uncovering the truth 👍 (2015)
many hard-hitting truth bombs dropped here
Reading time: 24 minutes.
WSPArchive: As a commenter said, the cold hard truth is the best gift if you are into getting results.
This post will hit on a lot of hard truths. Our most popular post has been destroyed with emotional comments from regular people so we are doing an elongated version to flush out the smart from… well… the not so smart.
The truth is rarely pleasant and takes a significant amount of emotional stability to accept.
This is why 1/100 people are good people to know.
Outline:
1) Why the Truth Hurts
2) Why the Truth Will Lead to Happiness
3) Reflect and Change Your Activities… Now
Why The Truth Hurts
We do not like cliche phrases.
That said, there are two that stand out.
“The truth hurts”
“The truth will set you free”
The truth hurts refers to *internal* realizations while the truth will set you free refers to acceptance of your *external* world.
Internal realizations will hurt you (the truth hurts)
Acceptance of the external world will make you happy (the truth will set you free)
The difference between the masses and excellence is the acceptance of the truth *regardless* of emotion.
Reiteration. In order to accept the truth you must apply logic to emotional topics.
This is the only way to remain balanced with your decision making. Lets get started:
🤦♀️ 1. Marriage is a Sham:
While we have a humorous version of our take on marriage in the form of a pitchbook, it is still the truth.
Marriage is just a way to siphon money from you, by taking advantage of your emotions. Here’s the rub:
Purchase an asset that serves no function (wedding ring)
go sign away half of your future earnings if anything goes south (divorce)
transfer all power to a woman who will still take your money away even if she’s the one cheating on you
Where in the world is the upside?
Simply put, all upside for her and all downside for you.
Game recognized. You lost control of your emotions. In addition? You’re going to pay higher taxes to the good old government if you’re in the higher income tax bracket!
Unfortunately, if you say these comments publicly, you’ll be ridiculed as a “monster”.
While it’s fun to get a rise out of people once and a while, you’re probably best off with the smile and nod approach (WSPs trademark approach to retards).
Finally, if you really met “the woman of your dreams” she should not care about getting the government involved with a ridiculous marriage license.
The reality is that most women just want the ceremony so she can obtain attention and jealousy from her friends.
In short: Do not get married… Ever.
Comment: Inefficient Governments & Their Emotional Business Models
💬 Financial Samurai says
Funny you should mention marriage. I did the calculation, and my tax bill would have gone up $25K for years while I was working. What a crock.
Love this advice: In Short: Avoid average men and never return their phone calls.
It gets extremely annoying, especially on the internet sometimes. Ignoring is great for the soul.
💬 Wall Street Playboys says
That is an insane amount of extra *charity* for an inefficient government. Could have paid for your car instead!!!
Great biz model for the government though. Capitalize on the emotions of people.
Similarly… Never tell a florist you are getting flowers for a wedding or a funeral.
Always make it a mundane event so you don’t get price gauged.
Also agree ignoring is the best course of action.
“When you argue with a fool there are two fools in the argument”
👎 2. Average Guys are Worse Than Average Women:
If you have ever started a company or at least moved up to a managerial position… You learn this fact quickly.
While an average girl may be boring, slightly unattractive and annoying… At least she is not angling to ruin your life.
Average guys are the worst.
Average guys get jealous extremely easily and are hyper competitive with nothing to show for it.
They will consistently compare themselves to others and believe that they are better than you based on their zero success in life. It is atrocious.
The worst part? They even have the audacity to give life advice when they have accomplished nothing at all.
Leading more and more people down a path of mediocrity.
In Short: Avoid average men and never return their phone calls
❌ 3. Family Doesn’t Matter:
We covered this in the post listed above and it is true.
Your family only matters if they are helping you with positive reinforcement.
If they are trying to tie up your time with crazy requests and phone calls, you have to stop picking up the phone and stop attending the family “meet ups”.
Standards should be applied equally across the board.
You wouldn’t let a friend try to bring you down so why does your family get a free pass? They don’t. You won’t let them if you’re smart.
Funny enough, the previous post railed at this truth the hardest. It does not make sense.
If your family *is* helping you… then absolutely keep in touch with them!
A good family member is probably equal to two friends you’ve known for a decade or longer.
If your family member is a crack smoking degenerate, it is not your responsibility to fix his life for him.
