1. You’re not creating enough value

Every dollar you earn is the result of creating value for others. If you want to make more money, make more value.

As it happens, much of the work being done in this country is pointless, and when it does get done, it often gets done half-assed. I can only imagine how much time the average worker spends surfing the web, talking to co-workers, or engaging in other non-work activities while on the job.

It’s true that some jobs are challenging and worthwhile, and some employees rely on the resources of their employers to accomplish great things that they could not do on their own. But for every iPad engineer, dozens of programmers are tasked with producing throw-away quality adware and spyware. Thousands of souls are spending the best years of their lives creating ephemeral junk driven purely by various irrational forms of marketing. Most workers create very little real value.

Since the bar is already set so low, it shouldn’t be too hard to surpass it.

You’ll probably want to choose some form of self-employment or business enterprise, so you won’t be stymied by bosses, co-workers, and other annoyances that prevent you from creating massive amounts of value — and fully enjoying the profits. Who generally makes more money: employees, or employers?

If you’re stuck, start by creating more value anywhere in your life — anywhere at all. It makes no difference whether you get paid for it. Since all money is earned by creating value for others, if you want to earn a lot of money, you have to become good at creating value. The only way to become good is to start by working on something that interests you — a product, a service, an idea — and build your skills over time.

So what if it will take years to develop marketable value-creation skills? Would you like to spend those years doing unimportant busywork for some employer, or would you rather spend them working on your escape plan? Whatever you choose, you have to spend those years doing something.

2. You don’t enjoy your work

Join the club, right? Enjoying one’s job is seen as a luxury reserved for a lucky few. We’re conditioned to think that all work is a chore and a duty.

You have no responsibility to perform any job, especially a job that you hate. Now, the flip side is that nobody has a responsibility to give you a job, money, food, or shelter. You must work in order to sustain your life.

People get trapped in jobs that feel like never-ending chores because they fear being penniless. Then they justify it by saying, “That’s the way life is. Work sucks and then you die.”

They get trapped because they view work from the wrong perspective. It’s common to think of a job as something that you are lucky to get from an employer you must bow down to and appease. If you don’t cooperate with “the way things are,” you’ll go broke and die hungry.

This is hardly the case. Workers are not slaves, but traders. As an employee, you have chosen to trade your time for dollars — not necessarily the wisest trade, but one that you and your employer made voluntarily. So why not voluntarily trade your time and skills with others on terms that are more acceptable to you? You’ll have to learn how to persuade others of your value, but what’s the alternative? Corporate serfdom forever?

Enjoying your work is a prerequisite to doing good work. I challenge you to think of any great thing — a business, a work of art, anything — that was created under the threat of death. It just does not happen. Many workers who don’t particularly enjoy their jobs manage to do decent, even good work, but could you imagine how much more value they would create if they hopped and skipped to work each day, grinning from ear to ear?

Which brings me to the part about how this helps you earn more. Enjoying your work is a prerequisite to doing good work, and good work is what gets richly rewarded in the marketplace.

3. You think you’re not creative enough

Creative self-expression is not reserved to artists. All work is a creative act, whether you’re a street sweeper or a sculptor. Take responsibility for the quality of your output and you will be motivated to do better work. When you do better work, you will grow and become capable of yet greater things. If you think you’re not creative enough, it’s not because you’re limited by the work you’re doing — you are limiting the potential of your own work by not thinking it worthy of your creativity.

4. You think you’re not original enough

I defer to Paul Rand on this one, who famously said:

Don’t try to be original; just try to be good.

Originality is overrated. While there are many wonderful, original ideas out there, you don’t need one of them to be successful. You just need something that works.

Often, potential entrepreneurs will dream grand dreams of internet companies, biotech startups, or some other world-changing idea. But you don’t need to come up with a new idea on the scale of the first wheel or the telephone to achieve some success in business. Start with an old idea that works. If you wait for that moment of perfect inspiration in order to begin, no matter how smart you think you are, you’ll be waiting for a long time.

5. You think you’re not smart enough.

The people who have truly enjoyable jobs, it seems, are lucky to be naturally endowed with ample intelligence. Or so goes the common wisdom, which, as usual, is completely wrong. I can’t even tell you how many people I know who earn money way above “comfortable,” and yet are far from being scholars. I don’t mean to slight a man because he is not an intellectual; in fact, success in any field at any scale requires intelligence. And when you apply whatever intelligence you do have as far as it can go, you will reap great rewards. The surprising thing is that sheer smartness itself doesn’t produce results, and many people who would never be considered to have more than average intelligence manage to outperform some who do. Success depends on you working as hard as you can with the resources you have, which are likely greater than you think. To let your feelings of inadequate intelligence stop you from earning more is what is actually dumb.

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