…today’s secret…Working the Carnival.

I stumbled across this Hacker News article written six years ago:

“Entrepreneurship is like one of those carnival games where you throw darts at something.

Rich kids can afford many throws. If they want to, they can try over and over and over again until they hit something and feel good about themselves. Some keep going until they hit the center bullseye, then they give speeches or write blog posts about the effects of hard work.

Poor kids aren’t visiting the carnival. They’re the ones working it.”

Roy H. Williams says that “We all know people who were born on third base and think they hit a triple. They are the royal families, financial aristocracies, college fraternities…the business world is full of empty suits and corporate assholes who like to pretend they earned what they were given.”

This is nothing new. It has always been this way. Life isn’t fair. We are all born into different means.

Yes, working the carnival sucks. So what? It also sucked when previous generations were drafted and shipped off to die in wars.

The right question to ask is “Now what?“

The carnival workers you are helping have two options. They can stay in whiney little bitch mode or do something to improve their lot.

It is a defeatist attitude for them to believe that they can’t win.

Tell them that history is full of carnival workers who grew up to own the carnival.