As you get older, you realize that the only time you should give advice is when you’re asked for it (particularly with friends and family). Otherwise keep focusing on building yourself up.
In Short: Just like friends, if a family member isn’t helping you improve… Move on.
⏰ 4. You Will Waste Time:
No matter what, you are going to waste *a lot* of time.
By 25 years old you’re going to look back and realize you wasted thousands of hours on horrible activities:
getting too drunk
participating on message boards
sleeping in
dating toxic girls
networking with the wrong people
eating the wrong foods
building the wrong type of company… We could go on and on and on.
Why does this blog exist? To help people avoid big mistakes.
Big mistakes being:
marriage
working a job instead of a career
becoming a boring type A person
trying to start an internet business that only clears $200K a year instead of a scalable product based business, etc.
Simply put, even if a guy isn’t very bright but is willing to put in the work, he’s going to break into the top 5% or so by simply avoiding the big mistakes.
In Short: You’re going to lose thousands of hours.. when you realize the mistake you’ll be in pain. Embrace it.
Comment: Wasted Youth
💬 William H. says
Good post. Time is probably the most significant one for me. Everything else can be changed, but time lost cannot.
It makes me shudder when I think about the amount of time I wasted in my early teenage years. Possibly the worst question to ask oneself is “Where would I be now if I knew then what I know now?”
Oh well, I’m still young. Thanks for the advice.
💬 Wall Street Playboys says
Better to understand the phrase “Youth is wasted on the young” at 20 than 50.
⚡️ We are on Substack Notes
We regularly post timeless advice from proven content both on X and Substack Notes.
Notes usually has less distractions & is more curated, so we recommend you follow us there:
5. You’ve Been Conned
That’s correct.
That comment includes the authors of this blog. Everyone at one time has been conned into believing something that is not true.
Our favorite quote of all time (that no one likes!) is the following:
“It is not what you don’t know that gets you in trouble. It’s what you know… that really isn’t so”
It takes a bright person to realize the intensity of this quote and how true it is. To make it even clearer.
The longer you go down the wrong path the more painful righting the ship becomes.
Lets say you’ve been married for 10 years thinking she has been a good housewife for the past decade… Then you find out she has been cheating on you for the past 4 years.
That pain is going to be significantly greater than breaking up 10 years ago! You *believed* something was true when it wasn’t.
That is real pain.
Closer to home for us…
Lets say you believe business person X is trustworthy and you place a large order with them.
Unfortunately “something comes up” and the person does not deliver.
This costs you many tens of thousands of dollars.
While you think it was a mistake that was unavoidable… You do your due diligence and realized he screwed you on purpose to throw a wrench in your business since he was playing on the other side of the fence!
That is going to hurt. You have to develop a new relationship over the course of a few years to displace this single dishonest person. You trusted the wrong person. Pain.
In Short: If you’re trying to succeed in life, you’re going to get conned.
Remain stable and remember that ignorance is rarely going to cause you meaningful pain…
Incorrect certainty will cause you the most pain.
Comment: Illusion of Knowledge
💬 Matias Page says
“It is not what you don’t know that gets you in trouble. It’s what you know… that really isn’t so”
I always liked this phrase, but I knew a different version. It is a science phrase that I applied to the world around me:
“The greatest obstacle to discovering the shape of the Earth, the continents, and the oceans was not ignorance but the illusion of knowledge”.
THE ILLUSION OF KNOWLEDGE is a brilliant way to put it. I think.
This article is a brutal kick to the gut. I love it.
💬 Wall Street Playboys says
Solid. Agree.
Illusion of intelligence can also be emotion. You really “feel” it’s correct… But it isn’t so.
💬 Aaron says
Great post!
The part that struck a cord is the bit about realizing a belief is entirely wrong. I have a lot of respect for guys who can realize a long held belief was actually wrong and turn it around entirely to fix it.
💬 Wall Street Playboys says
Yep. Real “open minded-ness” is recognizing when you’ve made a mistake and fixing it regardless of how upset you are.
This is also why it is easy to see real from fake… Fake people give you advice that you know doesn’t work.
6. You are Not Special
While we do not like hero worshipers, you should have one *mentor* or ideal person you’re striving to become (similar).
You’re not special because many people have lived insane lives over the past 5+ centuries and what you want is going to be *similar* to someone in the past.
Find that person, befriend that person and make your own path with the guiding comments in the background.
Two years ago, life was great. Going out drinking, having fun, traveling and the money was finally coming in.
