If you are born poor, it’s not your mistake
But if you die poor, it’s your mistake.
~Bill gates
Introduction
Yes, we all know him as one of the richest fellows in the world. And most of us admire him a lot or wanted to be like him.
Some see him as an innovative visionary who sparked a computer revolution. Others see him as a strong challenger in the software industry!
Regardless of what his supporters and detractors may think, few can argue that Bill Gates is one of, if not the most successful entrepreneur of the 20th century.
Therefore, to add some more value to our readers, we have extracted the best Bill Gates Quotes: 20 Things to Make you Rich in (2021). This article will focus on some basic key principles of life from Gates’ millionaire journey that will help you inherit a more happy and prosperous life ahead!
A Glimpse over the history
Gates was born William Henry Gates III on October 28, 1955, in Seattle, Washington. Gates grew up in an upper-middle-class family with his older sister, Kristianne, and younger sister, Libby. The Gates family atmosphere was warm and close, and all three children were encouraged to be competitive and strive for excellence.
Gates had a very close relationship with his mother, Mary, who after a brief career as a teacher devoted her time to helping raise the children and working with charities.
Gates showed early signs of competitiveness and was a voracious reader as a child, spending many hours poring over reference books such as the encyclopedia. Around the age of 11 or 12, Gates’s parents began to have concerns about his behavior. He was doing well in school, but he seemed bored and withdrawn at times, and his parents worried he might become a loner.
Gates’s first exposure to computers came while he was attending the prestigious Lakeside School in Seattle, Washington. A Local company offered the use of its computer to the school through a teletype link where Gates wrote his first software program at the age of 13.
Along with fellow student Paul Allen, he began ditching classes to work in the school’s computer room. When Gates turned up 16, he and Allen went into business together. The two teens netted $20,000 with Traf-O-Data, a program they developed to measure traffic flow in the Seattle Area. Thereafter, a long journey started and in the process, Gates became the youngest self-made billionaire in history by the age of just 31!
1. Don’t get distracted by Success
“Success is a lousy teacher. It seduces
smart people into thinking they can’t lose.”
~Bill Gates
It is often for humans to get carried away by success, especially when it comes easily and keeps coming. But that’s not the case with Bill Gates.
He never allowed his success to cloud his business judgments. He lacks overconfidence and understands that success cannot supersede business ethics.
Yes, he does attribute his initial success as the stepping stone for future triumphs, but he was always prepared for the psychological challenges that success can bring.
2. Be Yourself
“Don’t compare yourself with anyone in this world,
If you do so, you are insulting yourself.”
~Bill Gates
Accepting yourself for the way you are and not comparing with others is the first sign of a genius mindset. Nobody is perfect in this world, we all have weaknesses and we all have some qualities.
In today’s world, with social media and things going around digitally, it can be easy to compare yourself with others and get trapped in the situation. But, you need to stop doing it in a negative way!
Be grateful for the little things you have and don’t obsess over for what you don’t. Life is more fun and easy when you learn to feel better about yourself. You should accept your past and present, and realize that you can make changes for the future if you desire to do so!
3. Learn from Mistakes
“We all need people who will give us feedback.
That’s how we improve.”
~Bill Gates
Accepting your mistakes and learning to improve upon them can truly make you successful one fine day. Admitting your fault puts you one step closer to dealing with it. It shows that you’re someone with integrity and courage, ready to take responsibility.
Always ask for better feedback, identify the common mistakes, and learn to polish them up. Always show that you are ready to change yourself when tough situations arrive. This will soon let you become the best version of yourself with an extraordinary life experience!
4. Have a Vision
“Microsoft was founded with a vision of a
computer on every desk, and in every home.
We’ve never wavered from that vision.”
~Bill Gates
Gates never let his role at Microsoft define him. He dreams big, and he dreams beyond the immediate. My favorite example is Gates’ vision of “a computer on every desk and in every home”.
Gates was providing the world a glimpse of the future- where all offices and homes had computers- even though his company, Microsoft, did not make computers at that time and most people saw little need for them.
Today, more than 25 years later, computers are commonplace and considered essential work and home tools by the majority of people around the world.
5. Taking Risks
“To win big, you sometimes have to take big risks.”
~Bill Gates
Getting out of your comfort zone to taking an appropriate risk, can sometimes make wonders to your life. Life is unpredictable, you never know when things would gonna change and become easy for you until you take complete charge.
