Book of the Week: Tools of Titans by Tim Ferris

Tim Ferriss does a fabulous job of collating what he calls the tactics, routines and habits of 101 billionaires, icons and world-class performers. Few patterns emerge.

Whenever I read about people who have cut-over from good to great, one thing always jumps out at me - that the journey to good is an intellectual one, though journey from good to great is an emotional and a spiritual one, an inner journey to come home to our own self. By spiritual, I mean sourced in loving kindness, abundance and joyous freedom; instead of being trapped in survival, scarcity and fear. One steps up to a Good life creating external success, by being a Fighter - fighting the fears within by pretending they don't exist and fighting people and circumstances outside, which we don't realize are merely a reflection of what's inside. Emotionally, we feel empty and hollow inspite of all the professional and material success we have created. We usually call that point midlife crisis, which in fact is a gift of the Universe calling us to step up to our real purpose to undertake our Hero's journey from good to great.

The  Journey from Good to Great is a step-up to Graceful Existence, when one abandons the Fighter stance to find another path, another way to be - a Peaceful Warrior, accepting with grace, gratitude and vulnerable authenticity the unacceptables, the unmentionables, the fears within, which for so long were our blind spots holding us to ransom and not allowing us to move forward to become the greatest version of ourselves.

Few other observations:

1. The good to great journey is available to everyone. What makes it possible for some is the unwavering belief you will get there.

2. Fundamentally, the journey is about Habits which is what distinguish those on the Good journey and those on the journey to step up to Great, professionally and personally. 

3. The default circuitry of the human mind is trapped in evolutionary fear because of which Survival instinct plays out to hold us in the domain of good. Re-training the brain and trans-form-ing (transcending the default limiting form of the mind) is required for us to transcend limiting habits (physical, emotional, mental, spiritual) to embrace growth habits.

4. Professional and personal greatness march together. One without the other is not possible.

5. The journey to Good and the journey from Good to Great are in opposite directions. 

Few excerpts from the book laying out key ideas:

1. It is not true that I am self-made. Like everyone, to get to where I am, I stood on the shoulders of giants. My life was built on a foundation of parents, coaches, and teachers; of kind souls who lent couches or gym back rooms where I could sleep; of mentors who shared wisdom and advice...

So how can I ever claim to be self-made? To accept that mantle discounts every person and every piece of advice that got me here. And, it gives the wrong impression - that you can do it alone.

I couldn't. And odds are, you can't either. We all need fuel. Without the assistance, advice, and inspiration of others, the gears of our mind grind to a halt, and we're stuck with nowhere to go.

- Arnold Schwarzenegger

2. The quality of your questions determined the quality of your life.

3. These world-class performers don't have superpowers. The rules they've crafted for themselves allow the bending of reality to such an extent that it may seem that way, but they've learned to do this, and so can you. These "rules" are often uncommon habits and bigger questions.

4. Thirty minutes of stream-of-consciousness journaling could change your life.

5. More than 80% of the world-class performers interviewed have some form of daily mindfulness or meditation practice. ... It is a "meta-skill" that improves everything else.

6. ... information without emotion isn't retained.

7. When I let go of what I am, I become what I might me. - Lao Tzu

8. I assume the best in people, I assume I can trust them until they prove me wrong.

9. If I had to prescribe two things to improve health and happiness in the world, it'd be movement and play. Because you can't really play without movement, so they're intertwined.

10. Going 16 hours without eating generally provides the right balance of autophagy (body's way of cleaning out damaged cells in order to regenerate newer, healthier cells) and anabolism (muscle building).

​11. ... the most important type of exercise, especially in terms of bang for your buck, is going to be really high-intensity, heavy strength training. Strength training aids everything from glucose disposal and metabolic health to mitochondrial density and orthopedic stability. 

12. Calm is contagious.

13. Of 10,000 successful couples studied, there's only one thing that everybody had in common, no matter what the dynamic. What is it? The man respected the woman. The number one thing.

... more times than not, if the woman can refrain from trying to change or mother her partner, she has greater opportunity of putting herself in a position where the guy will respect her.

14. As a woman, we are taught as young girls, 'Hey, be nice. Nice girls act like this,' so it takes a long time to get to a place of 'I'm going to do things, say things, and believe in things that people aren't going to like, and I'm going to be okay with that.' Men do that much more easily, and it takes women a very long time.

