2018 BOOKS: THE 10X RULE BY GRANT CARDONE

This may come as something of a surprise, but I’ve always had a bit of fascination when it comes to entrepreneurship and success. Making this clear from the get-go: I’m a terrible businessman and I have been an abject failure at everything I ever attempted to do. I can definitively say I am not the intended audience of this book. Still… For some crazy reason, I often find myself drawn to books, shows, podcasts, articles, etc. about how entrepreneurs build successful companies and become recognized.

Anyway, I got messing around on Google when I should have been writing chord charts – I really need to stay off the internet – and started looking around for musicians who are actually making something a living through streaming revenues. (And of course… how they can actually do it.) I came across this guitarist whose name I completely forgot to write down who somehow managed to get onto curated playlists and break into licensing. One of the books he mentioned inspiring him was Grant Cardone’s “The 10X Rule: The Only Difference Between Success and Failure.” (2011) For whatever reason, I immediately hit the online bookstores.

Google is on my shitlist. I used to love Google, but then Google Wallet stonewalled me FOR TWO MONTHS by holding money sent to me FOR MY FATHER’S FUNERAL EXPENSES. It will be a cold day in Hell before I use Google Wallet again. Their customer service was abominable and condescending the entire time and you had all these people passing the buck and no doubt getting a good laugh screwing over some nameless guy who actually NEEDED the money. After seven identity confirmations, three letters, ten phone calls, and even getting my BEST FRIEND to create a Google Wallet account – which they THEN said didn’t solve the “problem” – they finally returned the money to my sister two months to the date. She then Paypalled it to me and I had it that evening. Mind you I originally asked them to do exactly that.

FUCK GOOGLE.

Yes, I said it. If my website and my workplace website didn’t use Gmail and Google Calendars and products and my music collection wasn’t on Play Music, I’d get rid of every Google account I own.

Jeff Bezos had just donated $33 million in scholarships to Dreamers, so I decided Amazon would get my money this time. At $4.49 on Kindle, I just hit that dangerous “One-Click-Purchase” button and had the book on my tablet seconds later.

Honestly, my record for finishing books is not that great. Between Amazon and Google Books (fuck them), I’ve amassed a nice little “digital graveyard.” I’ve finished a few. Lewis Howes and Isaiah Hankel did fine. From Half-Priced Books, I can add Keith Ferrazzi, Peter Guber, and Tim Ferriss’s “Four Hour Work Week” to the list I’ve got cover to cover.

I haven’t finished a single Tim Ferriss book after that. (They aren’t bad… but I haven’t finished them. I really need to stop buying them.) I got Dave Asprey’s “Bulletproof” and read a couple hundred pages and stopped. I try to be open, but the pseudoscience and non-stop advertisements for his products finally got to me. Maybe I’m being too hard on Asprey, but there were just too many times I thought “Really, Dude?” Tim Ferriss is nuts, too, but I never felt like he insulted my intelligence.

In comparison, I actually plowed through The 10X Rule fairly quickly. About three days, if I remember correctly. The biggest thing I appreciated was that it was relentlessly focused. (Go figure… and you can tell from this blog entry that I am not.) The main thrust is that people don’t achieve success because 1.) They set their goals way too low and 2.) They don’t take enough persistent action to achieve them. Cardone spends the rest of the book examining possibly whys, looking at how to fix these areas, talking about potential pitfalls, and – through it all – laying down a mindset to achieve success.

While I wouldn’t argue that it is anything ground-breaking – Gary Vaynerchuk also has a book languishing in my digital graveyard – I’d say Cardone makes the argument in his own way and based significantly on his own experiences.

Would I recommend the book to someone else? Honestly… yes. Not that I should be bragging about it, but it is my first “finish” of 2018 and at least inspired me to throw more stuff at the wall and perhaps not worry so much about whether it sticks or smears. Given the “life season” I am in and the directions where I feel myself drawn, the book was exactly what I needed to read at this time.

All the best,

TKP
2/1/18