Taking risks, however, does not mean going into something blindly, it involves careful planning and hard work. Countless entrepreneurs and businessmen have taken risks to get their businesses to where they are now. If you don’t embrace risk-taking, success won’t follow you until something dramatically happens on its own.
6. Life is Unfair
“Life is not fair, get used to it.”
~Bill Gates
Bill truly believes that God has made life unfair. You can always find people having great luxury life experiences and on the other hand, there are some without having access to food and safe drinking.
After walking out of Harvard in 1975, Gates in collaboration with Paul Allen laid the foundation of Microsoft Corporation. Even though his love for programming made him leave the college of dreams for many, the chosen path wasn’t easy for him. In the initial years of Microsoft, the company struggled to pay its bills and taxes, and their software got pirated by numerous hackers.
But Gates hadn’t learnt to give up hope. He worked harder and for the next five years, he worked 16-hour shifts a day to make his dream come true. He also ensured that every code that went live was double-checked by him personally. And the next thing the world knew was the launch of Windows 1.0.
While the new Windows features impressed some, critics were not entirely satisfied with the achievements made by Microsoft, which leads to a mere 10% of customers in favor of the product, leaving Gates and Allen devastated.
This leaves behind a vital lesson: “Get used to face challenges”, learn from them and head on to a path of success even when life is not fair.
7. Art of Presentation
When Windows Vista was designed in November 2006, some excitement was created. But it gradually failed to rise to the expectation. However, its appearance was attractive. In this context Bill Gates quoted:
If you can’t make it good,
at least make it look good.”
~Bill Gates
You have come up with a brilliant idea but you are not sure about making the process perfectly happen. Just try to make things interesting and engaging for your audience.
Have a clear overall picture and make the presentation concise and super easy to understand. Focus on keeping your goal short and simple in a way that everyone will understand.
Chances are, you may get clicked in people’s eyes for your simple and pleasant styles, leaving a positive impact on the audience to get through your goal successfully!
8. Be ready to embrace Failure
“It’s fine to celebrate success, but it is more
important to heed the lessons of failure.”
~Bill Gates
You’ve started your business to be successful, but entrepreneurship comes with its set of challenges. Things are not always going to go your way. And not everything is in your control. You might make a mistake, or the industry might suffer a slowdown.
What matters is how you respond to this crisis. Don’t let those bog you down. Instead, get back up, dust yourself, and learn from them.
9. Keep learning new things
“Your exposure from a young age to the
realities of the world is a super-big thing.”
~Bill Gates
According to Bill, you don’t have to be first, but you have to keep learning. Learning creates new dimensions for you and is dynamic.
The world is full of infinite opportunities and there is so much to learn new every day. To reach greater heights, you must start exploring them at an early age.
Free online tools and resources can also make education more available to a broader array of people. You don’t have to be enrolled in a university to learn a new skill: You can simply take an online course or even watch videos on YouTube to learn about any topic.
Checkout Evan Carmichael’s YouTube video to help you better understand the importance of learning to change your life forever:
10. Sacrifice
“The most amazing philanthropists are people
who are actually making a significant sacrifice.”
~Bill Gates
Sacrifice typically means to give something up of value to get something even more valuable in the future. Most times we don’t want to miss something that will make us happy for a little while for something that will benefit us in the long run.
Life always rewards actions and efforts, the more you put your best into it, the more you will be rewarded. Once you decide to focus more on actions, leaving aside your fun and enjoyments, success automatically comes into your hand!
11. Intuition
“Often you have to rely on intuition.”
~Bill Gates
Intuition is a gut feeling or instinct that often comes with a sense of certainty that distinguishes it from making an educated guess. Moreover, intuition has a direct impact on a person’s life.
Most of the world’s greatest inventions and discoveries have come from the magic of intuition. We all have gone through the process, where we usually rely on the little inner voice that whispers to us that something is right or wrong.
Research has shown that intuition is a powerful skill that helps us make better decisions and gives us more confidence in our personal and professional lives!
12. Reading
“I really had a lot of dreams when I was a kid, and
I think a great deal of that grew out of the fact that
I had a chance to read a lot.”
~Bill Gates
Do you know, What people like- Warren Buffett, Bill Gates, and Elon Musk have in common? Well, they all are great readers! Reading is one of the most common habits of great successful people.
