Let’s share a story about how persistence and dedication can lead to extraordinary success. In a world where everyone is chasing shortcuts and magic pills, Jiro Ono shows us what can be achieved through relentless discipline.
Chef Jiro Ono runs a 10-seat sushi restaurant tucked away in a subway passage near a train station. His restaurant has no menu, a meal costs $300, and each guest gets 20 minutes. It became the first sushi restaurant in history to earn three Michelin stars and is now the most in-demand reservation in Japan. Without a booking, entry is impossible — Jiro has turned away billionaires, and even Barack Obama only dined there because Japan’s Prime Minister made the reservation for him.
Jiro was born into a poor family, left home at the age of 7 to find work, and by 10 he was already an apprentice in a sushi shop. From then on, he never stopped striving for perfection.
He opened his own restaurant at 40, and for more than 50 yearsnow, he has arrived there every morning at 5 a.m., warming up his fingers, washing his hands, and personally checking every fish.
For him, this is not a job. It is practice. Jiro doesn’t just train his chefs — he teaches patience: 10 years of cooking rice, 5 years of shaping fish, 50 minutes of massaging octopus. No shortcuts, only discipline and devotion.
On October 27, Jiro Ono will turn 100. And he is still working. He built a world-renowned empire without technology, without scaling, without Instagram.
What lessons can we learn from this great chef — and what can we pass on to our children?
- We must build rituals, not chase motivation. Discipline is the ability to do the boring work day after day.
- There are no shortcuts to truly meaningful results.
- The key is practice: constant repetition, ruthless refinement, obsession with detail.
It’s the same with learning Russian. A child will always feel lazy about Russian since it’s not their main language, and there will be endless excuses to study only once a week or even less. A parent’s task is to explain why discipline matters here, and what remarkable results the child can achieve in the future if they stay consistent. And Jiro’s story is the perfect example to show it.
