The secret is very simple: I was prepared.

First, they asked what my purpose, passion, profile and values were. As you may recall, I did this effort more than a year ago in an exercise about my values. So when they asked, not only I knew what they were, but I gave more. I told them which values I need, which ones I offer, which ones I aspire to, and which ones I take for granted. I was so prepared that I gave them more than what they were expecting.

Then I gave them where I fit in the world, my Ikigai. It did not cost me more than 2min, because I had done it already more than a year ago. As a present, let me give you my Ikigai here below. I strongly encourage you to think hard about yours.

After this, I had to explain my investment philosophy. Well... I have written a "300 pages book" about it. The most difficult was to condense 300 pages of ideas into one slide. But this got done within an hour. For this part, I was more than prepared, I was the expert.

I then had to provide an investment plan and prove how it was credible. If you read my book, you probably know that I have tracked my finances line by line and month by month for the past 25 years without interruption. I can extract any trend, metrics, projections into the future, just in a matter of a few hours. They wanted to see my plan? I gave them two plans instead: a Disaster scenario, and a Moonshot scenario. Each plan coming with various criteria, but both starting from the same base and having the ability to morph into a third plan in the middle. I could do this in a few hours, because, you guessed it... I was prepared!

So the work I had to do was to put all together, make a good and credible story out of all these existing pieces of information, and make it look good. Still this was some effort, a full day of work, but not the same as if I had to start from a total blank page. I made the plan as convincing as if I was going to present my life in front of God judging me for either Hell or Heaven. I only had to piece the bits together, because I already had most of them.

The benefit of this extra day of work, is that now, thanks to this contest and their detailed questions and expectations, I have an even better plan that I had before. I know more about myself than a week ago, and I have an even bigger drive to achieve what I want, because now, I have the full plan in front of my eyes. It is perfectly mapped, I "only" have to execute it. It turns out that thanks to this exercise, I am even more prepared now than I was a week ago to execute my future life-plan.

Two days in, as God has just admitted me to Heaven, I look at the long queue of those still outside, and I feel like I cheated my way to the top spot... In truth, I did not cheat one bit. In truth, I was totally prepared, and God had no other choice but to let me in and accept that my plan deserved Heaven.

Why am I saying all this? Little by little, prepare yourself for being judged. Even if there is no judge knocking for the next decade. Who cares! Do it for yourself. Improve yourself, know yourself, use data points, track, measure, simulate, forecast, improve... Be prepared any day. When someone knocks on the door to see if you are ready, be prepared to give them no other choice but accept you within their circle.

To your journey! 🥂