The power of focus

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A quote in the movie John Wick 1:

John Wick is the main of focus, commitment and sheer will


Out of all the good traits, the movie writer chooses only 3 traits to describe how bad ass John Wick is. That shows how powerful focus is. I believe he also gets his excellence skills thank to these 3 traits. Focus, commitment and sheer will are pretty similar to each others, they show that the man can stick to something for a long period of time, without switching goal, despite inconvenient challenges.


If we apply this to bug bounty, it means, we make a goal, and stick to it, despite all self-doubts. For example, Losef is a beginner, who tries to find his first bug, he sets a goal to hunt on a program for 7 days. In day 1, he feels overwhelmed by how much details his target has. In day 2, he tests features one by one, but finds nothing, he feels down. In day 3, he feels that you have hit a steel wall, which he cannot even imagine how to get pass it. In day 4, he notices the program stats, which has 200+ reports resolved, he thinks to himself that there is no bug left. Then he gives up in day 4, because focus, commitment and will are something he knows very little about.


Imagine John Wick doing it. He will stick to a program for 7 days. After 7 days, even if he found nothing, he at least sticks long enough to learn somethings useful [1]. Then he repeats this goal on another program, then another program, then another program [2]. He may take pauses between his goals to learn from online resources, his learning is now more oriented and effective, because he experienced real targets and know where to learn, instead of jumping from tips to tips. If he keeps doing it for 6 months, what is the chances of him finding bugs?. It is 100%. (6 months is to be safe, he may find his first bug long before it).


Another important point: In the Losef example, we notice that he has many doubts and demotivating mental talkings. These are useless thoughts, which give you a LOT of stress, you will be surprised how much stress these things are if you start observing it. In John Wick case, he is so focus, he won't even take these thoughts as options to consider. Surely, as human being, he may have these thoughts bubble up in his mind while hunting, but he can make conscious choices to not focus on them. This saves him a lot of energy that he can put on his hunting.


[1]: You may think that you learned nothing useful in this 7 days and it will be more productive if you watch youtube videos instead. But your subconscious mind is surely learn a lot. If you hunt websites with as much details again, you won't feel overwhelm anymore.


[2]: If we successfully find bug in a program, he may change his goal and continue one this program in a longer time period.

Comments

  1. Jean BolívarOctober 21, 2023 at 12:39 AM

    Thank you for this post. Today is my 3 day testing on a bug bounty program and so far have found nothing, so I was really depressed. This helped me clear my mind of those thoughts.

    ReplyDelete

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