Rich and Smart people know that the rest will naturally flow their way if they can get the right book in their hands. Reading a book is one of the best things you can do for your mind and your soul. Books are a great source of learning and can give you some amazing inspiration as well!
13. Find your Obsession
During a Q&A session with Harvard students, the entrepreneur shared another key to success, He said-
“The thing that you are likely to be world-class at
is whatever you obsessed from age 12 to 18.”
~Bill Gates
Gates has been fixated on tech since age 13, when he was a student at Lakeside School in Seattle, Washington. He spent as much time as he could learning about computers, hacking, and coding.
There’s something to be said for chasing a dream. Some of the most successful people are fueled by their enthusiasm for what they’re doing. Being successful at almost anything means having a passion for it.
14. Self-Esteem
“The world won’t care about your self-esteem.
The world will expect you to accomplish something
before you feel good about yourself.”
~Bill Gates
Self-esteem is a very real feeling and it is important because it heavily influences people’s choices and decisions. People with high self-esteem are the ones who take care of themselves better and persistently strive to achieve their goals and ambitions.
No matter who you are, you have donned a ton! Take some to think about and give yourself a credit, for the accomplishments you have. Allowing yourself to visually see everything you have done will help you to build confidence!
15. Improve Yourself
“I am not in competition with anyone but myself.
My goal is to improve myself continuously.”
~Bill Gates
The importance of self-improvement often goes unnoticed. We usually refuse to face them or are just happy being ignorant. It is important to prioritize your life in order for self-improvement to occur.
Self-improvement is not a change that occurs overnight, but one can take months or even years. Start with consciously becoming more self-aware, observing your thoughts, emotions, and responses, and deciding to make self-improvement an integral part of your life!
16. Have Better Company
“Surround yourself with people who challenge you,
teach you, and push you to be your best self.”
~Bill Gates
People who are smarter than you make up your game. They are like a vast ocean, from which you can learn a lot of things! They even make you better, spark interest, and introduce you to new concepts, ideas, cultures, and people.
Having them around awakens a desire to be like them. And that desire pushes us to improve or to be like them. Truly smart people know the value of kindness and generosity, and they are likely to throw some of it your way, making the world a better place to live!
17. Leadership
“As we look ahead into the next century,
leaders will be those who empower others.”
~Bill Gates
According to Bill Gates, effective leaders are those who know the art to communicate well, motivate their team and have the flexibility to solve problems in an ever-changing workplace.
Empowering others with knowledge, establishing a clear vision, and sharing the vision so others will follow willingly is a great sign of leadership.
Leaders must be open to suggestions and feedback. If your staff is dissatisfied with an aspect of the office environment, listen to their concern and be open to making necessary changes.
18. Never Stop Learning
“Your most unhappy customers are
your greatest source of learning.”
~Bill Gates
We need to learn from our mistakes so that we do not run the risk of repeating them. Finding a learning opportunity to turning it into a great experience, must be our first priority in life.
Most of us tend to try and avoid mistakes and view them as negative rather than important. But mistakes can teach us and help us improve. Understanding the importance of what others wanted to say, and making it to our best advantage is what separates out the great leaders from the rest of the crowd!
19. Value Time
“No matter how much money you have,
you can’t buy more time.”
~Bill Gates
Gates values every minute of his day and plans his daily activities to ensure the most important tasks never get left undone.
He is immensely successful today but, he knows that he has the same number of hours as everyone else, and has still retained the same value for time as before.
Check out the video below to find what Bill and his friend, Warren Buffett has to say about the value of time:
20. Patience
“Patience is a key element of success.”
~Bill Gates
Patience is not the ability to wait, but the ability to keep a good attitude while waiting. Doesn’t matter how much big or small goal you are pursuing, it becomes essential for staying focused on the path for your dreams.
Success does not come overnight, it could take years for you, to be at the destination where you actually deserve to be!
Final Thought
That’s it from our side, we have completed all the key points from our post, “Bill Gates Quotes: 20 Things to Make you Rich in (2021)”. You can also check out the official blog of Bill Gates for getting more updates about him. It’s time for you to go out, take advantage and build yourself into a million-dollar empire.
Just remember, whether you are in your early 20s or late 30s there is never a right age to start with something valuable to others. You just need to take small gradual steps that will lead to your bigger goal in the most profound ways.
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