The wrong answer is, “it won’t.”
If you buy a piece of tech, it will break. If you buy an asset of some sort, it’s likely to go down in value one day. If you start a project, you will one day walk away from it. And everything that is alive will die. Refusing to answer the question doesn’t make it more likely that it won’t fail. All it does is make the failure more painful.
Your perspective is the frame from which you perceive reality. Like a camera. The field of view, even if the background is blurred, constrains what registers in the frame itself. By manipulating your perspective in any situation, you can perceive what used to be problematic as a minor road bump.
In the real world, the main spiritual problem is that people never change. They identify with beliefs, their job, and the life path that impressed them. Their ego never changes, because it doesn't want to. Once they've reached that point in life, they cease to learn, stack skills, and "level up" to the point of more opportunities being available to them. By improving your skill set, you are able to take on more complex challenges in life. By taking on more challenges, you acquire the knowledge and experience that expands your awareness.
What few understand is that you can create a game out of any situation in life. If you can mold your mind to create a fun game, life becomes enjoyable. If you can't, your mind will be molded into playing societal status games. Going to college, getting a high-paying job, or taking another structured approach to life eases the initial suffering that sovereign living implies.
Asking what makes someone successful is like asking which ingredient makes a recipe taste good. It’s not any single ingredient. It is the combination of many ingredients in the right proportions and in the right order—and the absence of anything that would ruin the mixture.
It changes. It changes as we age, and it changes depending on the situation. A second-grader might think that a boring class is never going to end. A bad cold might feel endless unless we have the perspective of someone who has experienced a chronic problem. Some things actually deserve “never.” But most of what we’re worried about probably would be better categorized as “eventually.”
Gratitude might be the way forward. So much of what ails us gets a bit better when we say ‘thank you.’ Even when it’s hard. Especially then.
The idea that you need to spend a very long time working at anything before you become an expert makes obvious sense. But people sometimes assume a corollary – that anyone can become expert simply by spending that amount of time. Ten thousand hours may be a necessary condition for becoming expert, but hours alone are not sufficient. Lots of people spend all that time but don’t become expert. You have to commit to continually improve.
Anytime you stay mired in a losing endeavor, that is when you are slowing your progress. Anytime you stick to something when there are better opportunities out there, that is when you are slowing your progress. Contrary to popular belief, quitting will get you to where you want to go faster.
People have a tendency to think they will have more time available one month from today than they have today, so they say yes to things now, assuming they'll have the time later. This leads them to take on new commitments that they shouldn't—meaning they say "Yes" and then later say "Damn!"
A finite game is played to win; there are clear victors and losers. An infinite game is played to keep playing; the goal is to maximize winning across all participants. Debate is a finite game. Marriage is an infinite game. A great deal of unnecessary suffering in the world comes from not knowing the difference.
Not all progress is visible. Don’t beat yourself up when things aren’t visible. One workout won't make you fit, but it is better than no workout. A small deposit in your savings today won’t get you to your goal, but it moves you closer. The daily grind is part of the process.
People with confidence, power, and reserves are able to admit when they are wrong, when things aren’t working and when it doesn’t turn out the way they hoped. If you’re hoping to demonstrate power, confidence, or status, taking responsibility is a better signal than whining.
While it’s tempting to view our days as an amusement park with unlimited rides, that’s not really true. It might not maximize our impact or enjoyment either. In fact, we each have a limited number of tickets to trade in. Limited time, limited opportunities, limited money, and other resources. How will you spend today’s tickets?
One of the simplest ways to win is to always connect the small things you do to the larger thing you hope to accomplish. Five minutes can be spent working on something trivial or working on something life-changing. A brief session of work-oriented toward a great cause is always time well spent. Most daily actions evaporate. Some accumulate.
One good day does not mean you can coast tomorrow. You never have it fully licked. Making good choices is an endless process. Many areas of life that we value most—our relationships, our fitness, our craft—require a continual commitment.
There’s always one thing that consistently drains the energy that we can pick out as currently more significant than the rest. Maybe it’s a vice you run to for its short-term hit that ultimately makes you feel hollow and tired in the longer term. It could be a friend you spend a lot of time with who is continually negative. You might spend a lot of time churning on worrying thoughts. It can take courage to confront what exactly this is, and it may take some reflection or note-taking to see what this is.
What is small is not small in itself, just as that which is great is not—great. A great and eternal beauty passes through the whole world, and it is distributed fairly over that which is small and that which is large; for in such important and essential matters, no injustice is to be found on earth.
Most of the planet is obsessed. But they’re obsessed with the world of illusion, hearsay, imagination, and opinion. Nothing is real here, and we can easily frighten ourselves when we spend considerable time in this space. Instead, be unreasonably biased to taking actions, even if they’re small and seemingly inconsequential. Take note of the things that make you nervous, and immediately take small, doable steps toward these fears. Relentless action is the soothing balm to all your fears.
How we behave defines how we feel about ourselves. You needn’t talk all the time. In fact, talking less is a sign you’re comfortable in your skin and aren’t compelled to prove yourself out of insecurity. But when we do talk, and we say it assertively, this communicates something very clearly, both to the world and yourself: I am confident in who I am.
It’s easy to imagine that they are, as it lets us off the hook as habits become negative, or even addictions. If someone else is thriving without the habit we seem to need, then it’s likely a desire pretending to be a need. For example, You can be a successful professional without spending time on social media.
In some areas of life, value is unlocked by starting. Even a five-minute workout or a short walk can reset your mood and benefit your body. In other areas, value is unlocked by finishing. It does you no good to build a bridge halfway across the river. You need to complete the project to realize its value.
Do you need to start or finish?
Are you building a body or building a bridge?
The ultimate form of preparation is not planning for a specific scenario, but a mindset that can handle uncertainty.
People have vastly different desires, except for three things: Respect, feeling useful, and control over their time. Those are nearly universal.
You're holding the things you think you need to get done in your head all at once. This overwhelms you. But it's in the mind. In reality, all we ever have is the one thing right in front of us. So pay attention to the delicious beauty of the present moment. Identify your next 1-3 priorities.
Worrying is one of our biggest soul killers and it never does us any good. Try this. When you feel worry coming on, and you have a strong urge to immerse yourself in negative thoughts, laugh. Chuckle like a freak clown who’s just received his paycheck. This trains the mind to associate worry with fun. You can’t lose.
It’s nearly impossible to be scared when you’ve done the reps. No one was born a magnificent TED speaker. They decided to do something cool and committed to practising it. A lot. This is why you get people who are the lamest nerds one year and a crowd-dazzler the next. Make it easier on yourself. Choose to focus on less. And become so good you can’t wait for the world to experience your brilliance.
Most of us scaredy-cats think our way into an unknown future, take one sniff, and fuck off out of there sharpish. Why? Because we’re in our heads, listening to our bizarre opinions about what we think might happen. They’re wrong. Let go of these thoughts, and find a way to bring sexy heat to your next steps.
We do the things we want to do, period. If we say we are too busy, it is just shorthand for the thing being "not important enough" or "not a priority." Busy is not a badge. You don’t find the time to make things, you make the time to do things.
