How to be a Bawse by Lilly Singh

Originally published: 2017

Author: Lilly Singh

Genre: Non-fiction

In case you don’t have time to read the full review read these Quick Fives to know the book:

To be a Bawse:

1. Understand yourself, take control of yourself, your thoughts and emotions
2. Identify your values, use them to set your goals and overcome fear & distraction to achieve your goals
3. Be uncomfortable, make mistakes, learn from them and invest in yourself
4. Inspire yourself, be consistent in your efforts, take a pause to appreciate your job/work
5. Be nice to people, empathize with them, learn from them and make them feel important

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Complete Summary 

Let me confess before I start – I have not read this book! I have not read but listened to this book on Amazon Audible…narrator is no one else but Lilly Singh! And I must say it was an amazing experience…as a narrator she is as funny and expressive as her YouTube videos…so listening to the book was an enjoyable experience!

The book starts with Lilly Singh asking why you bought this book. The choice of reasons she enlists are:

1. You are familiar with her work on YouTube
2. You are a nosy parent who found this book in your child’s room (and want to check out if it is an appropriate book)
3. You don’t know Lilly but want to be a Bawse

I definitely choose option 1…I am a Lilly fan since I discovered her videos a year ago (yeah…it feels I was living under a rock for past nine years!)). So, this book is Lilly’s account of how she became a Bawse and is filled with her personal anecdotes and stories. The best part of this book is that it doesn’t offer exotic (read difficult) solutions and learning trajectories. It provides simple, relatable hacks and small changes that can totally transform your identity. It is divided into four sections with 59 chapters (I’ve not seen the real book…I’m talking about the audio-book…the audio-book is 6 hours and 19 minutes long). There are no shortcuts, tips/tricks or survival methods in this book. But According to Lilly, this book is a personal trainer that will make you hustle. This book will help you conquer your life. So, let’s start…

We all know a boss. But who is a Bawse? A Bawse is a great boss…both in personal and professional life. What can we all do to become a Bawse? We can do following things:

Life Hacks

Transform yourself – In video games clock keeps ticking, enemies keep coming, obstructions are there and you can control none of it. The only thing you can control is your game character. Similarly, in life, you can control only yourself. You can’t change people around you, the situation you are stuck in, the work environment etc. If you can’t control people then change your reaction towards them. If you can’t control situations prepare for them. We are usually so fixated on changing others’ behavior that we often forget to change ourselves. The key to winning video games and the game of life is to control yourself, your perspective, thoughts, reactions and eventually actions.

Conquer your thoughts and emotions – If your emotions are triggered by small things people say or do this is for you. Accepting your emotions is important but it is also important to block distracting emotions during work. Ask yourself whether this emotion will get the task done and then allow/reject it. Analyze why you feel a certain way, what made you perform a certain action and how can you do things differently? On professional front, sometimes, you have to become Tinman from Wizard of Oz, no heart only determination. Always choose productivity over pride and elevation over emotion. On personal front, don’t bottle up your emotions but also don’t drag them. Get hurt efficiently. Cry as much as you want over a lost opportunity but hustle harder next day. Learn your lesson from any incident and move on. Overthinking is natural enemy of efficiency. A bawse understands the difference between thinking things through and overthinking. Take a step back to understand, remember your priorities and then take a decision according to your priorities.

Get uncomfortable and make mistakes – Seek out situations that make you uncomfortable and work towards your goal. Discomfort is the price you pay for success. To succeed at something, you have to crawl out of your comfort zone inch by inch. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes. Mistakes bring you closer to your goal. They are opportunities to learn. But you need to have the right attitude to learn from your mistakes. This is how you can do it:

• Take ownership of your mistakes (It’s very difficult because of pride & ego)
• Call yourself out - If you made a mistake, ask yourself the cause of mistake before anyone else 
• Find solutions - Repeating same mistakes is not cool. Discover ways to prevent them
• Communicate - Apologize for your mistake and explain ways in which you will try to avoid them

One mistake, one success or one failure should not make or break you. Empires are not built or lost in one day. Empires are built on many pillars, take years to build and loads of mistakes to perish. Don't let disappointment of mistakes or failures pull you down. Every success is result of turning your failures into something new.

