When I was growing up in a village of Nepal, I was taught a system run by one man, the king, and the king was designated as a great nation leader. Later, we found out what a weak system it was. When the king system was prevalent throughout the nation, many people enjoyed following the king as an inspirational figure.
Ironically, the king freed most of us from the need to think for ourselves.
“Small kings” were installed in every area of society, in economics, science, engineering, and so on. This is the story of every underdeveloped country in the world whether there is a king or other forms of king.
The biggest fantasy of every person living in an underdeveloped country is that someone else, especially a political leader can make us rich or successful is always ingrained with us. The truth is, in many underdeveloped countries around the world, only political leaders are rich, they are rich because their country is poor.
“In many parts of the underdeveloped world, most people have simplicity, no debt, a close family interaction, and sufficient healthy relationship.”
In David McCullough’s Pulitzer Prize-winning biography of ‘Truman‘, the 33rd President of the United States, Harry Truman, said, “You can’t get rich in politics unless you’re a crook.”
In my experience, this is the one of the biggest secrets that differentiate the mentality of people living in developed countries from the people living in underdeveloped countries.
After living many years in a developed country and traveling back to my home country regularly, I’ve experienced that a majority of people in the underdeveloped world are happier than most of us in the developed world.
In many parts of the underdeveloped world, most people have a very simple lifestyle with no debt, a close family interaction, and sufficient healthy relationship.
I believe this is one of the hallmarks of consistent happiness in life.
“It’s not difficult to get success but it’s very difficult to teach others to be successful.”
But still why does my childhood friend want to move and settle into the developed world?
What is the reason behind his decision?
I am trying to express my personal perspective in this matter because I also moved in the same way many years ago.
I am a very big fan of Abraham Lincoln, I’m borrowing his lines here.
“To believe in the things you can see and touch is no belief at all; but to believe in the unseen is a triumph and a blessing.”
Developed world provides a belief in the unseen for those living in poor countries and this is one of the fundamental reasons people across the globe want to move to the developed world.
They have watched, read, and heard news, life-styles, and glamour in social media, news outlets, and television. That, obviously, attracts them at first hand, and they start to imitate the quality of life inside these stories. I’m not discrediting the more opportunities and quality of life in the developed world, but this comes only after acquiring some minimum new skillsets.
There is a cycle and certainty of things in everyone’s life.
When the tide goes out, we know that the tide comes back again. The sun sets today but it will rise again tomorrow, no doubt. Somebody dies somewhere today but someone else is also born somewhere. Somebody is born poor somewhere but dies rich in another place.
Sure, we have read and heard these stories all the time.
Osho, philosopher and author of ‘The Book of Secrets‘ discussed that our life also flows in the same cycle and same patterns. This belief also plays a significant role in our decision to initiate immigration process.
I’ve seen and read about many successful people from different walks of life coming from very humble and poor beginnings. They’ve reached the pinnacle of success in various developed world like USA, UK, Australia. At one point in their lives they realize that it’s not difficult to get success but it’s very difficult to teach others to be successful.
They start to influence and give real education to their root people where they actually grew up.
This is also a cycle of everyone’s life.
Nobody becomes successful without harmonizing physical, mental, spiritual, and social well being.
These successful people understand this at their core later in their lives after achieving grand success.
They enjoy being around their root people and reflect back to their own beginnings.
Jonah Berger, PhD, Wharton’s professor and author of ‘Magic Words‘ said ‘If something is built to show, it’s built to grow.’
This belief hones them to lead and enlighten the poor and disadvantaged community for progress and prosperity.
Among many reasons, this becomes one reason for youths from underdeveloped countries to move into a developed country.
“Repeated mistakes only happen when we don’t study mistakes, and repeated success only happens when we study mistakes.”
Many successful people’s behavior is public but their thoughts are always private.
Due to these private thoughts they are successful in the first hand and the way they think and do their tasks are different from normal people.
They always look for patterns and consistency not only in their own lives but also in other successful people’s lives.
There are more opportunities for institutions which help to grow people in the developed world for private thinking, this is another factor to attract people from underdeveloped countries.
After achieving some tangible successes, they build their foundation in their mind so that they want to make schools, hospitals or libraries at their birth places.
Many of my own friends have talked about this to me and they’ve seen these activities in their home country so they might be influenced by them to make a moving decision.
Tony Robbins, life coach and author of ‘Life Force‘ says “If ordinary people can’t see what other successful people are choosing and doing, they can’t imitate and accept them in their own life.”
I have experienced one important difference in people living in the underdeveloped and developed world as I worked in both places.
In the underdeveloped world, people rarely promote or encourage someone who has made some major mistakes or failures.
They rarely appreciate and give second chances for growth.
