CIMV | How To Fail And Still Win Page 1

How To Fail At Almost Everything

And Still Win (Part 02)
Hi everyone and welcome to Part 2 of How To Fail at Almost Everything
And Still Win. I am Babette Craft and I will your English conversation partner
again. First let's take a look at this passage. I will read it to you one time and
then we will look at the individual lines and phrases highlighted in blue, and
try to get the meaning of this passage. OK? So let's begin.

"Scott urges us that instead of putting the blinders on and expecting a

certain result at the end of months or years of work, instead focus on
systems. Systems are skill-based. They allow you to transfer skills to future
projects and endeavors. Approach each new opportunity with the question:
'How likely is this going to improve my broad of skills and increase my odds
of success?'

Although most of Scott's endeavors could be considered failures from a

standpoint of goals, they were actually successes from the standpoint of
systems, because they gave him skills that transferred to the next career
move and allowed him to be successful in the long run, making comics and
making millions of people laugh every day.

His dozens of failures early in life with his entrepreneurial projects like
computer games, full transfer software, meditation program, they were all
considered failures when looking at it from the goal standpoint, but from
the systems standpoint, they gave them the skill of hustle which allowed
him to put in the long hours necessary to get his comic off the ground in the
following years.

His failure to move up the ranks at a certain level at a bank that he was
working at, allowed him to develop enough business skills to market and
manage his comic business. In his time at a big corporate telephone
company, it didn't really lead to him being a CEO or anything grand, but it
gave him all the materials for his Dilbert comic, which in turn obviously was
a useful thing.

Ultimately systems lead to success because success is luck multiplied by the

skills you obtain. For example, there are many kids today that have probably
much better programming skills than Bill Gates had.

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But Bill Gates happened to be born at a certain time in history. That's just
plain lucky. Because of that luck, he made billions and billions of dollars. But
having certain skills allowed him to capitalize on the opportunity that was
presented to him.

When you focus on systems, you accelerate skills development and you
leave yourself open to notice opportunities, to pivot and make yourself
more likely to be successful. The openness of systems increases the odds of
luck finding you and success coming your way.

That was the core message that most resonated with me from Scott's book.
I highly recommend getting his book and seeing what experience of his most
help you advance your career."

Let's take a deeper look at the passage.

Let's look at this first line --

"Scott urges us that instead of putting the blinders on."

So what does this phrase mean?

"Putting the blinders on" -- so of course "to put on" means, in this case, to
wear something and what we are wearing are blinders.

Well this actually comes from a long time ago in the US when we would use
-- well in Europe and the US -- when we would use horses. Putting on
blinders is a way of blinding you or keeping your eyes focused in one
direction.

So he is telling us, "don't be like these horses." He's telling you, don't be like
a horse and be focused in only one direction and don't keep looking in that
one direction for a goal that happens in months or years. Instead focus on
systems.

So here what does "instead" mean?

So here "instead" is the same as "instead of." You can actually use either
word, you just have to change the way that the sentence is written.

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So -- "Instead focus" is the same as, "instead of focusing."

And the meaning is, "in lieu" of or "other," "not this but that."

So -- not A but B; instead of A do B; or not A do B. That helps.

OK, so -- "Systems are skill-based."

What does "skill-based" mean?

Skills are abilities.

We can get these abilities from our own experience, our knowledge, our
education. These are things that we learn.

So "based" is like a root. We often use the word -- there's a verb, "rooted."

So if something's "based" in it, it's "rooted." You can thing of a plant and how
it has its roots and sits inside the dirt. This is "based," this focused on skills.

Skill-based refers to a foundation in something, it's rooted in things like

experiences.

So this sentence means that systems -- "systems" are rooted in skills; they're
founded in skills.

"They allow you to transfer skills to future projects and endeavors."

"They allow you..." So "they" refers to systems. The "they" in here we're
talking back about the sentence above; we're talking about systems, and
systems are what give us a chance; they're what allow us to do something.

So here -- systems that are rooted in skills gives you the chance to use those
skills in different ways and with different projects.

"Approach each new opportunity with the question."

We know "opportunities," so we'll start there since we've been talking about
this the whole time -- "opportunity."

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Of course "opportunity" is a chance. It's a chance to do something. Usually

we have an opportunity to do something. Here "new" is of course something
we haven't done before, and then we have the word "each," and this is
talking about every one of those chances. So the phrase "each new
opportunity" is really saying that you have these chances to do new things,
then you want to ask yourself a question. Every single time you have the
chance to do these things you've never done before, you want to ask the
question "how likely is this going to improve my broad range of skills and
increase my odds of success?"

