Decade Before Success

Mark Manson shares a story about people mischaracterizing his success as "overnight" when his book "The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F*ck" became a bestseller.

"It was funny when Subtle Art came out and it blew up and was at the top of all the bestseller lists, everybody in the publishing industry were like 'Oh you're the new phenom debut author, overnight success.'

I was like 'Overnight success? I've been grinding on a blog for 10 years, what do you mean overnight success?'

I got stories - I remember around 2013-2014, by this time my audience was pretty big with a few hundred thousand readers. I went home for Christmas one year and got in an argument with my parents. My stepmom was just like 'When are you gonna get a real job?' She said 'I know such and such is hiring a web designer, you could go do that.'

I was like 'That'd be a waste of my time' and she goes 'Oh you could probably make $100,000 a year.' I said 'I already make $100,000 a year' and she just looked at me and goes 'No you don't.' I was like 'Do you want tax returns? Jesus Christ, what do I have to do to get you people to believe in me?'"