Send the GPS deep (read understand yourself) – You are a tiramisu (When I read this, I felt so delicious). The first layer is about how we explain ourselves & our actions to others. It’s light, fluffy and easy to digest. The middle layer is how we explain our actions to ourselves. This layer is a bit heavy and difficult to digest. You can’t see it from outside because it is covered by icing. The bottom layer consists of deeply rooted reasons behind the way we behave. This layer is hardest to locate as you have to remove other layers but nevertheless extremely important because it’s the foundation. (E.g. When Lilly was asked by one of her friends why she used so many colors her tiramisu was as follow:

• Reason she gave to her friend – I am a unicorn who loves colors
• Reason she gave herself – I love myself & want to surround myself with things that make me happy
• Deep rooted reason - I know what it feels to be sad and I’m terrified of that. Thus, I surround myself with things that make me happy.

It is important to eat all the layers together to enjoy a tiramisu. Similarly accept all your emotions. And in order to accept all your emotions you have to learn to love yourself. Loving yourself means wanting to be proud of yourself. It is about caring, encouraging, consoling & advocating about yourself. Hug and talk to yourself. Be your own best friend and treat yourself with empathy.

Be in sync - Your mind is like a sponge that is hungry for knowledge and stimulus. When you talk crap about people you feed your brain with crap. Talk about ideas, inventions, dreams etc. Train your brain to think differently, appreciate things, constantly remind yourself of your privileges and be grateful and in sync. It means keep your mind, body and soul working as a team. Even if one member of this trio doesn't work the entire project suffers. Make this trio a well-oiled machine.

FOMO - One crucial obstacle your mind has to overcome is FOMO (Fear Of Missing Out). Temptations to slack off will always be there. (Lilly gave her own example when she missed a huge party in LA because she had a 6 am shoot for YouTube. To overcome her major FOMO, she envisioned future achievements because of the shoot – her face plastered on Times Square New York and so many more things and pushed herself to avoid going to party in order to sleep).

Be secretive – The more things people know about you the weaker you become. Lilly gave an excellent example of Daenerys Targaryen of GOT. She knew she had dragon blood and never shared it with her brother or husband and she used this strategy repeatedly. Be selectively secretive. Think of yourself as a fort. Welcome people to your fort for banquets and gatherings. But never tell them about all the secret passages and ways into your fort. Help others but don't give anyone a free ride.

Goals & Success

The foundation of a happy life is strong values. Create strong values for yourself and stay true to them. They need to be upheld in any situation. They should be the constant in your changing life. Be clear about your values, write them in your personal manifesto, enlist corresponding examples and review the list again and again. Study your manifesto weekly, remember who you want to be. Your values system should dictate your goals and action.

How do you set and achieve your goals? How do you keep hustling? The first step is to create your own Vision board. What is a Vision board? It is a board (a normal cardboard) that contains images of your long-term and short-term goals. Then create your own path to achieve these goals. Contrary to usual belief, there are many paths to success. Create a path and timelines keeping your goals in mind. You can track your growth and level of achievement for both long and short-term goals by marking it on this board. Being a bawse means committing to your decisions in spite of obstructions. Major hurdles during any journey of success are fear and distraction. Fear will try to hold you down; distractions will try to convince you that your attention spent elsewhere is better than on your goals. You have to shake these feelings off. Use visualization technique to reduce fear and distractions (Before her shows Lilly usually imagines how her show should go and what would a successful show contribute to her career).

Throughout your journey you will have to exercise self-control so that you don’t go astray.  There are three simple steps to do it.

1. Set your own mini goals and try not only to meet but to beat those mini goals. (E.g. I’ll complete 2 chapters of Maths before taking a snack break)
2. Reward yourself on completion of those mini goals (E.g. Eat a piece of cake or watch an episode of GOT). This step works well only when you adhere to your goals, your awards are well earned (eating a cake after doing only two math problems will not help) and you don’t cheat. If you can’t stop yourself from cheating you can put your reward in hands of other people (your friend can have the TV remote till you complete those chapters).
3. Challenge yourself.

These above steps work wonders for habit of procrastination.

Many of us just try to survive or do the work which helps achieve bare minimum. But this is not the approach of a Bawse. If you have to become a Bawse, work as if you are here to conquer. Gain as much knowledge and insight about what you are doing. Move around with energy, connect with people and be thorough with your work. All of this means overcoming nerves, putting in more effort and sacrificing fun time. Do the best you possibly can.

