Success is built at night!
Do you want to be different professionally? Do you want to live unique experiences and achieve extraordinary goals in your career? Then you'll have to make extraordinary sacrifices too!
"Success is built at night" is a phrase carved by the writer Roberto Shinyashiki. Like him, I don't know anyone who has managed to achieve their dreams and goals without sacrificing holidays and Sundays at least a hundred times.
This practice has been part of my life for many years. More recently, in 2017, after 20+ years in a successful career in the telecommunications industry, I decided to reinvent myself professionally. I left my home country and went to do a master's degree in Sustainable Energy Systems in Europe. When I started the course, I had a clear idea of the topic I wanted to develop for my master's thesis. But halfway through the course I realized that the topic wasn't original and was already on the list of some other colleagues.
In one of the meetings with professors about master's theses, I identified a subject that nobody wanted to work on, and there was very little material about it: the combination of Blockchain, Home Energy Management & P2P Energy Trading. Even though I knew very little about the technical side of the subject, I decided to choose it for my master's thesis. A difficult path that nobody wanted to take, but which I saw as an excellent opportunity for differentiation and innovation.
It took me 6 months of complete submission to study, research, interviews, research trips, sleepless nights, no weekends, mood swings and wondering why I was doing it all.... But in my mind, regardless of anything else, I was totally focused on completing it. So I did, with merit and excellent positive feedback.
I presented this work a few times at academic events, lectures and corporate fairs. On one of these occasions, a company executive was present. He was looking for a solution to a problem/opportunity for the company he worked for. And my master's thesis addressed precisely one of the organization's pains. I was invited to join the company and develop a special project where I worked for 4 years.
From then on, many other work horizons have opened up and I have been able to experience things that were unimaginable at the time I started this journey. But the first step had to be taken. Even if I didn't know what I would find ahead.
Success is built at night, at weekends! During the day you do what everyone else does.
But to get different results from the majority, you have to be special. If you do the same as everyone else, you'll get the same results. Don't compare yourself to the mass, because unfortunately they are not models of success.
If you want to achieve a special goal, you'll have to study when everyone else is having a beer and French fries. You'll have to plan while others are in front of the television. You have to work while others are sunbathing by the pool. The same goes for the quality of the emotional relationships you want to build with your spouse, friends and family.
Just dare, dare, dare... and keep daring!!! Success is buit at night!
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