How the world functions and how it grew to what it is today has always fascinated me. I wanted to be able to see the bigger picture, how the everyday individual in society collectively made an impact.
Life can be much broader once you discover one simple fact: Everything around you that you call life was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it… Once you learn that, you'll never be the same again.
It took me some time to truly understand what Steve Jobs meant. I eventually realized that entrepreneurs tend to have a different eye for the world in which we live.
Entrepreneurs are opportunists. They're often able to take problems people face and create things from it. The average person might encounter problems and assume a solution already exists, or simply leave it for someone else to fix.
Opportunists always act on opportunities presented; they always walk the talk. It's important to note that execution can be a major obstacle for most. The mental barrier to not execute is a common source that stops entrepreneurs from being born.
I spent some time observing and learning more about these kinds of individuals; the ones who have a deeper understanding of society, know how to execute and are motivated to achieve greatness.
I thought that by surrounding myself with them, I'd learn more about how to think like them and could then learn more about myself. I thought I could test myself to see if I could adapt to their mindset and most importantly, share my knowledge with others.
After spending some time doing this, I decided to "deconstruct" opportunists to understand what they did to gain that title. Aside from that, being able to distinguish these individuals was difficult to accomplish after consistently networking and befriending all kinds of individuals.
After quite some time, I started to see some patterns and learned a lot in the process. This was all rooted down to one factor: diversity.
This was the key ingredient in being able to truly understand how society works, how we behave, how our markets change, how growth affects our futures and how individuals (or groups) can impact society. These well-rounded entrepreneurs are the great kind of entrepreneurs.
Dabbling in different fields and understanding your strengths and weaknesses allows you to learn more about yourself and fuel your creative drive, which will put you one step closer toward a greater self.
I must stress that it is not diversity itself that makes the entrepreneur; it's the opportunities presented and how we act on them. Diversity does not lead to better self-development or success. It is one of the main factors, but the root of which is what makes the individual able to relate to an issue or problem.
It's about experience in the field or ability to correlate previous skills with one another.
These individuals possessed components necessary for them to be considered as opportunists. They had better understandings of how we behave socially, interact with one another and more specifically, our behaviors and wants.
We may view a certain factor as a single one, but these individuals are able to distinguish the small parts and the contributions they have. This all rooted back to their diversified backgrounds and their deeper understandings of all aspects of life.
The source of diversity was often the activities and studies in which they got involved during their early college years.
Surprisingly, we may possess talents or skills that we haven't yet nurtured, so we assume we're not skilled at it. This is absolutely false; I believe any talent can be mastered through willingness and time. Aside from this, many individuals have failed many times.
Persistence and the ability to constantly execute, even after failure, is crucial, despite the risks involved.
Be as open-minded as you can be. Work with your resources and act on your opportunities. Gen-Yers constantly have great opportunities; we're able to acquire new skills and try new things that could impact not only ourselves, but also even those around us.
If you choose to see the world from a new perspective and open your mind to new fields, new opportunities may present themselves; opportunities that may have been in front of you the whole time. What you do now will shape who you become.