How did MJ have the balls to start a website when there were other sites already on the market probably built by proffesional programmers?

What made him think he could build a better website? What was his competitive advantage? Passion? Knowing the industry?

Did he initially enjoy programming or did he do it purely because he saw a need.

Did he analyze the market before starting the website or did he use intuition? How did he come to the conclusion to invest his time in this particular website instead of another project / business? WADM?

What was his initial plan when he arrived in Phoenix or did he just have faith something good would happen?

What was his contingency plan if the website didn’t work or that just wasn't a consideration?

How did he deal with the stress of uncertainty … that the website wouldn’t possibly gain traction and this could be another failure?

How did he deal with the possibility of Bankruptcy?

How did he maintain discipline and keep his eye on the ball. Did he have a system to keep him on track?

How did he deal with the stress of programming? If I programmed 8-12 hours every day I would go insane. Programming is one of the most challenging tasks. Did he at least exercise during this time and maintain some balance? Did he have relationships during this time or was he exclusively dedicated to the website? Did he call his mom during this time?

How did he prevent himself from retreating back to the comfort zone once he started cashflowing $10,000/ month?


How did he come up with the statistic of 14% chance of attaining millions in 6 years using the FastLane? This probability seems very high to me?

From what I remember about his book, he did freelance work as a programmer and web designer. He used that to keep himself afloat while building his Fastlane. Chuma Mode. It sucks but it's fun at the same time.

But instead of making a topic, you probably should have PMed him.

It's not possible to Private Message MJ on this forum.

You "think" too much. Thinking is very important, but when it comes to business, you have to think "enough."
Do too much of it, and you will never start because you want to have all the answers/pieces of the puzzles before you begin trying to put it together.

How did MJ have the balls to start a website when there were other sites already on the market probably built by proffesional programmers?

Click to expand...

What made people stand on the front lines face to face knowing that they were going to get shot, while defending a country that didn't even exist yet?

What made people kill themselves when not drafted to fight for their country in the World Wars?

What gave Lincoln the courage to allow his country to go to war?

What gave Steve Jobs the ability to enter & dominante not 1, but multiple markets where he did not always have the 'movers advantage?'

What gave the Wright brothers the courage to build a plane when someone else, who was government funded was trying to do the same thing?

...and so on..


"Start With Why". -- Read that Book

I won't pretend I know why MJ did what he did, but I can answer for myself:

ions said:

How did MJ have the balls to start a website when there were other sites already on the market probably built by professional programmers?

What made him think he could build a better website? What was his competitive advantage? Passion? Knowing the industry?

Click to expand...

Professional programmers means nothing. Give me a hobby programmer who has been coding since he was 3 any day

He saw what was missing and provided it - if anyone takes anything away is that finding the right USP that matters to the market is more than 90% of the deal - a giant slayer.

ions said:

What was his contingency plan if the website didn’t work or that just wasn't a consideration?

Click to expand...

Burn bridges, don't build them up. There's nothing like necessity to kick you in the a$$ and make you think to make it work.

ions said:

How did he deal with the possibility of Bankruptcy?

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Bankruptcy schmankruptcy, especially when you are already broke

ions said:

How did he deal with the stress of programming? If I programmed 8-12 hours every day I would go insane. Programming is one of the most challenging tasks. Did he at least exercise during this time and maintain some balance?

Click to expand...

There's no suck thing as balance, only focus. You can have balance later, first you have to hustle.

You are right EastWind.

I am afraid because I took a high risk road five years ago and it almost killed me. If it wasn't for my parents I probably wouldn't be here.

I don't want to recklessly repeat the same experience, especially for my parents' sake. I can tolerate massive personal failure if the odds of success are decent but I think MJ’s probability of 14 % is too high for the majority of fast lane businesses. MJ is basically saying that in theory 14% of the population can be multi-millionaires in their 30’s and 40’s.

Your response motivated me to do a WADM analysis on my options. It is a great tool. I will bounce ideas in my head for another 4 weeks max before I pull the trigger and don’t look back.

Thanks for the responses.

Basically the answer is the circumstances forced MJ to take the risk as he had no other options.

After my bottom experience, I also felt that cornered feeling and there was only one path to take- to start my own IT business. Unfortunately after 3.5 years I have not been able to scale it.