"How likely" -- it's opposite is "unlikely," and we use it as an adjective; we

use it to describe something.

So "how likely is something going to happen" means "what's your estimate"

-- we can put this at the top. "How likely" means "an estimate." We use it to
say that something will probably happen or not happen in the future. So an
example would be -- "it's very likely to rain tomorrow," -- or the opposite --
"it's very unlikely..." We're taking a guess; we're estimating.

So "odds of success."

The word "odd" here first -- it can actually mean different things.

"Odd" sometimes means "strange." You can say "he's an odd man," and that
means he's a strange man. It's not a bad word, but it does not mean that
here. Here we're talking about success; it's not a "weird success" it's "odds
of success." It really means in this case, "probability" or "chance."

"What are the odds of something happening?"

So for example 0% -- this is unlikely. Actually this is very unlikely something

will happen.

50% -- your chances are good -- may be likely, sort of likely, that something
would happen.

100% -- odds are very likely that something would happen.

So again we're dealing with probability, with chance, this is math talk. You
can think in percentages, 0% is very unlikely something will happen, 100%
odds are something very likely will happen.

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Alright, so what is Scott trying to tell us in this section. Let's take a look.

So what he's really trying to tell us is that it's better to focus on systems,
because systems are skill-based, they're focused and rooted in improving
your skills and these skills are things that can be used for future projects
and endeavors. You can transfer them, you can carry them to a new place
and a new project and to do new things. They are not limited to a single
opportunity, not to one opportunity, but that can be used with everything
that you do in the future.

So don't blind yourself, don't be that horse, don't put blinders on and focus
on just one thing or one goal or result. You want to look at systems, and
you're more likely to succeed.

Alright, let's continue.

"Although most of Scott's endeavors could be considered failures."

Alright, what is an "endeavor" here?

It's a lovely word; it's a good word to know; it's a good vocabulary word.

"Endeavors" -- it's a very unique word; it can be used both as a verb -- "he
endeavors to something; he endeavors to become strong; he works at
becoming strong."

Or, it can be a noun -- an endeavor -- or in this case it would be plural,

"endeavors." Things that you attempt to achieve -- this would be the noun
-- and then the verb here, "to endeavor" would be attempting to achieve
something.

[aside] I'll take away this example, so we can compare these.

Interesting word -- both verb and a noun -- "to endeavor" -- attempting to

achieve.

"Endeavors" -- things that you attempt to achieve.

So...

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This also has an interesting spelling -- this "ea."

So I'll break the word up a little so we can work on the pronunciation.

En-dea-vor -- we have three syllables:

En dea vor. Endeavor.

You can think of the "ea" as an "eh" sound in "dea" like egg -- more like a
short e -- "en dea vor."

Then this V-O-R is actually not a strong "o" sound; it sounds more like an
"e."

"Endeavor" -- "er" -- E-R sound. En-dea-vor.

Good word to learn. Means things that you attempt to achieve and they're
usually big things. So if you endeavor, you're attempting to achieve
something important, something big.

"From a standpoint of goals."

This word -- "standpoint." What is "standpoint?"

"Standpoint" means "perspective" or point of view.

This one's good; you can really think about this like you're standing
somewhere high and you can see things in front of you, see things far away
from you -- that's your perspective; that's your point of view. It's the point
where you are standing, and what you can see across from you, around you
-- standpoint.

So if you're using a goal as your point of view, then for Scott this is very
narrow, because your focus is like a horse with blinders -- you can't see very
far in front of you. But with a system -- from Scott's point of view -- you
can see further and taller and farther. You can achieve important things like
endeavors. But if you are looking from a standpoint of a goal, you can't
achieve important things like endeavors; you would be more likely to fail;
this is the word standpoint.

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"They were actually successes from the standpoint of systems because they
gave him skills that transferred to the next career move."

This phrase -- "the next career move."

So Scott -- he's a really interesting guy because he seems to try a lot of

different things. He seems to have a habit of trying different careers. If you
recall the phrase from earlier, "each new opportunity," remember, a chance
to do something you've never done before. This is Scott's habit -- is to try
new things.

When you move to the next career, you get a new opportunity to do
something new. Scott's skills transferred to each new career move allowing
him to be successful.

So we're talking about the next career, so these are your new opportunities.