15. If you can't squat all the way to the ground with your feet and knees together, then you are missing full hip and ankle range of motion.

... if you can't breathe in a given position, you haven't mastered it.

16. Sleep hygiene - Dark means DARK. ... You cannot have your mobile in your room. You cannot have a TV in your room. It needs to be black, black as night.

17. Kids don't do what you say. They do what they see. How you live your life is their example.

18. When I landed, I would check into the hotel. The second we checked in, I'd ask them: 'Is the gym open? Can I go train? Even if it was to get on a bike and ride for 15 minutes to reset things. I learned early that it seemed anytime I did that, I didn't get jet lag.

19. Why would I be wound up? I'm either ready or I'm not. Worrying about it right now ain't gonna change a damn thing. Right? Whatever's gonna happen is gonna happen. I've either done everything I can to be ready for this, or I haven't.

20. .. if you don't do something well. don't do it unless you want to spend the time to improve it. ... 
What I am continuing to do myself that I'm not good at? - improve it, eliminate it, or delegate it.

21. ... you should never publicly criticize anyone or anything unless it is a matter of morals or ethics. Anything negative you say could at the very least ruin someone's day or worse, break someone's heart, or simply change someone from being a future ally of yours to someone who will never forget that you were unkind or unfairly critical.

22. For grounding, he convinced me to start making my bed.

23. We do not rise to the level of our expectations. We fall to the level of our training. - Archilochus

24. Give me six hours to chop down a tree and I'll spend the first hour sharpening the axe. - Abraham Lincoln

25. We suggest finding a "mindfulness buddy" and committing to a 15-minute conversation every week, covering:
i. How am I doing with my commitment to my practice?
ii. What has arisen in my life that relates to my practice?
iii. How did this conversation go?

26. 5-Minute Journal
To be answered in the morning
i. I am grateful for ... a. _________ b. _________ c. _________ 
ii. What would make today great?
a. _________ b. _________ c. _________ 
iii. Daily affirmations
I am 
a. _________ b. _________ c. _________ 

To be filled in at night:
i. 3 amazing things that happened today ... 
a. _________ b. _________ c. _________ 
ii. How could I have made today better?
a. _________ b. _________ c. _________ 

27. Dealing with the temporary frustration of not making progress is an integral part of the path towards excellence. ... If the pursuit of excellence was easy, everyone would do it. Infact, this impatience in dealing with frustration is the primary reason that most people fail to achieve their goals. ... Achieving the extraordinary is not a linear process. The secret is to show up, do the work, and go home. 

... accept that quality long-term results require long-term focus. No emotion. No drama. No beating yourself up over small bumps on the road. Learn to enjoy and appreciate the process. This is especially important because you are going to spend far more time on the actual journey than with those all too brief moments of triumph at the end.

Certainly celebrate the moments of triumph when they occur. More importantly, learn from your defeats when they happen. In fact, if you are not encountering defeat on a fairly regular basis, you are not trying hard enough. And absolutely refuse to accept less than your best.

Throw out a timeline. It will take what it takes.

If the commitment is to a long-term goal and not to a series of smaller intermediate goals, then only one decision needs to be made and adhered to. Clear, simple, straightforward. Much easier to maintain than having to make small decision after small decision to stay the course when dealing with each step along the way. This provides far too many opportunities to inadvertently drift from your chosen goal. The single decision is one of the most powerful tools in the toolbox.

​28. If you set your goals ridiculously high and it's a failure, you will fail above everyone else's success. - James Cameron

29. Good stories always beat good spreadsheets. ... we are all still emotionally driven human beings. ... We don't act because of equations. We follow our beliefs. We get behind leaders who stir our feelings. 

30. Cultivate a beginner's mind. ... Experience often deeply embeds the assumptions that need to be questioned in the first place. 

31. Empathy isn't just good for life, it's good for business. As a builder, as an entrepreneur, how can you create something for someone else if you don't have enough glancing familiarity with them to imagine the world through their eyes?

32. I think authenticity is one of the most lacking things out there these days. ... Be your unapologetically weird self.

33. Raise prices. ... They don't charge enough for their product to be able to afford the sales and marketing required to actually get anybody to buy it. Is your product any good if people won't pay more for it?

