When You Get to The Top

Don't lose traction...

Everyone of us aspires to hit the peak of our careers and endeavors, but we hardly understand what it means to stay there. It always seems like success is the goal, whereas staying at the peak means understanding Asake’s mind on lonely at the top - at least from a certain perspective.

If you know me well, then you should know Steve - He goes by many identities in our cluster, but he’s got a smart mind and a Korean spirit, weird abi? Anyways we had a conversation around a recent industry beef.

So J cole, Kendrick and Drake recently had a war of words on who is the greatest rapper. These guys used to be called the big three, they felt like a team in the days of growth, so what happened?

Let’s tell a story:

Three hungry guys are looking for bread, their search for the next meal drives them to hustle day and night for one purpose - we want to eat bread. So they begin to find bread, they first find bread without flavour, then buttered bread along the way, milk bread arrived and then sardined bread. At this point, they can afford to eat any flavour desired. So check the progression, from no bread to good bread and then flavoured bread. It got so good that they each bought ovens for production, hence transitioning from consumers into producers.

Success arrives and here lies the enemy, comparison. One of the three begins to check on whose oven is better, faster and more efficient. The switch from “I need to be the best version of myself” to “I need to be better than others” is the beginning of a fall off.

Anticipating success is something we all aspire, but preparing for it is a different ball game entirely. Defining your purpose and what drives you from the get go would align your future position as a successful person.

I have no problem with a fight between legends, however be careful not to judge the level of your success by envy of another. At the moment, we all seek bread; when we owns ovens, don’t bother about whose is bigger. What was the purpose of your hustle? Have you reached it? How can you be better than yesterday?