Scott tried a lot of different things. He went from next career to next career.
A move is exactly that, it's to change, it's motion -- a car moves, a person
moves. So "going from place to place" -- you can think of it that way.

So this person -- if you move career, you go from career to career. The next
career move is to try new opportunities.

Scott liked going from career to career because it would give him new skills
and he was trying different things; some of them failed by goal standards,
but in the end hopefully, he came out alright, and allowed him to "be
successful in the long run."

So this is what we're talking about -- in the end he was successful,

"successful in the long run."

What does this mean? So this means "over a long time."

For example, if you buy a more expensive computer now, you will save
money in the long run.

So you can think of it sometimes as an investment. Investing money,

investing time -- you're thinking long term, over a long time, "in the long
run."

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The opposite might be, "in the short run." You're thinking over a short time
period. A cheap computer may save money in the short run, but it will
eventually cost you more.

Scott was successful over a long time because he gained skills he could use,
skills he could transfer when he moved from career to career. So in the short
term seemed like a failure, but in the long term it was a success. His long
term success, making comics and making millions of people laugh every day.

"His dozens of failures early in life with his entrepreneurial projects."

These "dozens of failures" -- take a look at that phrase, "dozens of failures."

So a dozen is actually a number; it means twelve. A dozen of things is twelve

of something. If you ask for a dozen donuts, they will give you twelve
donuts.

"Dozens of" -- so this is in plural then, if you see it has an "s" here. Dozens
of something means "a lot."

You can think of it as it means "times twelve." So it could be 24, 36, 48...
Here, we don't know; we're not counting the specifics, but it means "a lot
of."

Poor Scott, he had dozens of failures, he could have 12, 24, 36 -- he had a
lot of failures. But in the end he proved successful, in the long run.

So what is he trying to tell us here? What the writer is trying to tell us here
about Scott is that Scott may not have won his goals, which were short term,
or in the short run; he may have failed in many many ways -- and that's
dozens of failures -- but from the point of a system, he was able to learn
from his endeavors, learn from the things that he was trying to achieve, to
learn from moving from career to career, and use those skills and abilities
for the next move, the next win, which just happened to be making a comic
that made millions of people laugh and that made him a lot of money.

Let's continue.

OK, we talked about his dozens of failures and now let's look --

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"They gave him the skill of hustle." So we're talking about his failures, these
two sentences are connected.

These failures gave him the skill of hustle.

What is hustle? I actually really like this word.

Of course "skill" here -- we mentioned it earlier -- this is talking about

abilities, and those abilities you get, you get from knowledge, you get from
experience, things you learn.

So what did Scott... In this case, what did he learn from his dozens of
failures? He learned how to hustle.

Alright. Well what is this word "hustle?"

In this case, it means "to be busy." So we have a phrase in English -- "hustle

and bustle." Hustle and bustle of the city.

Hustle and bustle of the city means busyness, to be active.

But be careful how you use this word. Of course in this case it can be to be
busy. To hustle he learned the skill, the art of being busy.

Keeping busy, being busy.

The reason we have to be careful how we use this word is because it doesn't
always have a nice meaning.

So I'll give you an example. You can use it to describe a person, but if you
describe a person as a "hustler," this actually means they are a thief or a
cheater. So you don't really want to describe Scott as a "hustler," unless he's
a cheater. I hope he's not a cheater, because we want to read his book.

No, he's an active, busy person. He learned the skill of "hustle," or the art of
keeping busy.

Also if you use this in the past tense it can also sound negative too.

So for example, "he hustled." E-D -- past tense. "He hustled me." Well then
it sounds like you're telling someone that you were cheated by someone.

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So it's important just to know that you have to be careful how you use this
phrase "he hustled."

Of course someone listening to you talking or telling a story will understand

by context. So you just want to be really clear what you mean. Of course
we're talking about making money, we're talking about doing many things -
- you could say, "ah yes, I started the new job and I'm hustling," meaning,
"I'm staying busy," as opposed to if you're really angry about something and
you say, "oh he hustled me; he cheated you."

We can always tell from context. Just be aware of it.

"Which allowed him to put in the long hours."

OK, he's very busy, right? So he's putting in these long hours.

[aside] I'll clear this off for you.

"Put in long hours."

What does this mean? So this phrase means, "to work for a long time" or "to
work for many hours."

Here, "put in" -- "put in" can actually be used with different words.