34. Be so good they can't ignore you.

35. To do original work: It's not necessary to know something nobody else knows. It is necessary to believe something few other people believe.
...
Andy Grove had the answer: For every metric, there should be another 'paired' metric that addresses adverse consequences of the first metric.
...
Every billionaire suffers from the same problem. Nobody around them says, 'Hey, that stupid idea that you just had is really stupid.'

- Marc Andreessen

36. I am a big believer that if you have a very clear vision of where you want to go, then the rest of it is much easier.
- Arnold Schwarzenegger

37. If more information was the answer, then we'd all be billionaires with perfect abs. ... It's not what you know, it's what you do consistently.

38. Ricardo Semler, CEO and majority owner of the Brazil-based Semco Partners, practices asking "Why?" three times. This is true when questioning his own motives, or when tackling big projects.

39. You can do everything you want to do. You just need foresight and patience.

40. Once you have some success - If it's not a 'Hell, Yes!', it's a 'No'.

41. 'Busy' = Out of control
... Lack of time is lack of priorities.

42. We are whatever we pretend to be.

43. One of his questions for founders who apply to Y Combinator: What are you doing that the world doesn't realize is a really big deal?
- Alexis Ohanian

44. Being busy is a form of laziness - lazy thinking and indiscriminate action.
...
Being busy is most often used as a guise for avoiding the few critically important but uncomfortable actions. 

45. Everyone is interesting. If you are ever bored in a conversation, the problem's with you, not the other person.

46. If we do X today, what does that result in tomorrow, a year from now, ten years from now? ... the dog is chasing the car. What does the dog do if he catches the car? He doesn't have a plan for it. So I find it just as often on the entrepreneurial side. People don't plan for success.

47. ... clarity of writing indicates clarity of thinking.

48. Nelson Mandela's answer when Tony Robbins asked him, "Sir, how did you survive all those years in prison?" - I didn't survive. I prepared.

49. Life is always happening for us, not to us. It's our job to find out where the benefit is. If we do, life is magnificent.
- Tony Robbins

50. Investing in yourself is the most important investment you'll ever make in your life.
- Warren Buffett

51. If you let your learning lead to knowledge, you become a fool. If you let your learning lead to action, you become wealthy.
- Jim Rohn

52. The reason you are suffering is you are focussed on yourself.

53. It is impossible to be angry and grateful simultaneously. When you are grateful, there is no fear. You can't be grateful and fearful simultaneously.

54. Commonality across the best investors - almost all of them were real givers, not just givers on the surface... but really passionate about giving...

55. Morning pages (journaling) are spiritual windshield wipers. It's the most cost-effective therapy. ... Once we get those muddy, maddening, confusing thoughts (nebulous worries, jitters and preoccupations) on the page, we face our day with clearer eyes. ... There are huge benefits to writing, even if no one - yourself included - ever reads what you write. In other words, the process matters more than the product.

56. Reid Hoffman responding to an insult with "I'm perfectly willing to accept that" and moving on.

57. The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.

58. I have come to learn that part of the business strategy is to solve the simplest, easiest, and most valuable problem. And, actually, in fact, part of doing strategy is to solve the easiest problem. 
- Reid Hoffman

59. In doing an 80/20 analysis of your activities (determining which 20% of activities / tasks produce 80% of the results you want), you typically end up with a short list. Make 'easy' your next criterion. Which of these highest-value activities is the easiest for me to do? 

60. On a daily basis, Reid Hoffman jots down problems in a notebook that he wants his mind to work on overnight.

61. Never go to sleep without a request to your subconscious. - Thomas Edison

62. How do you know if you have A-players on your project team? You know it if they don't accept the strategy you hand them. They should suggest modifications to the plan based on their closeness to the details.

63. What I prefer over trends is a sense of mission. That you are working on a unique problem that people are not solving elsewhere. - Peter Thiel

64. So I think, every day, it's something to reflect on and think about 'How do I become less competitive in order that I can become more successful?" - Peter Thiel

65. Peter Thiel
What do people agree merely by convention, and what is the truth?
...
Tell me something that's true that very few people agree with you on?
...
What problem do you face every day that nobody has solved yet?
...
What is a great company no one has started?
...
What do you believe that other people think is insane?
...
The Monopoly Question: Are you starting with a big share of a small market?
...
The Secret Question: Have you identified a unique opportunity others don't see?
...
The Distribution Question: Do you have a way to not just create but deliver your product?

