Lessons from the movie: A Beautiful Mind

Authors - Ajayya Kumar, Mohamad Abou-Zaki & Ghassan Khoury

Despite battling with severe mental illness and paranoid schizophrenia, John Forbes Nash Jr. won the Nobel Prize in economics in 1994. Yet it is only in 2001 that the world really came to know his life story when his biopic A Beautiful Mind, hit the screens and left viewers dumbstruck. 

The movie, directed by Ron Howard with the brilliant acting of Russell Crowe and Jennifer Connelly, was one of the best films in cinema history and won four Oscars.It is one of the most beautiful and touching stories of madness, recovery, discovery, fame, uselessness, loneliness, and is, needless to say, a must-watch.

But can the story of a mad scientist hold lessons for entrepreneurs? 

Turns out it does. 

1. Keep your focus steady and look for original ideas

The movie begins at Princeton University where Nash arrives as a co-recipient of the prestigious Carnegie Scholarship. He is pressured by both the faculty and his peers to quickly submit papers and get published, but Nash, hellbent on coming up with his own original idea, is not ready to compromise on what he wants to achieve. Even when he risks losing a placement opportunity, he does not yield to what he considers derivative or incremental works. He stays steady focused on his goal and, publishes his classic paper on game-theoretic bargaining which earns him a place at nowhere else but MIT. 

Takeaway: It isn’t always easy to stick to what you really want. Things and circumstances around you keep changing. But ultimately, it’s your conviction that matters. So, if you believe in it, go for it. 

2. Question old theories, create your own path

In order for Nash to publish his original idea, he had to question existing beliefs and disturb the status-quo. And that is exactly what he did: by rebutting the 150-year-old ''invisible hand of the market'' principle of “The Father of Economics” Adam Smith which stated that when each group member acts selfishly, pursuing their own interests, it leads to an efficient equilibrium state of this group. 

Instead, Nash argued that better chances of success were when people adopted a co-operative approach. He formed a new concept of governing dynamics based on his argument which eventually fetched him a place at MIT and earned him the highest award in mathematics — the Abel Prize.

Takeaway: Don’t be afraid to be that lone wolf who treads his own path. Businesses keep evolving, and change is the only constant. So do not hesitate to question old concepts and evolve your business to suit the times.

3. There might be more than one solution for a problem

As brilliant as he was, Nash wasn’t a very social person: he came across as self-centered and rude, often looked down upon other students, was not very interested in teaching, preferring to focus on his research. 

One day, as he was giving a class, and finding the noise of the construction works outside disturbing, he shut all the windows despite it being quite hot. He paid no heed to the students’ requests to keep at least one window open and continued his class unmindful of their plight. Alicia, one of the students (who would later become his wife), gets up, opens a window and requests politely to the men outside to work elsewhere for about 45 minutes. They agree, and she re-opens the windows. 

It’s a win-win for everyone.

Takeaway:  There may be multiple paths that lead you to your goal. But what matters is your ability to choose the wisest of the strategies.

4. Find people who would stick with you when you are at your lowest

After the brilliance and madness came the reawakening and Nash’s life turned upside down. He was convinced that everything was going just fine for him: he had a great job, was married to Alicia who was now pregnant, and he was doing something for the country that made him proud (or so he thought).

He slowly realizes that it was his paranoic mind playing tricks on him, and that neither his best friend nor the dream mission he was part of ever existed. His career seemed over when he ends up in a psychiatric hospital, with his family as unique support.

Fortunately, he had chosen the right person in Alicia, who, despite the signs of mental illness and knowing how awkward he could get, supported him and stuck with him through thick and thin. Even against the doctor’s advice when Nash almost drowns their baby then accidentally knocks her to the ground, she finds a way to take care of him, to motivate him and become that strong pillar he needed.

Takeaway:  It is easy to find people who praise you and do anything for you when you are at your best. But what matters is to find people who will care for your company, its mission, its goal and are ready to work for it in the long term.

5. To achieve success, leave no stone unturned

When Nash was at Princeton, he was not in good terms with Martin Hansen, the co-recipient of the Carnegie fellowship. A serious rivalry developed between the two, with Hansen pulling his legs while Nash derided him.

As Nash gots sucked down the vortex of hallucinations and mental illness, he was unable to focus on his research and his career seemed to have reached a dead end. 

But Alicia, knowing that it would be good for Nash to get out of the house, suggests that he meets his old rival Hansen, now head of the mathematics department at Princeton, and ask him to let him work out of the library and audit classes. Nash is not hopeful given their old rivalry and his mental state now, but to his surprise, he realises Hansen always considered him a friend. He not only okayes Nash’s requests, but even allows him to continue after a terrible first day.

Takeaway: Once you set your mind on your goal, put your heart and soul into it. Do not limit your options or let your ego come in way of opportunities.

6. Do not let failures haunt you

As he noticed that the medication that he was given for his mental disorder affected his research and his relationship with Alicia, Nash stopped taking the tablets. But without them, his hallucinations immediately came back. He needed a solution that kept the hallucinations at bay without involving the medication. 

On his first day back at Princeton, he got stressed, the delusions kicked in, and he started screaming at the imaginary characters in his mind as a crowd gathered around him. Realizing what he was doing, he fled the campus, terrified and ashamed. 

It’s unlikely someone would dare to go back after an episode like that, but Nash did, with the support of Alicia. He decided he wouldn’t talk to his visions anymore. They never went away, but he used several tools of mental toughness to learn to ignore them slowly. Day after day, he walked into that campus, even when some of the students ridiculed him behind his back. As the years passed, he acquired the love of teaching and went on to become a beloved professor and later a Nobel awardee.

• Takeaway: It is sometimes good to make your own solutions for your problems. While advice might pour in from different quarters, you know your situation best. So analyze, weigh all the options and make your own decision. Do not let your fears or your past failures hold you back. Tailor your solution and be the master of your fate.