Why So Few People are Willing to Pay the Price to be Successful

By Menachem Brodie

Coach, Consultant, Fitness AI Expert & Leader

Published January 3, 2023 | 11 min read

Are you on the path to success?

What does it take to “Be successful,” and why do so few people seem to make it?

While this is a complex question and each and every one of us has different definitions for our own success, there are a number of reasons why so few people are willing to pay the price to be successful.

For you to create the life of your dreams, you must plot your path to success and be willing and able to commit and pay the ultimate price for success.

Let’s look at the top 9 reasons why so few people are willing to pay the price to be successful.

1. The path to success is not easy

Talk to anyone who has attained the level of success they set out to accomplish, and they will tell you that they knew from day 1 that deep down inside that, they would be successful.

But it wasn’t easy.

There were days, weeks, months, and even years where they were working 2 jobs (or more), had bills they either barely were able to pay, or were left unpaid.

And don’t forget the times they failed.

The many, many, many times they failed.

There were times of doubt, times of deep soul searching, and times when they thought about giving up but just couldn’t do it….

No, becoming successful doesn’t happen overnight.

It takes much patience and persistence.

Often many years of hard work through many dark nights and hard times.

This leads us to number 2 on our list.

2. They lose faith or run out of patience

Much like the Bamboo tree, it takes lots of care and effort before you see any results on your path to success.

But when you finally reach that critical mass or breakthrough point, it often comes with increasing intensity and even ease.

While the media want us to believe that one can “be an overnight success story,” this is, in fact, B.S.

Every single “Overnight success story” will tell you that it took a long time to get to the point where they either got their break, finally got the ingredients right, or their product’s target audience was ready for it.

From Apple and Spanx to FUBU and Google, they each took years to develop, pushed through many failures, and held strong with rock-solid faith through it all.

Push through when everything is going against you and others are telling you to quit.

You know this is where you belong and what you need to be doing.

Your faith and resolve only strengthens your purpose.

You dig in to ensure you’ve got the right team around you and that you don’t have any weak spots that aren’t being addressed.

But even then…

You will also enjoy our article on right path.

3. You will fail on your path to success numerous times

You’ll be upset, surprised, perhaps even a little bit angry or bitter for a brief moment

Yet, it won’t last long.

You know that you’ll learn quickly from the failure and build yourself up even better, smarter, stronger, and more focused than before.

This is where so many others quit and throw in the towel.

They fail a few times, sometimes big, sometimes small, and then they hear the voices of those around them.

4. People will tell you you’re wrong, stupid, naive, or dumb

Those who quit will let those voices and opinions take hold and eat away at their faith.

People who quit will allow those who don’t believe in what they’re doing or their ultimate goal to dig at them.

They allow these comments to slowly erode their self-confidence that things will happen and their vision will come true.

Failing to live the life you want and are working towards is not the way to live!

Your ambition has led you to take massive action on your path to success, and toward the life you desire.

You’ve stopped wishing for the life you want and instead have taken life by the horns and are working to make it happen.

Don’t let those who are too scared to go after what they truly want deter you from getting what you want and deserve.

If just being ambitious were enough, we wouldn’t have the hard times we endure, and anyone who wanted would be successful.

5. It’s HARD to keep going, especially when it feels like nothing is building

When everything seems to be falling apart, and even those who are very close to you, like a spouse or best friend, say, “maybe it’s time to get a full-time job/ let this go for a little bit. You should work and do something you can see progress on and then come back to this later”.

But you refuse to let it go.

You know that you’re on the right track.

Perhaps you’re missing something, so you go out and find another team member or mentor to help you build.

Maybe you pick up another job, but it’s something that eases the financial burden a bit and helps take the worry about the bills down a few levels.

It does not drain you of the precious energy and focus your dream requires.

Because you know that the only way to get gold of higher purity is to put it through a hotter fire, and that’s exactly what life is doing for you right now.

It’s helping you become the highest level of yourself that you can become.

Isn’t it funny that all the hard-working, smart working, committed, persistent, and diligent people are the ones who make it to be successful after all?

