 6 is they are proactive with Ice Cube.

You know, I'm doing my career my way. Um, you know, being able to put together your own movies is a blessing. You know, most actors are just sitting around waiting for somebody to say, "Hey, you wanna be in my movie?" So I don't like that. I wouldn't. I wouldn't be an actor if I was just sitting around. So I love producing, I love writing, and just making sure it happened. You know, you got to be proactive.

And rule number 7: they are persistent. With Camila Cabello.

I went to the producer round of The X Factor, and after that they send you to perform for the actual judges. And so when they wrote me the letter, basically they said that I was a What's that called? Alternate, right, an alternate. An alternate, which means that you're not guaranteed a spot to audition in front of the judges. And if they have time at the end of the show, then you can audition, but that's never guaranteed.

So you have to still sit there and wait, wait, wait?

So the auditions were all the way in North Carolina, and so my whole family and I traveled to North Carolina to see if maybe I could audition. So the auditions, the judges auditions are 3 days. The first day I get there and I'm about to go on the stage and sing and I have my microphone in my hand and a producer comes and says, "Sorry, we don't have enough time." As you keep going throughout the days, your name keeps going down and down on the list because there's different alternates for every day. So anyway, so then I said, "Okay, like, I'm just gonna try like to come the next day." So the next day I come, same thing. Basically the same thing happens and I'm crying backstage. And the producer, like my grandma's there and my grandma's crying 'cause we were all like, "This sucks, I'm not gonna get a chance to audition and I wanted it so badly." And they were like, "Honestly, you shouldn't come at all anymore because I don't wanna see your family disappointed. If you come tomorrow, there's not gonna be any room for you to audition. I honestly think you should just go home and try again next year." Boo. Yeah, and so Simon Cowell luckily walks out like behind the stage and I was like—

Was he wearing a really tight white shirt?

Yeah.

And I was like, I was like, Simon, they won't let me audition. Could you please let me audition? Simon and all the judges on the show, they have no idea what the alternate process is actually like. They just see people walk out on stage, give them a yes, whatever. And so he was like, oh yeah, for sure, you can audition. And I turned over to the executive producer and I was like, I was like, "See? He's Simon Cowell and he's telling me I can audition." That was aggressive.

I like that.

Thanks. And I was like, "Can I please just come back tomorrow?" And so basically, to sum up the story, they saw how persistent I was and how much I wanted to be there because I ended up just crying to the producer and being like, "Honestly, I don't even have to— you don't even have to put me as an alternate tomorrow. I just want to be in the building to know that I did everything that I could." to know that if there maybe is a 1% chance that I'm allowed to audition, that I'm here, that I'm still here for it. And so they saw how persistent I was, and the next day they ended up letting me audition.

Now I've got a really special bonus clip with Richard Branson on being bold, but before that, my question of the day is: What is the most resourceful thing that you have ever done in your life or your business? Leave it down in the comments below. I'm really curious to see what you have to to say. Thank you guys so much for watching. I believe in you. I hope you continue to believe in yourself and whatever your one word is. Much love.

I'll see you soon.

And enjoy the bonus clip.

I was flying from the British Virgin Islands— no, sorry, from Puerto Rico to the British Virgin Islands. And, and I was 28 years old, and I'd been away from home for 3 weeks. and I had this gorgeous lady waiting for me, and American Airlines announced that they're not going to fly the flight till the next morning, they didn't have enough passengers, and I was damned if I was going to wait till the next morning, so I went to the back of the airport and I borrowed a blackboard, and I scribbled Virgin Airlines as a joke, $39 one way to the British Virgin Islands, and went around all the passengers, and I managed to fill up my first flight. And when I got to the BVI, the guy on my left, you know, turned to me and said, you know, sharpen up the service a bit and you could be in the airline business. And the next day— anyway, the night went well. The next day— the next— She's now my wife, 40 years—

still 40 years later.

Thank goodness she likes me. The next day I rang up Boeing and I said, I'm thinking of going into the airline business. In fact, I've just had my test flight. Do you have any secondhand 747s for sale? And the person who took the phone call, I thought he was going to put the phone down on me, but he hung on in there. So he said, well, you know, what does your company do? And I said, well, you know, we're a record company. We've got the Rolling Stones, we've got the Sex Pistols. And again, he didn't sound very, very, you know, and he said, what's the name of the company? And I said Virgin. And there was a long pause and he said, well, look, we'll send a salesman to see you, but with a name like Virgin, I just hope your airline goes the whole way.

Raise your standard.

Apple, at the core, its core value is that we believe that people with passion can change the world for the better.

Not one drop of my self-worth depends on your acceptance of me.

I don't ever give up. I'd have to be dead or completely incapacitated.

Hey, Believe Nation, if you want to see my all-time favorite top 10 rules of success, I have a very special secret video for you. These are the individual clips that I have personally learned the most from and applied to my life and my business. Check the link in the description for details.