The Invisibility of Progress

Not seeing progress doesn't mean you're not making it.

Progress is not linear. There will be times in your life and career when it doesn’t feel like you’re making progress because the results are slow, or appear non-existent.

I’ll share my own journey as a musician and creative entrpreneur.

I released my first music album, Commercial Underground, in 2006 when I was in my second year at Oxford University, studying Computer Science.

After graduating in 2007 and taking a year off to release and promote my second album, The Unknown Celebrity, I moved to London and started a job as a management consultant.

Three years later, in 2011, I quit my corporate job to become a full-time rapper. I’ve been self-employed ever since then.

Here’s a fun fact:

The first year that I made more money as a musician and entrepreneur than I used to make in my corporate job was 2019. It took eight years just to get back to my previous income level. Considering all the hours worked and expenses, my average hourly income was below minimum wage for several years.

Most people who have discovered me recently don’t know that I spent many years selling my CDs on the streets of various cities in the UK. As an independent musician, it was the best way I knew to get my music heard, make new fans, and earn an income without any support from the music industry.

In 2015, I started running pop-up shops with my friend Shao Dow in shopping malls around the country. For weeks at a time, with no days off, I was there for up to 12 hours a day – selling my CDs, T-shirts, hats, and other merchandise. The hours were long but at least I wasn’t outside in the cold anymore.

Over the years, I spoke to over 500,000 people and sold over 25,000 CDs hand-to-hand.

By the beginning of 2019 (thirteen years after releasing my first album), I had amassed 50,000 followers across all of my social media platforms. I’d reached the financial status of “Not rich, but at least I ain’t broke” as per the lyrics of my song Perseverance.

As I write this, I have over 2 million followers across my social media platforms. I share these numbers not because I think follower counts are a great measure of success – but because they’re an easily understandable metric to demonstrate the growth of my reach. Thankfully, I’m now in a comfortable financial position, and have expanded my career beyond music and merchandise, to also include writing, podcasting, public speaking, and coaching.

Long story short, it has taken nineteen years since releasing my first project to achieve the modest level of success that I have so far. That’s half of my entire life.

Over the years, I’ve experienced countless ups and downs. Very few people have experienced being rejected by hundreds of thousands of people (in real life, not just online) and being admired by hundreds of thousands. It’s quite the juxtaposition.

I don’t share my story to court sympathy nor boast. I want you to understand the sheer amount of time, dedication, and perseverance it can take before you see results that justify your efforts.

This isn’t only true of entrepreneurship. It can apply to any personal or career goal.

There are millions of successful people who have experienced more hardship than I have. But I’m not interested in competing in the Victim Olympics or Privilege World Series. Everybody has their own ‘hero’s journey’ that’s open to them, should they choose to take it on.

There will be times when the payoff for your work isn’t commensurate with the effort you are putting in. This can persist for years, or even decades. This is normal.

Not seeing progress immediately doesn’t mean that you’re not making it.

Don’t get discouraged.

Don’t be defeatist.

Don’t expect success to come quickly.

Stay the course and learn to embrace and enjoy the process.

Most people don’t achieve their goals simply because they give up too soon. But if you’re running a marathon, you’ll complete the race as long as you continue to put one foot in front of the other.

Don’t worry about what everyone else is doing. You are your own competition.

Just keep going.

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Zuby