And once you achieve your goals don't let yourself be complacent. A letter to your future self will help reduce complacency (Lilly wrote a letter to her future self about how much she wanted to succeed at YouTube. And she reads that letter frequently to get inspiration and hustle) Also, success in one area doesn't mean you are entitled to succeed in other areas. You have to climb each ladder of success separately. When you are trying to climb the ladder the heaviest clothing you want to get rid of is pride. The people above you have the experience you can learn from. Climbing will lead to growth in knowledge and development of your character. Don’t complain, start climbing.

Work Hacks

Lilly has given some pretty amazing professional hacks for future bawses. Here they are:

Inspiration - Inspiration and motivation is fuel for hustle. A Bawse understands that lack of motivation is not equal to failure. In fact, she expects it and addresses it. Sometimes we get spontaneously inspired by people, situations and events. Spontaneous inspiration is great. But you cannot wait for inspiration to strike. Schedule your inspiration. Listen to successful people, see their interviews, read/ listen to autobiographies, podcasts etc. to get that daily dose of inspiration and go for the kill.

Pause – Key to working hard is to pause. Enjoying what you do is the key to hustle hard. But all great jobs sometimes become mundane and boring. During those times of boredom take a pause to think about how great your job is and how blessed you are to have that every day. Some other ways to take a pause are to meditate and disconnect (Both of them emphasize on giving a lot of attention to the moment or enjoying/embracing the moment)

Push - Push until you get what you want. Don’t be afraid to ask for things you want. The worst thing that can happen is that you will be denied. Smile, stand tall and ask politely. (Lilly did a video with Michelle Obama when Michelle was the first lady of the US. Lilly was given 15 minutes for the shoot. Lilly asked for 30 minutes and she got 20…so it works)

Consistency - Words lie, actions can also lie sometimes. it's consistency that speaks the truth. (Lilly would never have got 1 billion views on her YouTube videos if she was not consistently churning out 2 videos per week)

Be dumb - In some situations it's best to be the dumbest person in the room. Be shamelessly dumb and accept what you don't know. Take the opportunity to learn from others. Always ask questions when you don't understand.

Invest in yourself – Lilly gave example of a world-famous violin player who regularly takes violin lessons. According to the violin player, “you are never too good to stop investing in yourself”. Invest your time in reading books and attending events that broaden your horizons. Invest your money in a  good team, courses, books and projects.

Have a presence - Dwayne Johnson, Jimmy Fallon and other celebrities Lilly has met introduce themselves and shake hands with everyone in the room as if people don’t know them. It takes a lot of energy and effort to make people feel important. Before you go into a meeting or an interview always remind yourself, “For next 60 minutes I'll be here and nowhere else”. Always dress to make yourself feel the situation. If you are going to office wear formals, do power poses in front of mirror and listen to music that pumps you up and don't speak softly. If you are going to a party wear a cocktail dress, a pair of stilettos, put your hair down and relax. Have impeccable manners. Don't try blend into the room. Make sure people know you, shake hands, introduce yourself, hang out with different people at the party. Be a Bwse and make the first impression.

Change your surroundings – Have you ever seen any sad face having a happy meal or got any work done with a bunch of procrastinators? Your surroundings influence how you think and behave. You are a product of your environment. So, you need to create a positive and conducive environment to enhance your productivity. Create a workplace that pumps you to work hard, set passwords which inspire, if you are struggling with bad habits make small notes and stick them on different places in your home to remind you, set happy ringtones, follow people on social media who make you happy, spend time with people who are like-minded and push you to work hard.

Be nice to people – Lilly told this interesting story where during a party she saw Scooter Braun (Justin Bieber’s manager). She was excited to see him and wanted to talk. But she was also afraid and doubtful. Eventually she gathered her courage and went up and talked to him. He was having a rough day and chatting with Lilly lightened his mood. Next day he gave a shoutout to Lilly on social media. Being nice and empathetic takes you a long way. People will provide you with opportunities and help you grow. Actively think of ways to make people feel nice, smile, talk politely, say please and thank you, express gratitude. People always remember how you made them feel so make them feel good and positively impact others

Say what you mean but don't be mean - Sometimes we have to speak up about what we don't like. It's about fighting your battles with tact. So, if you are a vegan don't put negative comments on people eating chicken. Instead put a post giving people loads of healthy vegan options. Mean words never solve problems but increase them. Convey your message politely.

Empathy - Everyone does not have same priority as you. Don't be upset with people who don't share the same level of enthusiasm, zeal or push with you.

So my fellow Bawses…are you ready to hustle??

 

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