Perhaps I should burn all my bridges, and go near bankruptcy again to get the impetus to explode my performance. I was hoping there is another way to tap that focus.

ions said:

Perhaps I should burn all my bridges, and go near bankruptcy again to get the impetus to explode my performance. I was hoping there is another way to tap that focus.

Click to expand...

I don't want to be a dick about it, but I am certainly not advocating recklessness.

Please read MJ's book if you have not already and look into why you are doing it and how you are doing it - USP. In my experience which projects were failures and which were successes - it was the right USP. Differentiation, uniqueness in terms of how you communicate as well as how important is the unmet need you are focusing on to the market is 90% on the way in the right direction to success.

One thing that propelled me through the years on top of my entrepreneurial nature was the fact that I hated jobs, I crave control above all else and always defy "authority", so I was and still am for all intense and purposes unemployable

Hey ions,

I highly recommend you read his book since it answers all of your questions ... and you get to read a great book

I will give you a run through, but i'll be honest, people on this forum do no like posts like the one you made because they know you didn't put any effort into researching this on your own. (i.e. you didn't read the book, you didn't go through the legendary threads: Legendary Threads etc etc.)

Btw, don't take that as some sort of insult, i'm just letting you know, for future reference.(Trust me I have seen some things lol...)

Alright so for the things you wanted answered:

1. He knew nothing of the industry but he found a need that he committed to exploit. ( he used to drive limo's and people would always ask him if he knew of a limo service in another city... as this kept happening he saw a need for a service)

- At this point he was already fed up with his life and he finally decided to do something about it. So he read a lot of books and learned to code and also set up a directory. (He freelanced web design jobs in order to pay rent after he quit his job)

2. He didn't "think" he could make a website, he simply looked at the competition and asked what he could do better. He did not care about programming as his driving for was his passion FOR FREEDOM. It just so happened that coding was going to get him there, due to the service he was going to provide.

3. Yes of course he analyzed the market and he did a financial analysis (you can check get a lot more details if you check out this interview:The Founder Who Sold Limos.com. Twice. – with MJ DeMarco | Business Tips His intuition was obviously used on a lot of decisions but it was not used to build a business. The recognized need was built to build the business, his intuition led him through the right path of how to make it and when to change it(btw, this intuition came from him constantly reading books about millionaires who succeeded)

4. The plan in Phoenix was nothing other than he was affected by bad weather so he wanted to give himself the best environment. But, it gave him huge leverage as he was now homeless unless he stepped up.

5. Contingency plan wasn't applicable (as mentioned earlier he was doing freelance work)

6. The stress of uncertainty goes away if you are in a certain mindset. He was at a point where he was so sick and tired of all the BS and he worked like never before to create something. Instead of concentrating on what "could happen" he concentrated on how he could make his business better all the time.

7. He had many systems to keep him on track. ( I have written out very detailed notes, so PM if you would like them)

8. He did not deal with the stress of programming. He did not care about the stress of programming. All he cared about was getting his freedom and whatever needed to be done to get there got done. (You can't maintain balance if you want to get wealthy quickly. This is probably the biggest lie I have been fed for the last 5 years and by all self-development speakers. Everyone preaches balance, yet none of them had balance until they made it big.) No exercise, macaroni and cheese was his breakfast, lunch and dinner good sir!

9. There was no comfort zone until he reached his goal (which he planned out BTW)

10. The statistics are much better explained in the book (as is all this info tbh). However the jist of it is that not many people get out of their comfort zone to start a business. (I.e. all the people who are graduating with me this semester are all looking for careers)


I hope that helps, :smxF:

ions said:

How did MJ have the balls to start a website when there were other sites already on the market probably built by proffesional programmers?

What made him think he could build a better website? What was his competitive advantage? Passion? Knowing the industry?

Did he initially enjoy programming or did he do it purely because he saw a need.

Did he analyze the market before starting the website or did he use intuition? How did he come to the conclusion to invest his time in this particular website instead of another project / business? WADM?

What was his initial plan when he arrived in Phoenix or did he just have faith something good would happen?

What was his contingency plan if the website didn’t work or that just wasn't a consideration?

How did he deal with the stress of uncertainty … that the website wouldn’t possibly gain traction and this could be another failure?

How did he deal with the possibility of Bankruptcy?

How did he maintain discipline and keep his eye on the ball. Did he have a system to keep him on track?

How did he deal with the stress of programming? If I programmed 8-12 hours every day I would go insane. Programming is one of the most challenging tasks. Did he at least exercise during this time and maintain some balance? Did he have relationships during this time or was he exclusively dedicated to the website? Did he call his mom during this time?