Flew out to see the “mentor” for a game of tennis and a few truth bombs were dropped that forced change immediately.
Without butchering the actual advice, here is the crux of it:
1) “If your life is so great, why do you have to go out of your way to meet new girls?”
2) “Why are you building someone else’s dreams? Only do this if it will help you obtain yours.”
3) “Before you decide to retire, take a week off. Do not do anything related to your career or company… Report back”
These three truths will quickly put a 180 on how you think. They are all true.
First, if you are not coming across people you want to meet on a day to day basis (replace women with new connections as well) your life is not where it should be. You need a consistent stream of new contacts so you can improve in every environment.
Going out to be entertained is ridiculous when you can go out for *both* entertainment and improvement.
Be honest with what you’re doing.
If it is pure entertainment, great, a few hours a week will do. Otherwise… Better start combining.
Second, building a company or your career is great… Just make sure its part of *your* dream.
Is that the direction you want to go in?
Are you just burning time out of boredom?
Working on a project that is not part of your dream is expensive. You will never get the time back.
Third, retirement is a complete and utter joke.
Once you hit your financial independence marker you’re immediately thinking of all the cool stuff you can do now.
travel to a new country
lay up on the beach for several months
take up new hobbies
etc
The problem? It’s boring.
The type of person who obtains financial independence is an actual winner.
Meaning, he/she enjoys improving.
Working hard is the *fun* part of life. <– regular people will NEVER understand that sentence.
Once you realize that hard work is the best part of your day, selling that company is not going to make much sense anymore.
In Short: You’re not that unique.
Someone out there has a life you’re trying to at least emulate.
Befriend them and be open to hard truths.
Oh… and before you sell that company… take a week off first and realize retirement is non-sense.
Comment: Never Stop Growing
💬 Anon1 says
This isn’t a truth bomb, it’s a truth 50 megaton Tsar Bomba goddamned masterpiece.
Needed saying and you said it.
>Working hard is the *fun* part of life. <– regular people will NEVER understand that sentence.
Once you realize that hard work is the best part of your day, selling that company is not going to make much sense anymore.
I think you hit on something very crucial there.
Mediocre people think the fun part of life is chilling
Great people think the fun part of life is growing.
And the secret? never stop growing
💬 Wall Street Playboys says
Well said:
“The secret? Never stop growing”
Regular people think when they hit their “number” they are going to be happy. Couldn’t be further from the truth.
When you hit your number you find out exactly what you enjoy doing.
This leads you directy to the business you want to run.
WSPArchive: We have some valuable personal experience to add here.
The statement that working hard is the fun part of life is entirely true, but you may not be recognizing it correctly.
The STATE of being driven and motivated to develop a certain product and compete in the marketplace, paired with the ACT of doing it successfully (seeing incremental payoffs) is one of the most pleasurable long-lived actions one can do with their time.
This is why we have realized that a certain number of $$$, it makes no sense to pursue the financially-most optimal outcome. e.g imagine you’re following the advice of growing side-businesses and maintaining a career. If you truly don’t need more money (have enough run rate and no plans of increasing your spending), then staying in the career you don’t care about makes less sense.
What you want to optimize for is passion. But this doesn’t mean calling it a life and going to draw some sketches of a village by the sea - it means doing something that you’re good at, see progress and ultimately deliver value (make money). Basically the combination of these two great archives:
7. Your Emotions are Meaningless
If you learn anything from practicing sales it is that people are driven entirely by emotion.
Sales is nothing but the transference of a feeling.
As soon as you can control your own emotions and feelings, you’re going to realize they do nothing but create bad decisions for you!
The above paragraph sounds like it is written by a bitter person and that couldn’t be further from the truth.
Once you’re in control of your emotions you get to *choose* how you feel on a day to day basis!
This is the complete opposite of regular people. Regular people are easily influenced and swayed by how they feel.
This is exactly why they listen to motivational nonsense all day long.
They just want to feel good. Temporarily.
They don’t actually want to take control of their lives and their emotions. That is far too much work.
In Short: Emotions need to be controlled.
As long as you are ruled by how you feel, you’ll never gain any momentum.
8. You Shouldn’t Ask Many Questions About the Future
We get a lot of these and they need to end. Now.
You should not ask “scenario” type questions unless you are actually in the scenario. You are wasting your time.
Lots of young people do this and we used to do this as well.