66. Seth Godin
It's always the hard part that creates value.
...
You are more powerful than you think you are. Act accordingly.
...
... the goal isn't to get good ideas; the goal is to get bad ideas. Because once you get enough bad ideas, then some good ones have to show up.
...
... a simple theory of marketing that says: tell ten people, show ten people, share it with ten people; ten people who already trust you and already like you. If they don't tell anybody else, it's not that good and you should start over. If they do tell other people, you are on your way.
...
To create something great (or eventually huge), start extremely small. My suggestion is ... to ask yourself: What's the smallest possible footprint I can get away with? What is the smallest possible project that is worth my time? What is the smallest group of people who I could make a difference for, or to? Because smallest is achievable. Smallest feels risky. Because if you pick smallest and you fail, now you've really screwed up.

We want to pick big. Infinity is our friend. Infinity is safe. Infinity gives us a place to hide. So, I want to encourage people instead to look for the small. To be on one medium in a place where people can find you. To have one sort of interaction with one tribe, with one group where you don't have a lot of lifeboats.
....
If you spend 2 hours a day without an electronic device, looking your kid in the eye, talking to them and solving interesting problems, you will raise a different kid than someone who doesn't do that. That's one of the reasons why I cook dinner every night. Because, what a wonderful semi-distracted environment in which the kid can tell you the truth. For you to have low-stakes but super important conversations with someone who's important to you.
...
... we need to teach kids two things -
i. how to lead, and
ii. how to solve interesting problems

The way you teach your kids to solve interesting problems is to give them interesting problems to solve. And, then don't criticize them when they fail. Because kids aren't stupid. If they get in trouble every time they try to solve an interesting problem, they'll just go back to getting an A by memorizing what's in the textbook. ... And what we can say is: I really don't care how you did on your vocabulary test. I care about whether you have something to say.
...
You need to be clear with yourself about what you are afraid of, why you are afraid, and whether you care enough to dance with that fear because it will never go away.
...

67. James Altucher
James recommends the habit of writing down 10 ideas each morning in a notebook. This exercise is for developing your "idea muscle" and confidence for creativity on demand, so regular practice is more important than the topics. 

What if you just can't come up with 10 ideas? Here's the magic trick: If you can't come up with 10 ideas, come up with 20 ideas ... You are putting too much pressure on yourself. Perfectionism is the ENEMY of the idea muscle ... it's your brain trying to protect you from harm, from coming up with an idea that is embarrassing and stupid and could cause you to suffer pain. The way you shut this off is by forcing the brain to come up with bad ideas.

I then divide my paper into two columns. On one column is my list of ideas. On the other column is the list of FIRST STEPS. Remember, only the first step. Because you have no idea where that first step will take you. One of my favourite examples: Richard Branson didn't like the service on airlines he was flying, so he had an idea: 'I am going to start a new airline.' How the heck can a magazine publisher start an airline from scratch with no money? His first step: He called Boeing to see if they had an airplane he could lease. 

No idea is so big that you can't take the first step. If the first step seems too hard, make it simpler. And don't worry again if the idea is bad. This is all practice.
...
On the value of Selective Ignorance, After Working at a Newspaper - You are basically told, 'Find the things that's going to scare people the most and write about it.' ... It's like everyday is Halloween at the newspaper. I avoid newspapers. ... Many productive people do the same.

68. Have the founders ever had crappy service jobs, like waiting tables or bussing at restaurants? If so, they tend to stay grounded for longer. Less entitlement and megalomania usually means better decisions...
...
Commit, within financial reason, to action instead of theory.

​69. Scott Adams
Losers have goals. Winners have systems.
...
On the odd effectiveness of affirmations - All you do is you pick a goal and you write it down 15 times a day in some specific sentence form. And you do that every day. 

First, I said I would become a number-one best selling author. This was before I'd ever written a book, and I'd never taken a class in writing, except a 2-day course in business writing, and that was it. The Dilbert Principle became the number one best-selling book.

There was a period ... where I lost my voice beginning in 2005 due to spasmodic dysphonia. I couldn't speak for three and a half years. That was the next time I used affirmations. And the affirmation was: I, Scott Adams, will speak perfectly. (PS: He now speaks perfectly after a surgery.)