It’s not about just having the above characteristics.

This seems to be where so many fall off the track of success.

They think simply cultivating the above characteristics and practices is all they must do.

However, they don’t realize there is a whole other dimension they are missing…

6. You must get comfortable with discomfort

Those who quit on the path to success can’t handle getting comfortable with the discomfort of growth and challenge.

They don’t like being different, sticking out, or doing things differently.

They can’t “handle the heat in the kitchen,” so they get out.

Sometimes, this discomfort comes from their “Norms” or self-developed paradigms of “How things work,” which get challenged, flipped upside down, or smashed.

This leaves them with the realization that they have to get comfortable with the discomfort of doing things differently and that they have to relearn many things.

Including…

7. You have to re-learn how to learn

This is one of the worst realizations for some entrepreneurs and successful folks on their path to success…

What you learned in school, the approach of “How to learn” being that of memorizing something to regurgitate it on a set date, at a set time, in a set format, is next to useless on the path to success.

In fact, it’s like trying to use a wet noodle to cut glass.

Staying in the “School mindset” of learning leaves you far behind everyone who’s got the right tools and has learned to re-learn how to learn and apply new knowledge.

Memorizing information to regurgitate it in a neat, clean fashion is nice and all.

Let’s face it, though, outside of academia; it can leave you far behind everyone else.

Square up to this huge challenge and realize that you must be more creative!

Learn to tie together thoughts, ideas, and concepts from different areas and seemingly non-related fields.

Then McGuyver together a highly valuable and impactful final product.

You will not only be successful in your life, but you’ll begin to taste some of the finest experiences that life has to offer:

The experience of creating change, and something that has not been done before.

Some of the most well-known entrepreneurs have done exactly this!

Richard Branson started an airline and turned the paradigm on its head when he knew nothing about the airline business.

Gary Vaynerchuk started a media company when all he had known for most of his life was wine.

To be successful, your whole idea of how and where you learn, especially how to use that knowledge, will be flipped upside down, inside out, and spun around with a jetpack strapped to its back in outer space.

Take the time to open your mind and let your imagination and creativity be unleashed… and the world will be your oyster.

8. The more you learn, the less you realize you know

So many people believe that getting your degree or diploma is the end of your learning.

But as we just recognized, this is far from the truth.

Those who manage to get through the minefield of re-learning how to learn often capsize and sink when they come to realize:

THERE IS SO MUCH MORE ABOUT MY SPECIALTY/ AREA/ MARKET THAT I DON’T KNOW.

Why do so many people go “At Irons” and stall out or sink at this part of the success journey, especially when they’re sailing so close to Treasure Island?

Because it scares the living crap out of them.

They’ve spent all these years, all that money, and invested so much energy into becoming “THE expert” or “THE go to guy/gal.”

Suddenly, they recognize that there is more out there than they can possibly comprehend and learn.

They hit a mental “Chute” in the game of life and slide all the way back to #1 or #2 on our list.

Some would call this a part of the process of success, and others would call it “the seasons of life.”

9. The seasons get them

If you’ve made it through all of these obstacles to accomplishing your success, and you get to where you think, “You’ve DONE IT,” the seasons of life come knocking on your door and push you all the way out into the Sea of the Averages.”

Life has seasons, much as each year, yet we tend to forget this hard fact.

On your path to success, we all tend to start in the autumn.

We know that there is something that is calling us.

Perhaps from deep within us, it is an urge to DO SOMETHING… so we start, we begin to learn, first volunteering and reading, then move on to doing.

This is our planting the seeds for success, working the “earth” by taking the time to learn from others who have come before us.

However, it’s not a straightforward path to success.

We will have “spring times” where we move one step or one big leap closer to what we seek.

These are followed by the summertime, where we enjoy these steps towards our “big success.”

But those who quit after having “some success” often forget about these seasons.

This leads them to quit after experiencing this one small summer of success.

Perhaps they give up on attaining the success they are after because they neglect to celebrate and enjoy these summer times as they come or because they fail to recognize the cycles in life.

The path to success is NOT straight, and you will have more autumns and winters to come.