“What if this happens, then what?”
…
Who cares.
Unless it is actually happening it’s a waste of your time.
Go do something that will benefit you *today*.
Asking questions about gold diggers when you’re not even making $500K a year is equivalent to asking about movie contracts when you haven’t even acted in a play before.
Here’s the fun part. If you’re smart enough to make $500K+ and you found this blog…
You’re going to be smart enough to avoid being skinned by “gold diggers”.
In Short: Unless you are in situation X, don’t worry about situation X. It is simply mental masturbation.
9. Doing is Learning
The self improvement community, or whatever you want to call it, focuses a lot on reading.
The problem? Reading is nothing compared to doing.
For every 2 hours you spend reading you could have learned the same material in 15 minutes by doing.
That is the legitimate ratio… 15 minutes of doing gives you as much information as 2 hours of reading.
While smart people read, those same smart people spend at minimum 8x more time doing.
Being well read is like watching videos of Michael Jordan shooting a basketball. You can replay the shooting form in your head 1,000x times but if you’ve never picked up a basketball you’re never going to be any good at it. The guy who spent 8 hours a day playing, without watching anything, will beat you every single time.
Being well read is a good excuse made by intellectuals to avoid actual work.
They will read and read and give you a lot of Snapple facts. But. They cannot connect the dots so they always seem socially “off”.
In Short: Spend more of your time doing than reading. Reading is great when you have a problem to solve, it is horrible for building a talent base.
10. You Are Not In Control
That’s correct. There are many things that you cannot control.
You cannot control the actions of others (IE: your expectations are insane if you believe this). You need to accept this fact.
If someone does something bad to you or something bad happens to you… Ask yourself… Could I actually control this event? 99% of the time the answer is no.
If you cannot control it do not worry about it.
Many many many people worry, whine and complain about things they cannot control.
This is exactly why we do not talk about ridiculous things such as:
culture
feminism
politics
religion
or otherwise
People are going to believe what they are going to believe and you can only control how you interact with the *environment*.
People who complain about these things are not able to understand that they cannot control the actions of other people. It is best to move on.
In Short: Stop worrying and complaining about things you cannot control. The world does not revolve around anyone.
Comment: Control
💬 Ryan says
So much knowledge in here.
#10 “You Are Not In Control” is especially important to how I live my life.
I witness so much wasted energy on meaningless things that can’t be controlled every single day. Things like:
weather
other men’s success
heavy traffic
a rude waitress actually ruin people’s day
Put all of your emotion in YOU and the aspects of your life you can actually control (YOUR business, YOUR life) and be prepared to reap the benefits.
Wall Street Playboys says
Correct!!!
Absolutely spot on.
We should make it clear this change is *not* going to happen overnight. But work on getting better at this every day.
It doesn’t mean you become an emotionless zombie, you just accept that you can’t control it.
If some dude messes up your dinner order, have it corrected, no need to yell like a baby and have it ruin your day. 99/100 times it was just a mistake anyway.
WSPArchive: If these minor things can ruin your day… you aren’t gonna make it.
Learn how to take losses:
Concluding Remarks
That was a lengthy section. We’re going to give you the bullets in more concise and actionable steps below:
Never, under any circumstances, do you get married
Average guys are much more likely to cause you harm than an average woman who you can ignore
If your family is bringing you down, it is not your job to fix their lives for them
You are going to waste a lot of time. Accept this as a part of learning and life
You will go through painful truth realization phases. Accept this. You will get burned at least once.
You’re not special. Someone has obtained what you’re hoping to obtain.
Emotional decisions don’t work. Take control of them and live a happier life.
Stop asking about the future, ask about improving your current situation. “Scenario Analysis” is primarily done by people who never get into said scenarios.
Doing is learning. You read to solve a problem after *doing* something fails.
You are not in control of the lives of others. Don’t expect anyone to listen to you. If they want your opinion they will ask for it.
*Bonus*: For fun. Find what someone complains about and you’ll find what they were never any good at. This is exactly why poor people complain about the rich. They never did the necessary work to make it. Use this to avoid bad advice.
Why the Truth Will Lead to Happiness
The section above primarily covered “the truth hurts”.
This section will explain the external version of the truth.
That it will set you free.
If you are free spiritually, financially and emotionally then you will be fast tracked to extreme levels of happiness (barring good health of course which is always #1).
The rest of this post is paid.
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