Former Frat Guy Explains The One Skill He Learned From His Fraternity That Helps Him Earn $100,000+ A Month
Money isn't everything.
Joel Mott / Upsplash College offers a chance to widen our perspectives and learn new skill sets, both inside and outside of the classroom. For most people, college is the first time they live without any parental supervision or guidance. Those four years of higher education provide young adults with a framework for how to enter the world, one that’s expanded on as years pass.
One college student shared the specific way his extracurricular activities launched him toward success after school ended.
A former frat guy explained the one skill he learned that helps him earn over $100,000 a month.
Ben Bader revealed how Greek life prepared him for life post-grad. “There’s one skill that I learned while pledging a fraternity that’s helped me make over $100,000 a month and run a semi-successful business at the age of 23,” he started his video.
He explained that during the process of pledging a fraternity, “You’re basically a maid for all the brothers and the frat. So, you’re running around all day, you’re [expletive] doing laundry, you’re getting people food, you’re setting up all the [expletive] for parties or getting alcohol,” he continued. “Like, you’re just problem-solving all day.”
“Obviously it [expletive] blows, but you kind of learn to appreciate how much it sucks and that you have this camaraderie with your brothers who are also going through that,” he said.
Photo: Leszek Glasner / Shutterstock
While maintaining connection within our community grounds us and gives us purpose, some might call Bader’s experience the formation of a trauma bond as a result of being hazed. Yet Bader believes that his time in a frat set him up for success later on.
“There was this one saying, one slogan, that everybody used to always say when anything was super challenging or we were just struggling to get through something,” he said.
He gave an example of a moment that embodied the essence of that communal saying, sharing that “One time we were throwing this party, and one of the brothers really wanted this white robe that was hard to find for some reason.”
“He was just like, ‘Yo, somebody needs to go get me this robe, like, I don’t care what it takes. You just have to figure it the [expletive] out,’” Ben recalled. “So, FITFO. Figure it the [expletive] out. That was the slogan or the saying we had.”
If you’re wondering how that particular saying played into the saga of getting a college-aged boy the bathrobe he wanted, just wait.
“One of my pledge brothers ended up sneaking into this hotel and he, like, went up 20-something floors and found one of the maids that was cleaning a room, and he walked by her cart and he snagged a robe and that was that,” Bader revealed.
Photo: Dean Drobot / Shutterstock
There is so much to unpack there and it’s too much to dissect fully over the span of these pages, so let’s focus on the sense of entitlement needed to steal from someone who’s just doing their job, who most likely got blamed for that robe disappearing.
A robe is a small, replaceable thing. The larger issue is that not one person involved in the scheme considered how their actions would affect anyone else.
Yet Bader seems to have adopted his frat’s phrase as his personal mantra for success, saying, “This concept of FITFO… has been the biggest thing that I’ve seen that separates people that kind of make it, entrepreneurs, and people that don’t.”
A gentler version of the frat-mentality phrase would be the idea that 'The only way out is through,' which recognizes life as an ever-unfolding learning process.
“People fail because they refuse to figure [expletive] out on their own,” Bader continued, overlooking every structural barrier built into our overarching systems that hold certain people down while elevating others. “There’s gonna be little things that come up that you can’t just [expletive] turn to somebody and say, ‘Hey, what exactly do I need to do here?’ You just have to man up and [expletive] do it on your own,” he said.
At the opposite end of that belief is the idea that asking for support when we need it is actually a highly intelligent and often necessary part of functioning, both in our work lives and beyond. Admitting what we don’t know makes us vulnerable, but it also shows that we’re willing to grow.
“Starting a business is simple, but sometimes you need to be creative,” Bader exclaimed. “You need to find the back door. You need to weasel your way in somewhere. This ‘figure it the [expletive] out’ mentality is the biggest thing that will take you far in life.”
But there’s truth in another saying, too: No matter how much money you make, you can’t take it with you.
There are so many moving pieces to finding success. Some versions of success look different than others; there’s no one right way to exist. Maintaining a mindset that success is solely based on how much we earn overlooks other parts of life that enrich us, like the people we hold close and the communities we contribute to.
Alexandra Blogier is a writer on YourTango's news and entertainment team. She covers social issues, pop culture and all things to do with the entertainment industry.