There are a lot of examples... Basically things that have a clear cost and no clear benefit (or the benefit is so far down the line and so risky that it's basically a lottery ticket).
Sacrificing all your social life for your business... rarely pays off. If you're not mentally and socially healthy, you probably won't be building a successful business.
Sacrificing your career for a startup... if the startup fails, you should still be coming out of it with a stronger CV (if that's still relevant) than you went in. However you measure it, the startup should give you more than the "I did a startup" experience even if it fails.
Saying "I don't have the time to learn X because I'm too busy doing things" is usually a good sign that you're in a self-sacrificing mindset.
Taking a significant loan/mortgage to cofound your first business, with the idea that "I'll make it back later" - that's a self-sacrifice mindset, and likely to decrease your "score".
Pulling all nighters when working for someone else, without some very clear immediate tangible (and sufficiently valuable) benefit - typical symptom of self-sacrifice. Success-minded people will save their energy for the right kind of situation that has clear benefits to themselves as well as to their employer. Those who constantly burn themselves out may well achieve success - once they learn to stop doing that.
Concrete examples from my life:
- Staying involved full-time in a venture that I didn't believe in anymore because I felt I'd be letting my cofounder down. I don't think that did him any favours either. I should have left earlier.
- Going to work even though I was on strong doses of Solpadeine+Ibuprofene just to keep my 39-degree fever down (I had a tonsil infection), because "the project needed me" - and the same for working on that project on weekends. No positive difference made to my life 5 years later (but probably some health aftereffects waiting for me a few decades down the line).
- Taking on costs I didn't need to in order to "be nice" - generally that's rarely ever appreciated or even noticed. "Les bons comptes font les bons amis", as they say in French (good accounts make good friends).
Sacrificing all your social life for your business... rarely pays off. If you're not mentally and socially healthy, you probably won't be building a successful business.
Sacrificing your career for a startup... if the startup fails, you should still be coming out of it with a stronger CV (if that's still relevant) than you went in. However you measure it, the startup should give you more than the "I did a startup" experience even if it fails.
Saying "I don't have the time to learn X because I'm too busy doing things" is usually a good sign that you're in a self-sacrificing mindset.
Taking a significant loan/mortgage to cofound your first business, with the idea that "I'll make it back later" - that's a self-sacrifice mindset, and likely to decrease your "score".
Pulling all nighters when working for someone else, without some very clear immediate tangible (and sufficiently valuable) benefit - typical symptom of self-sacrifice. Success-minded people will save their energy for the right kind of situation that has clear benefits to themselves as well as to their employer. Those who constantly burn themselves out may well achieve success - once they learn to stop doing that.
Concrete examples from my life:
- Staying involved full-time in a venture that I didn't believe in anymore because I felt I'd be letting my cofounder down. I don't think that did him any favours either. I should have left earlier.
- Going to work even though I was on strong doses of Solpadeine+Ibuprofene just to keep my 39-degree fever down (I had a tonsil infection), because "the project needed me" - and the same for working on that project on weekends. No positive difference made to my life 5 years later (but probably some health aftereffects waiting for me a few decades down the line).
- Taking on costs I didn't need to in order to "be nice" - generally that's rarely ever appreciated or even noticed. "Les bons comptes font les bons amis", as they say in French (good accounts make good friends).