Your life doesn’t need to go through a predictable story arc. It doesn’t have to start with a dream, follow through hard work and end up in a nice home with four bedrooms. Instead it can twist and travel. You don’t have to know the final answer, you just need to act on the next step.
Never blame malice for what can easily be explained by conceit. People don’t care about you. This isn’t because people are mean or hurtful, but simply because they are mostly focused on themselves. Consider this hypothetical pie-chart showing the variety of thoughts a typical person has: Thought Chart In this example, 60% of thoughts are self-directed. My goals. My problems. My feelings. Another 30% are directed towards relationships, but how they affect me. What does Julie think of me? How will boss evaluate my performance in the next review? Do my friends like me or see me as irritating?
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Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma – which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of other’s opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.
Right here, right now. Mindfulness extends life infinitely. If you can appreciate this moment rather than mourn the lost ones or yearn for the yet unlived ones, you can relax into a rewarding calm. Seek out opposites.
Self-awareness is the lubricant to all social friction. If you can see yourself the way others truly see you, you are well on your way to getting along with others. In seeing yourself for what you are, you can laugh at yourself. If you can laugh at yourself, you will avoid so much anger or insult.
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Sometimes the mind blocks off unpleasant things, so it becomes painful to think about it. But you have to face unpleasant realities, if you want to grow and improve as a person. Read. People who lived thousands of years ago had the very same basic questions of the world we still try to grapple with today. And they've written about what they think, so go read it. The accumulated knowledge of mankind is far far greater than what one person can learn/think by themselves in one lifetime, so the quickest way to learn or gain perspective is to read. Be curious.
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Warren Buffet said "The chains of habit are too light to be felt until they're too heavy to be broken". Realize that nothing matters. In a hundred thousand years from now all of our actions will be insignificant. Be honest with yourself.
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Realize that nobody cares, and if they do, you shouldn't care that they care. Got a new car? Nobody cares. You'll get some gawkers for a couple of weeks—they don't care. They're curious. Three weeks in it'll be just another shiny blob among all the thousands of others crawling down the freeway and sitting in garages and driveways up and down your street. People will care about your car just as much as you care about all of those. Got a new gewgaw? New wardrobe? Went to a swanky restaurant? Exotic vacation? Nobody cares. Don't base your happiness on people caring, because they won't. And if they do, they either want your stuff or hate you for it.
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It was the most valuable lesson I learned about life. I matter. I matter to myself. It matters that I live. It matters that I do the things that I want to do. And in this same light, I want to share with you - You Matter. Don't wait for a near death experience for you to understand this. You matter. Even if no one else cares, no one else notices you, no one else hears what you say. You Matter. Remember that - and do things knowing that you matter. What you say matters, what you do matters, every thing about you matters.
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Accurate thinking is being able to distinguish between fact and opinion. Whenever someone talks to you, they will share their opinion, peppered with facts. Not facts, peppered with opinion. Your job is to find out what is fact and what is opinion. Then to analyze the fact whether it is an important fact, or a useless fact. If this is an important fact, keep it in your mind. If it is an unimportant fact, forget about it.
Accurate Thinking The ability to see things as they are and not as you ‘think’ they are is one of the most important thing you will learn in your life.
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Then when you wake up and repeat the practice, this gets reinforced in the brain. There is a saying about the brain, “Neurons that fire together, wire together”. What this means is when you practice something new, initially it is hard because the brain hans’t yet established the pathways inside the brain to accommodate this activity. As you practice more and more the pathways get created. This process is called myelination. Myelin is a chemical in the brain that is used to connect neurons together.
The 20 minute M&N rule is this - whatever you want to learn, practice it 20 minutes in the morning right after you wake up and another 20 minutes before you goto sleep. This is very important. By spending the 20 minutes after you wake up your brain will be at it’s freshest and will be able to incorporate the lesson quickly.
Learn The “20-Minute-M&N” Rule The 20 minutes M&N rule... If you do this every day you will be able to learn any language, pick up any skill, play any instrument you want to. This rule will completely change the way you think about doing things and learning new things. Even if you’ve never been able to learn a skill before following this rule you will be able to pick up anything you want to in 30 days or less.
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If you take a job, think of ways you can make the company more money, find out ways you can improve the processes at work, find out ways to cut down the over runs in billing.
Leave Things Better Than You Find Them
We buy money in the form of credit cards, mortgages, loans, car leases etc. Since we’re spending money that we don’t have and paying a premium on top of that to use the money that we don’t have.
The bank isn’t a charity.
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The Greatest Force In The World Is Compound interest Or better yet, compounding. Compounding is the most powerful force on earth.
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