Canadian-American actor, Jim Carrey, said it best: “I think everybody should get rich and famous and get everything they ever dreamt of so that they can see that it’s not the answer”

Reflecting back, I realize that I was guilty of associating the car one drives, the size of their house, their job title or the amount of bling on their body directly with their level of success. As a result, I found myself keeping up with the Joneses and it took a toll on my mind and body, where the chase never seemed to end.

I purposefully re-routed myself in search of meaning and fulfilment only to stumble upon a journey where I began researching and deeply studying success and greatness. My research isn’t done, but my perception has surely altered. As a coach and educator, I have observed the students and young professionals that I work with talk about success and it breaks my heart sometimes when their innocent minds are constantly corrupted by loud marketing messages that convince them that they need the latest iPhone, the coolest pair of Nikes and the hottest Louis Vuitton attire to be considered successful.

As part of the research, I am not just studying the lives of the greats such as Einstein, Da Vinci, Darwin and many more, but also reaching out to 21st-century contemporaries to learn their perspective on the topic directly one-on-one.

I had the extreme pleasure of having a deep conversation on success, greatness, leadership, mindset and more with an international sportsperson who sprinted ahead of more than 200 million people to grab a prestigious spot for himself in the playing XI of the Pakistani Test Cricket team: Shan Masood.

You can watch the full interview here

Here are some key insights and lessons on success and leadership from Shan himself.

1. An outcome-oriented mindset results in inconsistencies

Shan had a good start to his international cricket career but soon faced an extended period of inconsistent performances where he saw himself get dropped from the team. With a more mature perspective now, Shan looked back at the early phase of his career and identified his outcome-oriented mindset (or in other words a fixed-mindset) as the cause of the inconsistent performances.

Regardless of the career path that you have chosen for yourself, it is important to identify your mindset as it can be the foundation for either success or failure.

An outcome-oriented mindset is one where you are obsessed about a positive outcome without paying heed to the process. As a result, people with this mindset miss the opportunities to reflect and analyze their flaws. For Shan, the obsession about playing for the Pakistani Test team was so intense that he failed to create a strategy towards achieving that goal initially.

On the other hand, people with a process-oriented mindset are more strategic in their approach. They are open to experimentation along the journey and take time to analyze their mistakes. After spending a few years outside the international team, Shan invested in developing his mental skills and became more strategic and process-oriented in his approach towards achieving his goals. He made a comeback into the team in 2018 as a transformed cricketer and hasn’t looked back since.

ACTIONABLE TIP: Use the following test to determine the current state of your mindset. Remember, it is not about where you are, but about where you want to go.

2. Your environment is key for your growth

Let’s dig deeper into the investment Shan made into the mental aspect of the game.

After a poor outing against England in 2016, Shan got dropped from the team. He used that time to invest not just in his technical skills by hiring a professional batting coach but also in his non-cognitive skills. As a batsman, he realized that batting is a decision-making process and the decisions are made using the mind. Hence, for him, it was really important to train his brain. He invested in self-help books, podcasts and a psychologist to prepare him for the uphill battle against his old-self.

To me, training the brain is not an option but a compulsion regardless of our field of work.

Just like our physical body needs nutrients to stay healthy, our brains need nourishment to become sharper, faster and stronger. Our environment determines the level of nourishment the brain receives: what we listen to, what we read, what we watch and what company we keep.

If the environment feeds more positive thoughts to our brain and tells the brain: You can learn, you can grow, you can develop, then the brainological cycle makes the brain believe all of it and creates that confirmation and conviction in the subconscious part of the brain.

And of course, the opposite happens, if the environment feeds the brain with negative thoughts, leading to self-destruction rather than self-development.

Actionable Tip: Pay attention to your environment and how you are spending time-consuming information from various channels: What are you reading, what are you listening to, what are you watching? With a quick glance, you can figure out the path you are on.

3. Tangible success is a byproduct of the intangible

From Greek philosophers such as Socrates to Sufi poets like Rumi and all the way to modern-day tech entrepreneurs like Jack Ma, have emphasized the importance of taking the journey inwards to study one-self.

It was no surprise, hence, that Shan too stated that the first step towards success in any facet of life is to take the inner journey to better understand yourself and raise your level of self-awareness before investing heavily in the technical skills.

The journey inwards allowed Shan to be honest with himself about his fixed mindset and the technical flaws in his cricketing skills. As a result, he was able to assess himself and create a robust strategy towards self-transformation.

Actionable Tip: Shan shared some really powerful tips on how to take that inner journey and invest in the intangibles:

• Be honest with yourself — This is difficult but extremely important if you actually want to improve and succeed. Don’t mask your flaws. There should be no shame in admitting your flaws to your own self, after all, it is for the purpose of a greater good.

• Act and don’t be scared — Once you admit to the flaws and discover the areas of improvement, create an action plan and act on that plan to take steps towards a better version of yourself.

• Get yourself outside your comfort zone — This step goes hand-in-hand with the step above. By acting on a plan towards a version 2.0 of yourself, you place yourself in the growth zone. And yes, you will stutter, fall and perhaps even fail in this zone. But don’t be scared, those downhill moments will form the monumental and foundational lessons on the path to success.

4. Leadership is about empowering your teammates

As the most successful captain of his franchise team, Multan Sultan, at the Pakistan Super League (PSL) 2020, Shan spoke about the secret behind the team’s success: a culture of empowerment.

In this culture, there is no concept of seniority which can be an alien concept in a lot of workplaces and civil societies. This is a culture where everybody is equal: A flat organization with evenly distributed ownership and a figurative open door policy.

In a culture of empowerment, the leader is able to fulfill the most basic and fundamental human needs as per psychologist Abraham Maslow: the need to feel safe. Once your team feels safe, they aren’t afraid to speak up or to experiment or to fail. The ownership aspect coupled with the safety net feeds directly into individual and team motivation.

Actionable Tip: Reflect on your team’s or organization’s culture and get a reality check on whether you are breeding in a culture of empowerment or in a culture of hierarchical totalitarianism?

It’s not false that successful people drive fancy cars, live in posh neighbourhoods and have the latest and greatest gadgets, it’s just that they acquired these tangible possessions as a byproduct of their investment in the intangibles.