A mistake that cost me 5 years: Thinking preparation was progress. Reading every book. Taking every course. Planning every detail. Meanwhile, someone dumber than me started badly and figured it out. Preparation feels productive but it's often just fear dressed up as strategy. You learn to swim by getting in the water, not by studying water.
Nothing will kill more dreams over the next decade than the paralyzing curse of infinite optionality.
Decide what you want. Calculate the cost to get there. Pursue as if no other option ever existed. Fall in love with the sound.
To focus is to reject
The autistic urge to win people's friendship by being as helpful as you can, but then accidentally getting manipulated and misled by opportunists who use you for your free labour.
that burning mental exhaustion you feel when learning a hard skill isn't failure. it’s the physical sensation of neuroplasticity happening in real time.