But in the developed world, people never promote or encourage someone who hasn’t made some big mistakes and failures because if they do without mistakes and failures, they are promoting someone who has never done anything in life.
Life only flows with good and bad experiences though in different time.
Life tastes good and bad equally.
If you have tasted some bad food, then only you always lean to taste good food next time.
This is another truth in life.
Paulo Coelho, the author of the classic novel ‘The Alchemist‘ says “Repeated mistakes only happen when we don’t study mistakes, and repeated success only happens when we study mistakes.”
“Complex human activities cannot be efficiently regulated and automated because they need an exercise of acute judgement.”
I have not tasted any big success in the developed world yet, but I am still a good student of successful people.
I also noticed a very clear difference in the perception of success in the underdeveloped and developed world.
In the developed world, what everybody knows is not worth knowing, what everybody does is not worth doing. They stand on their own and live life to the beat of their own music.
They put everything in their own perspective, behavior, and action.
The pattern is quite the opposite in the least developed world, they try to copy the success of others which most of the time does not work without sound judgement, risk tolerance, and proper skills.
My friend also want to pursue the life of freedom in the developed world against mass approval.
My friend used to run a small business in his home country but was not getting much success in recent days.
There is another mass belief that the developed world is strong in technology so that everybody uses it for their business advantage and prosperity.
This might have catalyzed him to make a decision to move and explore some business opportunities.
In reality, technology is just one avenue to the developed world, developed world is powerful in developing a positive mindset for consumer franchise and service excellence.
They are very successful in aligning technology to customer psychology to promote their products and services.
Imagine why the iPhone is so popular across the globe, it’s not only due to product, it’s due to leveraging the skillset to read mass psychology by the company.
Most of the underdeveloped world is far behind to utilize technology for consumer psychology.
I would like to add one additional point here.
Why did Daniel Kahneman, author of ‘Thinking, Fast and Slow‘ get the Nobel prize in Economics?
He isn’t an economist, he is a psychologist.
This is one example of how human psychology impacts to advance economic thinking, underdeveloped nations are weaker to grasp this theme to advance businesses and entrepreneurship.
Complex human activities cannot be efficiently regulated and automated because they need an exercise of acute judgement.
Sophisticated machines and technology can smoothen the systems, process, and environment, but can not replace humans.
Developed nations know this so they consistently focus on developing the human capacity and resources.
Underdeveloped countries are very poor to recognize this aspect.
“It is the mistakes that are more noteworthy in the developed world.”
Many people are attracted to move to developed countries because these countries act like a neutral market, provide an environment and opportunity to grow everybody but has no responsibility in itself.
For example, the market does not care whether a trader gains or loses.
Traders have to develop the skills, knowledge, strategies, and psychology to consistently take profit from the market.
Samir Amin, an economist and the author of ‘The Liberal Virus‘ said “Underdeveloped countries act as polarized and induced markets, but the developed countries act like neutral markets.”
Success comes from diligent application of the approaches we have applied consistently throughout our lives.
There is very little focus to study failures in the underdeveloped world and most of the people focus only on success.
They may have knowledge, but they lack to turn that knowledge into wisdom through vigorous practice and application.
But it is quite the opposite in the developed world.
They don’t study only other successful people, they take a lot of time to study their own personal failures as well as other’s failure.
It is the mistakes that are more noteworthy in the developed world.
Henry Ford, the founder of Ford motor company, often highlighted that each mistake brings its own new lesson and new innovation.
There are many ways to get through the practice and application of mistakes, the crucial fact is we can’t achieve anything important in life until we get into the flow and magic of practice, that part is lacking in the underdeveloped world.
My friend may want to join the flow of practice so that he wants to move to the developed country.
Conclusion
There are two types of people we generally encounter in this world; first category who make things happen like inventors, scientists, entrepreneurs, and are mostly found in the developed world. They take risks and study failures a lot.
Second category who watch things happen, and those who wonder what happened, are mostly found in the underdeveloped world.
These people rarely practice anything but read the political news all day and watch the soccer game in television constantly.
In which category you fall determines your own destination.
Whether you accept or not, our life circulates with our thinking, activities, and participation.
Mark Twain expressed a good human sentiment that most of us regret many years from now that we didn’t participate in things of our choice but only watched things happening.
In order to succeed wherever we move, we need drive, knowledge, and discipline.
Developed countries certainly provide the proper soil to grow these qualities faster in comparison to underdeveloped countries.
But, success is one of the most important byproducts of the plantation on proper soil, but less so than any of those qualities in itself. Richard St. John has a wonderful TedTalk ‘8 secrets of success‘, worth watching.
Yam Timsina, PhD, writes primarily on health basics, scientific progress, social upliftment, and value creation.
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