How did he prevent himself from retreating back to the comfort zone once he started cashflowing $10,000/ month?


How did he come up with the statistic of 14% chance of attaining millions in 6 years using the FastLane? This probability seems very high to me?

Click to expand...

Thank you for the time you took to answer my questions The Truth.

When I wrote the original post I read about 65 % of MJ's book in two days. To be honest I was disappointed by the book probably because I was so excited and over-hyped it in my mind. I love MJ's you tube videos and expected the book to be like his videos.

I felt I wasn't getting the information I was looking for in the book. Yesterday I read chapter 29 slowly and was enjoying the book more.

Yesterday I also read cantwait2's success story and it was truly epic and inspirational.

I will respond further to you later on today The Truth as I am interested in the systems you documented. ( I have to run to a squash game right now)

Again thank you very much for taking the time The Truth.

Hi The Truth,

I read MJ's interview on mixenergy. Thanks for providing the link. It was a good interview with some concrete numbers.

I was thinking about your answers quite a bit and appreciate your response.

ions said:

I am afraid because I took a high risk road five years ago and it almost killed me. If it wasn't for my parents I probably wouldn't be here.

...I can tolerate massive personal failure if the odds of success are decent but I think MJ’s probability of 14 % is too high for the majority of fast lane businesses.

Click to expand...

You contradict yourself here. When you are taking a risk, what do the odds of success have to do with if you can tolerate it or not? Would it be the opposite of what you wrote?

If the risk of success is 90% and you fail, wouldn't you feel like shit because 9 of 10 make it? If the risk of success is 5% and you fail, you would actually feel worse about your failure?

I think maybe you are just too intense or you may have a win or nothing attitude. That's not bad for business, but for your health it could be.

ions said:

After my bottom experience, I also felt that cornered feeling and there was only one path to take- to start my own IT business. Unfortunately after 3.5 years I have not been able to scale it.

Perhaps I should burn all my bridges, and go near bankruptcy again to get the impetus to explode my performance. I was hoping there is another way to tap that focus.

Click to expand...

It does sound like you are either 100% going for it or never going to do it. You should always analyze worse case scenario and understand it. For most people on this forum, worse case scenario is that your business fails and you have to get a job. Remember, that is the BEST case scenario most of the rest of the world.

Thanks for your response Biophase.

Before I respond to your post I want to say that I just finished reading chapter 30 and it was excellent.

It shattered my illusion that it’s possible to find highly profitable work I will love. The fact that “doing what you love” for money often contaminates what you love was a great insight.

The best solution to live a passionate life is to take calculated risks towards your dreams (fastlane). Once you made your money, THEN you can then do what you love.

As long as the road I am travelling on converges at my dream I will have the passion to persevere. That road could entail drudgery but as long as I BELIEVE I am moving towards my dream that should give me enough fuel to persevere and to remain passionate.

The trick is to quickly exit the road once you see it’s not converging towards your dream and to understand that doing anything else is a passion killer. A life without a dream is stale and will eventually lead to suffering even with all the security in the world.

You contradict yourself here. When you are taking a risk, what do the odds of success have to do with if you can tolerate it or not?

Click to expand...

When I wrote that I was considering if taking a less risky route that I enjoy with decent rewards will be better than a high risk route with massive rewards.

After reading chapter 30 I realized that enjoying your work is impossible if it doesn't converge at a dream. The first question should be whether or not the path converges at my dream and then to consider the risks. My dream is Freedom of time.

I think maybe you are just too intense or you may have a win or nothing attitude. That's not bad for business, but for your health it could be.

Click to expand...

I was and am afraid that I will disappoint my parents again by taking high risks but now that the illusion of "loving your job" is gone the path is clear. Find a lane that converges at your dreams and forget about enjoying your job.

It does sound like you are either 100% going for it or never going to do it. You should always analyze worse case scenario and understand it. For most people on this forum, worse case scenario is that your business fails and you have to get a job. Remember, that is the BEST case scenario most of the rest of the world.

Click to expand...

The worst case scenario is debt slavery, depression, losing home, losing respect of friends and family, loss of health. But I think the biggest thing stopping me before reading chapter 30 was the thought "What if I find a job I truly like? Then I don't need to retire early because I am doing something I already like."

Chapter 30 was a strong argument against this myth. I accept now that the only solution is working smart and working very hard without consideration for enjoyment as long as the road converges at your dream.