So "put in" can be used with time and effort. So of course "long hours"
means to work for many hours or "to put in effort" means to work hard. So
if you put in time, we're talking about working for many hours. But if you
say, "put in effort" then we're saying he worked hard.

Working many projects knowing how to hustle, has helped him to

understand how to "get his comic off the ground." These things were
"necessary to get his comic off the ground in the following years."

"Get his comic off the ground" -- these are good phrases.

"Get his comic off the ground..." [aside] Make this bigger.

"Get this comic off the ground."

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To get something "off the ground" is directly related to an airplane. So the

airplane leaves the ground and takes flight.

"Taking flight." To get something off the ground literally or directly related
to airplanes taking off and flying.

So here, getting something off the ground -- he got his comic off the ground;
it went up; it took off. It took flight.

Entrepreneurs, like Scott are often trying to get the business off the ground;
they want to make them sustainable and successful. Scott was able to get
his Dilbert comic off the ground. It was able to take flight and soar. It's a
success; it's a win.

So what is Scott saying here? Well, he learned many things... Well, he failed
at many things -- we should say that -- he failed at things like computer
games, file transfer, a meditation program, but he learned the most
important thing, and that was this -- the skill of the art of the hustle.

And B) This skill taught him how to work, how to put in long hours, how to
make effort where he could finally make his project soar and win in the
following years.

Alright. Let's take a look at the next sentence.

"His failure to move up the ranks at a certain level."

What is this? Moving "up the ranks." Moving up the ranks. To move up the
ranks.

[aside] Shrink this a little.

Move up the ranks. Well, this actually has to deal with the military. So of
course originally, in the military you have ranks, or you have a hierarchy --
this is a fancy word for "ranks" -- or levels. Hierarchy. Levels.

So when you have ranks, or you have a hierarchy, you have a sequence of
levels. You start with a lower position, and you end with a higher position.
That's the idea -- start low, and end high. So to "move up the ranks" means
to rise from a lower level to a higher level of leadership.

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So here, he started low, and then he was supposed to move up high, but he
didn't.

That is to move up the ranks. Here, he didn't make it to a higher position;

he didn't move up from the low area where he started.

But he got skills, right? He learned some business skills.

"In his time at a corporate telephone company..."

"In his time..." What is that phrase referring to?

"In his time," or phase of something. Mostly we say life, but it's referring to
a time period, a phase of something. This is referring to Scott's life, where
he worked at this corporate telephone company. So there was a time in his
life -- a certain time period -- where he was this worker at a phone company.

You can use this in your own life. You can say, "my time as a student." You
can say, "my time as a pilot."

So in your own time, in your own life, how you experienced a phase of your
life -- that's what this phrase is used for.

Sometimes when you use "in my time," you also mean "generation." So lots
of older folks, lots of older adults like to use this for younger kids.

"In my time, we were more polite; in my time, we didn't do those things."

That's a phase; that's a time period.

It didn't really lead to him being a CEO. Remember? He did not move up the
ranks, so it did not "lead to..."

So, "lead to," here is talking about "result." "Did not result in..." you could
say.

So, Scott, working at the telephone company -- it didn't result in him

becoming a big-shot CEO. So an example might be, this junior position will
lead to a senior position in the company. Remember, we were moving "up
the ranks," the result from starting low -- it will lead to a result in a higher
position. Not the case for Scott. But that's OK.

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" -- which in turn, obviously..."

"-- obviously, was a useful thing."

What does this mean? "In turn..."

"In turn" means "then." So Scott felt "in turn..." then he found success.

Example -- Scott suffered failures in the business world which helped him
to become successful through the Dilbert comics.

So -- "which in turn" -- which then... Then there was a result; then something
happened.

So we're setting up to explain, or to talk about a result -- "in turn, then"

which then followed by a result.

Which in turn... Which then... It was a useful thing. Because he actually got
a lot of material for his Dilbert comic.

OK, so let's look at the whole meaning of this passage, what he's trying to
tell us.

Look at this whole passage. He really didn't do much in terms of promotions

at any of his old jobs. He didn't move up ranks. He didn't become a CEO.
Nothing led to a CEO while he had these different phases of his life, but the
experience led him to creating a comic. In turn -- the result -- then he
created this comic, this famous one, Dilbert. That was a result of all this
work, and all these failures.

Ultimately, systems lead to success. "Ultimately" -- this is a very strong

word. "Ultimately..."

So, "ultimately" -- it can actually mean two things. One, it can mean "finally."
When you're talking about a series of things or ideas, and you use the
opening words like "first," "next," and then "ultimately" will mean the final
thing in the series.

