To have a great relationship with your siblings is an incredible blessing and a privilege that I cherish.

To showcase the supportive and encouraging people that I’m blessed to call my siblings, I’ve recently conducted “interviews” where I ask them questions from James Walpoles’ blog post “Questions I Like To Ask Successful People.”

I’ve already interviewed my youngest brother, where we got a glimpse inside the mind of a 15-year-old, but today I took to the opposite end of the age spectrum where my eldest brother shares some of his wisdom.

What is one piece of conventional advice that you disagree with most strongly?

There is a big belief in following your passion – if you have one. Cal Newport has a good take on this topic: following your passion. However,  I think a lot of people don’t have a passion. And in that case, I think the answer is to develop competency and develop things you’re good at. Then you will establish proficiency at those things – and once proficient it’s human nature to like what you’re good. As well as you start earning flexibility and more meaningful work. Everyone wants flexibility and meaningful work – those things are quite universal.

What is one piece of unconventional advice that you disagree with most strongly?

An unconventional piece of advice that I’ve heard recently is to try drugs. There’s a site conveying marijuana as an alternative to smoking cigarettes and getting drunk. There are something things that are clearly not good for you –  even if they’re not always morally bad. When I aspire to be like someone who I think is really awesome – my conclusion has never been that my next step to be closer to how they performed needs to be doing drugs. A close second would be to invest in cryptocurrency.

What was your biggest mistake? What helped you to identify it? What helped you to get over it?

I think my biggest mistakes are all personal ones, either losing my temper, being inconsiderate or bossy.

Once I shot my brother in the eye with an airsoft gun – that’s a story for another time.

It becomes a question of how do you cope with those kinds of things – an example for me would be directly hurting someone through my own stupidity and when I clearly knew better.

The answer to feeling better is to apologize and ask for forgiveness – whether it’s given or not. I think it is very biblical to extend grace to others and extend grace to yourself. The Bible makes it clear that he who is forgiven much should love much. Extend grace to other people, try to be kind and don’t make those things a big deal – be a buffer for your team provide the best support structure – try to think about the realistic worse case and plan for it. Work to mitigate the worse case.  If you’re trying to hide your mistakes it ends badly almost always. If you do make mistakes apologies and be transparent with others.

What do you do to gain self-awareness when everyone is out to flatter you?

Realize that not everyone is out to flatter you, in fact, most people don’t even care. I think it’s important to have friends that will tell you the truth and when you are wrong – that’s really important.

When are you closest to a state of “flow”? How do you get there?

When I encounter an interesting puzzle and think of an interesting way to solve it. I also enjoy reading or researching something that’s interesting or that I disagree with. Even listening to music and having your mind occupied is another way. A lot of “flow” is knowing what works for you, that could be listening to podcasts, silence, or setting specific targets and goals of set periods of work and set periods of rest. I think a state of flow can be overrated – a lot of people’s job doesn’t require, or perhaps easily allow, a state of flow and not more than 20 – 30% of my work is done in a state of flow – however, I could be wrong.

How did you find your definition of success? What is it?

I decided on success late in high school. I wanted to define success to be processed not outcome oriented – because you can’t control the outcome – that’s a subset of the process, luck, and aptitude – it’s not within your control.

My definition of success is working hard to fulfill my mission – and not giving up – even if I never succeed with any of the goals I set for myself. I take this to the logical extreme – where if I was homeless in my least favorite place but never gave up – I would still view that as a success.

Asking my siblings these questions has uncovered gems that and provided a valuable understanding of their perspectives. I look forward to reflecting on the answers to these questions in future years.