My parents weren't exactly the best with money, so we lived paycheck to paycheck. Meanwhile my childhood friends and grade school classmates were of rich families. For the longest time ever, I thought I was severely disadvantaged because I was relatively poor unlike them.

But in high school, things changed. Turns out the families with deep pockets were running into money troubles while my family was heading in the opposite direction finally. My old man told me why this was happening: it's not how much you make, but how much you pay yourself. My rich friends' parents were making tons, but had horrible spending/saving habits, with my father earning peanuts but having a keen sense of living within our means. My friends were complaining on how they couldn't achieve as much as they wanted, if only they had more time, they rationalized. Meanwhile, I was incredibly productive despite having a fraction of their spending money and free time.

It took me a while to figure this out: being poor is a sort of advantage. Sure, wealth has obvious advantages, but often a rich kid will take that for granted, never fulling understanding the why/how. My family dug themselves out of their hole cause they really learned how money worked relative to their situation. I hustled for a job and worked out and studied efficiently. I became more successful than my peers cause I learned how to work hard and smart, truly internalizing the value of little achievements that accumulate over time and how to become proactive in making bank.

Then I noticed this general trend. Many things that seem like a jarring disadvantage actually encourage growth and self-improvement, which isn't pushed forward as much in other situations (like the poor vs. rich thing I just explained). I noticed many guys who were average looking had more success with girls than many inherently handsome guys. It's because these average guys had to learn the hard way that looks aren't everything sooner than the attractive guys. The former had to focus to take of themselves more and build a better inner game than the latter. I noticed this in my classes too, after a while, the hard workers trumped the lazy geniuses and for the same line of reasoning.

And that's the secret to bettering yourself, to beating out rivals in a competition, and to approaching women successfully. How/why you work with what you have helps you so much more than what you have. If life is a game, then there is a meta-game if you will. It helps if you have a nice face or spending money for nice clothes and a gym membership, but it won't help as much as it can if you don't understand how it improves inner game and take advantage of that. It doesn't hold a candle to looking average, but actively building your body with workouts you can do at home and cultivating your mind with books from the library. That's why a lot of pick up artists aren't necessarily the most attractive guys and why wealthy and successful people aren't necessarily from the most cushioned backgrounds.

In essence this is what inner game is, where confidence is derived from, where peace of mind is born. It's not starting off with tons of resources to your advantages, but using yourself to fully understand the benefits of those resources and making the most of them.

This is what helped me with pickup. I wasn't born the most attractive or smoothest guy, but I worked with the few things I had going from me and got farther than guys born with these perks.

What can you take away from this?

Don't compare yourself to other people but don't rationalize not pushing yourself out of your comfort zone with excuses.