"Ultimately" -- final thing in the series.

So this is not really how we're using it here.

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"Ultimately, systems lead to success."

Here, we're mostly using it in the second sense.

The second sense is to say something is fundamentally or primarily...

Fundamentally -- the essence, the foundation of something.

"In the end the most important thing is that the systems will lead you to
success."

"Bill Gates happened to be born at a certain time in history."

"Happened to be born." Happened to be, in this case, born. "Happened" is

related to odds.

"Happened to," we are past tense. [aside] Let's go back.

"Happened to be born" -- "happened to" here is related to our odds.

Remember, odds are our chances, are possibilities. "Odds" here is another
word for "luck."

So "bad luck" here in this case would be something like, "he happened to be
on that bus that caught fire" -- yes, that's very unlucky.

-- if you happened to be on a bus that caught fire.

So what would be good luck? What are the good odds? "I happened to win
the lottery." Yay lottery.

OK so for Bill Gates it means Bill Gates was "lucky" that he was born at a
very certain time in history, it was the beginning of the Internet and it was
the beginning of the computer age. "That's just plain lucky."

"Plain lucky."

So "plain lucky," this is kind of slang. It just means "very." Of course lucky -
- remember, we're referring to our odds, but "plain" -- "Plain" usually is an
adjective; it's used to describe something kind of neutral. "Plain" sometimes
can be not pretty, but it's not ugly either. It's kind of neutral. It's kind of a
neutral word. "That's plain lucky."

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In this case very, very lucky. Or plain can also be "clearly." Very lucky. Clearly
lucky.

So "capitalize on this" means to profit or make the most of something. When

you capitalize on a chance or an opportunity you are making the most of it,
or getting as much as you can out of it. This can be through an experience
or this could be with money.

So here, Gates was able to make the most of the chance he had. So Gates
was able to capitalize, he was able to make the most of the chance he had
that was presented to him using the skills that he had.

So from "ultimately..."

[aside] Here, let me adjust this.

From "ultimately," this is really talking about systems, and what they can get
you. Systems are important, they help you build skills. These skills can then
be used when you find the right opportunity, just like Bill Gates had. He was
very lucky but he also had the skills and the opportunity or chance to use
them, to capitalize on them.

Let's look at this this next blue word here -- "to notice."

So what is "notice?" We'll say what is "to notice." This is "to see" or "to pay
attention to something." When you notice something you see something;
you pay attention to something.

In this case you're going to notice opportunities, or you want to notice

opportunities.

"To pivot and make yourself more likely to be successful."

"Pivot" is a very interesting word; it's a good word. "To pivot."

So this word comes from dancing, and it means to turn quickly. But it means
to turn quickly in a circle or you can say "a circular motion." So to turn
quickly in a circle, is to pivot.

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This is very frequently used when you talk about dancing. So you would say
we would turn or spin on a pivot and the pivot or the center of the circle is
your foot, and you're turning in a circle around your foot.

So here, pivoting let's you turn around quickly to face or to see

opportunities.

"That was the core message that most resonated with me from Scott's
book."

[aside] We'll go ahead and increase the size.

"-- that most resonated with me."

"Resonate" -- this means a deep full sound. Usually this refers to sounds we
hear, music, deep full sound. An example would be -- the sound of the ocean
"resonates" inside a seashell; when you put a seashell up to your ear you
can hear the deep full sound of the ocean -- sounds like the ocean. So it's a
sound that fills the body of the shell.

Well, in the sentence, it's not a sound that fills our body, but a message --
the message the writer heard most deeply and connected with. The
message the writer heard most deeply and connected with, their heart and
mind is about systems.

So here it "resonated with me," it connected to me, my heart and my mind.

It filled me with meaning.

"I highly recommend getting his book."

"Get it" -- he recommends the book; he wants you to read the book; he
thinks there's an important message that will resonate with you. So go buy
his book; go get Scott's book.

So what is this final piece telling us?

When you focus on systems, it allows you to build skills and then you can
be open to connect your skills to more opportunities. This is the main lesson
that the writer learned.

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To summarize. Systems allow you to see opportunities, allow you to pivot

and take advantage of opportunities when they happen. The reason that
systems are so successful is because they are focused on skills and those
skills are transferable. So you increase the odds, you increase the possibility
that the things that you do or try will succeed.

OK, we'll finish there. I hope you enjoyed today's passage. See you next
time. Bye.

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