Eugene Plotkin is an investment banker, CEO, and an entrepreneur who has not only lived through multiple market downturns, but has also remained consistently successful through it all. But don’t call the Harvard-educated multimillionaire lucky. The financier says he approaches life just like he does his ledgers: strategically, patiently, and most of all, consistently.
Read on to glean his five factors of success.
1. Unplug often, says Eugene Plotkin
The social media “likes” can wait. So, too, can that hot new show you want to stream. Create more time by unplugging from the glow of your smartphone or TV, he tips.
“We live in a world of distractions,” Eugene Plotkin says. “Every billboard, every website, every mobile app — they have all been psychologically optimized to grab our attention and never let it go. Have you ever counted the number of hours that you spend on various streams and apps and websites in a typical week? Try it sometime, and I guarantee you will be shocked. All that time spent on mindless entertainment is time taken away from self-improvement, whether it be in your career or in your personal life.”
Indeed, a 2020 study of 10,000 people across five countries — U.S., U.K., France, Germany, and Spain — shows that the average person spends more than six hours per day online. An hour or more of that time is spent on various social media platforms. And with more flashy apps entering the mainstream, that number is bound to grow.
“It’s not that we don’t have time in life; it’s that we don’t know what to do with it,” Plotkin says. “We have become a post-hedonistic society. Everything is about entertainment all the time. You have to unplug, if for no other reason than to understand just how much free time you actually have,” Plotkin explains. “Take one day where you only take calls and reply to text messages, but otherwise have no interaction with the internet or with television. You are going to feel like time is crawling. You will itch to plug back into the matrix. If you’re able to resist and make it through one day, you will realize that you have all this free time — time you can use to learn a new skill, or to exercise, or to volunteer, or just to take a walk.”
2. Find a new passion
With all of that newfound free time, Plotkin says you can channel it into something productive. “Decide what you truly care about, whether it’s exercise, education, or entrepreneurship. Then set up a daily routine in which that thing you care about is given at least a couple hours of your day.”
3. Get into a healthy routine — and stick with it
You could also get moving. According to experts, fewer than 25% of all Americans engage in the recommended level of physical activity. People spend too little time exercising or being active. As a result, many chronic diseases are on the rise.
“Do you feel like your life is out of control, like you’re stuck in the same old rut and powerless to change it?” asks Plotkin. “I’ve been there. I know exactly how it feels. The problem is that we let life put us into a routine rather than creating a routine and putting our life into it. Imagine if you had an hour to take a shower; that would be pretty easy. What if you only got hot water for five minutes a day? Would you be able to learn how to take a five-minute shower? I bet you could. The truth is, virtually, all of us could be more efficient if we imposed a schedule on ourselves.”
And you definitely shouldn’t wait until New Year’s Day to turn a new leaf. In January, well-intentioned gym goers snap up brand-new gym memberships — but by February and March, many of those memberships lapse as people find it more difficult to follow through than to sign up.
4. Master a skill
Winning at life takes more than talent. It’s grit that separates the wheat from the chaff. It’s trying again and again, and, at times, failing again and again, at a task before you truly master it. Such is the playbook many of the greats — athletes, investors, authors, celebrities, and the like — live by.
“We have forgotten how to apprentice ourselves,” adds Eugene Plotkin. “Yet, who are the people we look up to? It’s people who have spent thousands of hours mastering a skill. The truth is that it’s never too late to begin that process. Find your passion and commit to perfecting it.”
Eugene Plotkin brings up multiple examples of people who became exceptional later in their lives. Vera Wang became a fashion designer and Suzanne Collins wrote the The Hunger Games series when each was in their 40s. Joseph Campbell didn’t start the famous canned food company and Julia Child did not write her first cookbook until each was in their 50s. Sam Walton founded Walmart when he was in his 40s, and Ray Kroc took over McDonald’s in his 50s.
5. Be specific in your goals, and relentless in your pursuit of them
“It’s hard to be good and it’s next to impossible to become exceptional,” Plotkin admits. “Most of us think about all the pain and difficulty of achieving something and that’s enough to demotivate us. David Goggins famously tells how he wanted to try out for the Navy SEALs but needed to lose more than 100 pounds in less than three months to qualify. The first day, he tried to go on a 4-mile run but couldn’t even make it 1 mile. He then went home, got a big milkshake, and watched TV. But you know what? He went out the next day, and the day after that, and the day after that. Eventually he became a Navy SEAL and an ultramarathon runner. You know why? Because he refused to give up. So, you have to decide if you want that milkshake and TV show, or you want to fight for something extraordinary. We all have that choice.”
As if his acceptance to the Navy SEALs weren’t enough, in 2018, David Goggins published an autobiography called Can’t Hurt Me: Master Your Mind and Defy the Odds. The book became a New York Times bestseller and sold more than 2.5 million copies.
“The problem most people have is not that they don’t know what they want, but that they don’t know how to get there,” Eugene Plotkin explains. “The big goal is easy to define, whether it’s the mansion on the hill, or the six-pack abs, or the corporate C-suite. The hard parts are the thousand little steps required to get there. A thousand steps is hard to contemplate — but you know what’s easy to contemplate? One little step. If you just focus on what you can do today to get a little bit closer to your goal, and then do that, then the thousand steps will take care of themselves.”
