Why Are Successful People So Boring?

How is it that people who earn their millions through tedious hard work seem able to hold on to their cash.

15:44 12 March 2021

And yet one-hit-wonder singers and lotto winners seem to burn through their cash in a matter of months? In most cases, it is because the people who won their success are more exciting than those who worked hard for years to achieve it. Where the one-hit-wonder invests the money in seven Jaguar cars (one for each day of the week), the self-made millionaire invests their money in a retirement fund. It seems that many successful people are a little dull and boring. Which begs the question, why are successful people so boring?

 

The House That Jimmy Built

 

Jimmy lives in a village, and he builds himself a mansion from bricks he made himself. It takes him years of casting each brick by hand, but he achieves it before he retires. The people in his village are envious of the massive house that Jimmy has, and they wish him ill will because he doesn't sing his happiness from the rooftops. Jimmy doesn't let people stay in his house, and he seems pretty dull.

The problem with the people in Jimmy’s village is that they only see the results of his success, they do not see the mundane, boring, and repetitive work that earned him his house. It is entirely possible that Jimmy’s success came with a price. The cost of his success was that it made him dull and boring to people who don’t know him. 

 

Famous Sports Stars

 

There are very few interesting and engaging sports stars. That is why the minority that are interesting are so popular. Take a look at the world of snooker, and it is full of people who are almost like robots because they are so clinical, stale, boring and dull.

 

Take a look at soccer stars. With the exception of a few who have mastered the world of celebrity, the rest of them are incredibly dull or incredibly dumb. How is it that these people at the top of their game are so dull or dumb?

 

The short answer is that they have dedicated all their time, effort and brainpower to one thing. In the case of soccer stars, it is a dedication to the game, but it is the same for all high-achieving sports personalities. In order to reach the top, their lives must be dominated by their game, which doesn't leave much room to develop intellect or an interesting personality. 

 

Do I Need to Become Boring to Become Successful?

 

It is fair to say that you can be very interesting and become successful, but if you consider that you will have to do the same things over and over again in order to achieve success, you are going to have a hard time “Not” becoming boring.

 

Successful people are those who are able to work on the same things over and over again without losing their motivation or their drive. Those who attack a project like a T-Rex attacking a goat are more likely to burn out and fail because the boring part of their job is too disheartening.

 

On the other hand, this doesn't mean that boring people are automatically successful. It is more likely that your success comes at a cost of being boring. If you paid the price in advance (if you are already boring), then that doesn't guarantee success; though you may find success a little easier.

 

Hard Work Brings Profit - But Hard Work is Not its Own Reward

 

Proverbs 14:23 says, “All hard work brings a profit, but mere talk leads only to poverty.” Hard work is rewarding because it gives you money, success, fame, or whatever you seek from your endeavors. However, the work itself is not its own rewards. People who pull teeth for a living are just as “Ho-Hum” about going to work as the people who clean toilets.

 

Yet, each job, no matter how horrible or mundane, seems to have some sort of emotional payoff. Even call center workers have a good day from time-to-time when they really help somebody who needed it, and even a cadaver worker has a good day from time-to-time when they do a great job in a very efficient manner. 

 

But it almost goes a little deeper than that. Take somebody who has trained to be and engaged in a career as a financial advisor. That person has trudged their way to a good position with a big company, and the expansion bid is under threat, not to mention that the graphic design department is going to be outsourced if its budget isn't renewed. Hours upon hours of work lead the financial advisor to get the expansion back on track, and they save the graphic design department for another year. That financial advisor may have spent months doing the most mundane and tedious work trying to fix the numbers, and even though the money for doing the job is amazing, it is that moment of success when the job is done that is the real payoff. 

 

What if Successful People Do Not Get Bored

 

The term “Boring” is rather subjective, but even so, is it possible that successful people are “Not” boring, but rather are not able to get bored. Look at the hyper-successful people who are not flash-in-the-pan celebrities. The likes of Bill Gates, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, or Julia Cheek, Catherine MacGregor and Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala are not exciting people. They have risen to success and power through the ability to work on the same thing for years and years with the same intensity as they started. They seem unable to become bored, so perhaps that is the secret to long-term success.

 

Perhaps the next time you feel your motivation is grinding to a halt, delete the word “Bored” from your vocabulary. Perhaps if you do, you won’t win a personality of the year award, but being boring is a fair price to pay for success.