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It’s Supposed to Be Hard: |
Everything worth pursuing comes with a little pain. The trick is not minding that it hurts. This is one of the most useful life skills – enduring the pain when necessary rather than assuming there’s a hack, or a shortcut, around it. |
A simple rule that’s obvious but easy to ignore is that nothing worth pursuing is free. How could it be otherwise? Everything has a price, and the price is usually proportionate to the potential rewards. Most things worth pursuing charge their fee in the form of stress, uncertainty, dealing with quirky people, bureaucracy, other people’s conflicting incentives, hassle, nonsense, long hours, and constant doubt. That’s the overhead cost of getting ahead. A lot of times that price is worth paying. But you have to realize that it’s a price that must be paid. There are few coupons, and sales are rare. |
Every industry and career is different, but there’s universal value in accepting hassle when reality demands it. Compounding is fueled by endurance, so sitting through periods of insanity is not a defect; it’s accepting an optimal level of hassle. Another upside of this is that once you accept a certain level of inefficiency, you stop denying its existence and have a clearer view of how the world works. |
The best view of the game is probably from the stands. But that's not where the action is. And so you have to decide, do you want a nice view or do you want to be in the thick of it and playing the game?
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On luck:
Luck flows through people and travels by conversation. The people you talk to determine the opportunities you find.
Keep talking to the same people, keep finding the same opportunities. Start talking to new people, start finding new opportunities.
If you want different luck, start walking into different rooms."
On self-image:
You will rarely outperform your self-image.
On people management:
No matter how busy you are, you must take time to make the other person feel important. Everyone has an invisible sign hanging from their neck saying, "Make me feel important." Never forget this message when working with people.
On non-urgency of mediocre problems:
Often we fail to improve our lives simply because things don't get bad enough. If your new job is hell, you’ll leave it, but if it’s just unsatisfying, you’ll likely grind it out. Thus, small problems often threaten our quality of life more than big ones.
1) You Have Zero Control Over Someone Else's Opinion of You: |
Poet Mary Oliver asked this question in her poem, The Summer Day: "Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?" I don't know what your answer to Mary Oliver's question is, but I do know this: Whatever it is that you plan to do, other people are going to have an opinion about it. |
People will have negative opinions about you and there is absolutely nothing you can do to change this fact. When you allow your fear of what other people think to stop you from doing what you want to do, you become a prisoner to other people's opinions. This fear impacts every aspect of your life. It makes your procrastinate. It makes you doubt yourself. It paralyzes you with perfectionism. It's the reason you overthink. |
It is impossible to control someone else's thoughts. Therefore, fearing what other people think, or trying to control their thoughts, is a complete waste of your time. You will never feel in control of your life, your feelings, your thoughts, or your actions until you stop being consumed with or trying to control what other people think about you. |
The fact is, adults will have negative opinions about you, no matter what you do. Why? Because adults are allowed to think whatever they want. It is physically and neurologically impossible for you to control what someone else thinks. The average human being has about 70,000 thoughts a day. Most of which are random and cannot be controlled. Starting today, you are going to grant people the freedom to think negative thoughts about you. Let Them. |
2) Keep Showing Up: |
You have a beautiful and amazing life to live. You have potential beyond your imagination. You are not limited by where you live, or the circumstances you are facing, or the aspects of your life that you believe are limitations. |
If you can be honest with yourself about what you truly want, and take responsibility for creating it, you will. You don't have to be special. You just have to get up every day, put one foot in front of the other, and work hard to do a little better, and be a little better, than you were yesterday. And one of these days, you are going to wake up and realize that you not only changed yourself, but you are in the middle of living the life you were once jealous of. |
Let others have their success and leverage it to fuel your own journey. Other people's success is evidence that you can do it too. By turning inspiration into action, you begin to build the extraordinary life you deserve. |
"To simplify before you understand the details is ignorance. To simplify after you understand the details is genius." ---- Most inventors find that they need to keep 'just trying' things. Tolerance of error is therefore critical. Of all the lessons of innovations in the book, I think the most relevant is Thomas Edison's. Edison understood better than anybody before, and many since, that innovation is itself a product, the manufacturing of which is a team effort requiring trial and error. He tested more than 6000 plant materials till he found the right kind of bamboo for the filament of a light bulb. 'I've not failed,' he once said. 'I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work.' | ||||
Starting his career in the telegraph industry and diversifying into stock-ticker machines, he step up a laboratory in Menlo Park, New Jersey, in 1876, to do what he called 'the invention business', later moving to an even bigger outfit in West Orange. He assembled a team of 200 skilled craftsmen and scientist and worked them ruthlessly hard. Edison's approach worked: within six years he had registered 400 patents. He remained relentlessly focused on finding out what the world needed and then inventing ways of meeting the needs, rather than the other way around. The method of invention was always trial and error. In developing the nickel-iron battery his employees undertook 50,000 experiments. | ||||
Invention, he famously said, is 1 percent inspiration and 99 percent perspiration. Yet in effect what he was doing was not invention, so much as innovation: turning ideas into practical, reliable and affordable reality.
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Yooki you faced one of your first set backs when u worked hard for an exam and didn't do so well.
I however remind you of the zen saying of reframing the problem. And some more things. I say this because you are a beautiful emotional child. But you tend to get upset when you see failures. And failures are important part of growth.
A Zen Koan
A master approaches his student while holding a large, switch-like stick in his hands. He tells his student:
"If you tell me the stick is real, then I will beat you with it. If you tell me the stick is not real, then I will beat you with it. If you say nothing, then I will beat you with it."
And so, the student reaches out, grabs the stick, and breaks it.
This is my point. My point will always be one of agency.
Once you see the game, you can break the stick.
Always remember somewhere, at this very moment, someone appears to be doing better than you. Their progress is faster. Perhaps their business grows more quickly or their career is advancing rapidly. Maybe dating is easy for them or their progress in the gym seems to come effortlessly. In any domain, there is always another life that shimmers more than your own.
But comparison is a poor use of energy. You were not meant to inhabit someone else's story. You have your own work to do. The goal is not to beat their life, the goal is to live your life. Keep your eyes on your own paper. Stay on the path and continue forward, even when progress feels slow.
Don't ruminate, activate.
I find it is difficult to think my way into a better mood. When I sit and stew, the problem usually grows larger in my mind.
But if I activate — even if it's unrelated to the problem at hand — my mood tends to improve. Action breaks the spell. Move your body, go outside, play an instrument, work in a different room, do something.
Movement changes your state. And when your state changes, your perspective changes. New solutions appear. You notice options that were invisible when your mind was stuck running the same loop.
Always remember-
If you want to get warm you must stand near the fire: if you want to be wet you must get into the water. If you want long life, joy, power, peace, eternal life, you must get close to, or even into, the thing that has them.