You never actually make it.
Casey Neistat said this once.
And my intuition says it couldn’t be more true.
If you haven’t seen Casey, he’s an incredible example of where hard work in the video industry can get you. Go watch his work before he started vlogging and you’ll see he’s incredibly talented at his craft as well.
In a video reflecting on his career path, he explains how he landed a television series with major American TV network HBO and at that time he thought he had “made it”. So then sat back for two years while the show ran its course, not pursuing any further opportunities.
After the show finished he’d realised he was still exactly where he’d started and in order to start his next project, he now needed to do even more work than he’d done previously to land his next opportunity.
What’s more although he’s achieved some fantastic success since, even now just like all the rest of us, he still needs to keep working to find his next film job or opportunity.
The idea of making it, centres around getting to a point in your career where you’re so successful that work will just keep coming your way and you can relax and sit back while increasingly better and better opportunities flood into your inbox.
But in actual fact, even for people like Spielberg and Scorsese, sure they’ve had unbelievable success but yet they still need to keep improving and making better films to secure their next job.
It might seem disheartening and make you wonder if it’s actually worth dedicating so much of your life to pursuit of a goal if in the end you’re never actually going to make it. But my intuition says that fully embodying the idea is hugely motivational. It draws your focus right on to your next project, exactly where your ambition needs to be.
Maybe you want to make Holywood Feature films, but focusing on making your next passion project the best it can be is definitely a more attainable goal. And you only need it to get one view from the right person to springboard you to Hollywood success.
I’ve been incredibly lucky to have some amazing opportunities in my career so far, and 18 year old me would definitely have thought that where I am today is making it. But in actual fact, today I still feel like I’m just getting started.
So remember, you never actually make it and I wish you every success.
Jack
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Here’s the link to Casey’s video, it explains the idea far better than I have… https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YaGKf6266PY
Also as usual I’ve paraphrased Gary Vaynerchuk’s ideas, you should check him out now because I think in our lifetime he’s going to be the most well known person in the world.