My dream is to be the Master of my TIME and to have relationships with people I respect and value. To achieve this dream I need $1 million principal invested at 5% for a yearly income of $50K.

I have given myself 5 years to accomplish this and have broken my goal down to yearly milestones. My first goal is to save $25K by March 26, 2013.

I finished reading MJ's book and the final third was very good with a lot of the information I was looking for. I should have been more patient and read the entire book before posting my questions.

Thank you for everyone's feedback provided in this thread.

Now that you read the book, I'll answer...

ions said:

How did MJ have the balls to start a website when there were other sites already on the market probably built by proffesional programmers?

Click to expand...

Bills to pay. Desire not to want to get another mindless job.

ions said:

What made him think he could build a better website? What was his competitive advantage? Passion? Knowing the industry?

Click to expand...

All of the above. (Passion, industry knowledge, superior service, etc.)

ions said:

Did he initially enjoy programming or did he do it purely because he saw a need.

Click to expand...

I enjoyed being free. Programming was in that process. I enjoy learning and still do. I was fascinated with the web at the time and having knowledge in this area was exciting to me.

ions said:

Did he analyze the market before starting the website or did he use intuition? How did he come to the conclusion to invest his time in this particular website instead of another project / business? WADM?

Click to expand...

I analyzed the market due to intuition. WADM told me to pursue a web business over a limo business.

ions said:

What was his initial plan when he arrived in Phoenix or did he just have faith something good would happen?

Click to expand...

Good faith? Huh? No, I worked hard. Good things come to those who work, not wait.

ions said:

What was his contingency plan if the website didn’t work or that just wasn't a consideration?

Click to expand...

Not a consideration. Worse case? I get a job delivering pizza, driving taxis, or even a inside sales "corporate" job. Even if the website was a failure, I built myself a skill designing and architecting websites which I could readily sell in a time trade.

ions said:

How did he deal with the stress of uncertainty … that the website wouldn’t possibly gain traction and this could be another failure?

Click to expand...

Huh? Obviously, I wasn't afraid of failure since I was used to it.

ions said:

How did he deal with the possibility of Bankruptcy?

Click to expand...

Another huh??? Never thought about it once. Wasn't an option. I pay my bills and my obligations. Again, worst case: I get a job driving taxis, washing dishes, or something else.

ions said:

How did he maintain discipline and keep his eye on the ball. Did he have a system to keep him on track?

Click to expand...

Growth will keep you on track. Paying customers will keep you on track. The market will keep you on track.

ions said:

How did he deal with the stress of programming? If I programmed 8-12 hours every day I would go insane. Programming is one of the most challenging tasks. Did he at least exercise during this time and maintain some balance?

Click to expand...

My life at that time consisted of this: WORK, GYM, WORK, GYM.

ions said:

Did he have relationships during this time or was he exclusively dedicated to the website? Did he call his mom during this time?

Click to expand...

I had no steady girlfriends if that's what you mean, however I dated a lot. I called mom at least once a week. Again, my life at that time was WORK, GYM, WORK and an occasional night out. Looking back, it was a very happy time. The turning point for my life in terms of happiness was when I moved to Phoenix, broke, but on the right path. Hasn't changed in years.

ions said:

How did he prevent himself from retreating back to the comfort zone once he started cashflowing $10,000/ month?

Click to expand...

Again, the market, customers, and growth will keep you from doing that. I also had a strong desire to be the best in my particular space. I had a strong desire for constant improvement. The money followed.

ions said:

How did he come up with the statistic of 14% chance of attaining millions in 6 years using the FastLane? This probability seems very high to me?

Click to expand...

For some, it will be high. For others, low. It's based on my assessment of someone who applies themselves in a business encompassing the 5 Commandments, and lives a Fastlane mindset (A legit effort).

For those who stand around and say "I'm gonna TRY this Fastlane stuff", their odds are probably .0001%. Fastlane isn't something you try, it's something you live.

to the original poster, go to mark cuban's blog and read his startup story. he knew nothing about software when he first started but learned on the job.

MJ, I can't believe you took the time to respond. I wasn't expecting that. You "violated my expectations!".

Thank you for taking the time to answer my questions MJ. I am looking forward to your audio book. I still can't believe you answered. That means a lot to me MJ and I think it will have a profound impact on me.


mavwrx. Thank you for pointing me to Mark cuban. I will check him out.