... I'm positive the exact method doesn't matter. I think what matters is the degree of focus and the commitment you have to that focus. Because the last affirmation (about speaking perfectly) I mentioned was primarily done in my head while driving, but continuously for years, for about 3 years. At first, the way I did it back in those times was I used a pencil or a pen and a piece of paper, and I wrote the same sentence 15 times, once a day, I think. Here's why I think it seems to work, and there are several possibilities. One is ... 'reticular activation'. It's basically the idea that it's easy to hear your own name spoken in a crowd. 

... Basically, your brain isn't capable of processing everything in its environment, or even coming close. So the best it can do is set up those little filters. And the way it sets its filters is by what you pay attention to. It's what you spend the most energy on ... That's how you set your filter. 

... you can use these affirmations ... to focus your mind and your memory on a very specific thing. And, that would allow you to notice things in your environment that might have already been there. It's just that your filter was set to ignore, and then you just tune in through this memory and repetition trick until it widens a little bit to allow some extra stuff in. So, there is some science to back that ...

Eventually, I decided to start the affirmation - I, Scott Adams, would become a famous cartoonist. The odds of becoming a famous cartoonist ... very rare. In fact, Dilbert was probably the biggest breakout, or one of the biggest, in 20 years.
​... 
Listening to the Body instead of the Mind - I am looking at a new problem, I am thinking of a new idea. But then you've got to find out where in that flood is the little piece that's worth working with. That's where I use the body model. ... Your brain can't find good contact, not directly in an intellectual sense. Obviously, the brain is involved, but what I mean is that as I am thinking of these ideas and they are flowing through my head, I am monitoring my body; I am not monitoring my mind. And when my body changes, I have something that other people are going to care about, too.
...
If you want an average, successful life, it doesn't take much planning. Just stay out of trouble, go to school, and apply for jobs you might like. But if you want something extraordinary, you have two paths:
i. become the best at one specific thing
ii. become very good (top 25%) at two or more things

The first strategy is difficult to the point of near impossibility. ... The second strategy is fairly easy. Everyone has at least a few areas in which they could be in the top 25% with some effort. In my case, I can draw better than most people, but I'm hardly an artist. And, I am not any funnier than the average standup comedian who never makes it big, but I'm funnier than most people. The magic is that few people can draw well and write jokes. It's the combination of the two that makes what I do so rare. And when you add in my business background, suddenly I had a topic that few cartoonists could hope to understand without living it. ...

At least one of the skills in your mixture should involve communication, either written or verbal. ...  you'd be hard-pressed to find any successful person who didn't have about three skills in the top 25%.

70. If you can't be first in a category, set-up a new category you can be first in. 
...
When you launch a new product, the first question to ask yourself is not 'How is this new product better than the competition?' but 'First what?'. In other words, what category is this new product first in?
...
When you are the first in a new category, promote the category. In essence, you have no competition. DEC told its prospects why they ought to buy a minicomputer, not a DEC minicomputer.

71. Chase Jarvis
I don't create art to get high-dollar projects, I do high-dollar projects so I can create more art.
...
Creativity is an infinite resource. The more you spend, the more you have. ... creativity and meditation are similar.
...
On going premium from Day One - I wanted to do less stuff, and do high-end stuff.
...
Good Content is the best SEO.

72. ... don't be afraid to do something you are not qualified to do. ... just copyright your faults.

73. 'Success' need not be complicated. Just start with making 1,000 people extremely, extremely happy. 
...
A true fan is defined as 'a fan who will buy anything you produce'. 
...
It's always easier and better to give your existing customers more, than it is to find new fans. ... you must have a direct relationship with your fans.
...
True fans are not only the direct source of your income, but also your chief marketing force for the ordinary fans. ... the high-touch 1,000 true fans who act as your most powerful unpaid marketing force for 'crossing the chasm' into the mainstream. If you don't build that initial army, you are likely to fail. 
...
You just need to create a great experience and charge enough.

74. Alex Blumberg
Ask the dumb question everyone else is afraid to ask.
...
... pseudo-commands are sometimes more effective than questions:
i. Tell me more about ...
ii. Describe ...
iii. Explain that a bit more ...
...
Follow-up questions when something interesting comes up:
i. How did that make you feel?
ii. What do you make of that? ...
iii. What did you learn from that?
...
When you do X (or when Y happened to you), what does your internal self-talk sound like? What do you say to yourself.

75. Not only am I not going to say anything negative about the situation I am in, but I am not going to let myself think negative about it ... It took a long time and I wasn't perfect at it ... not only did replacing those thoughts helped me start moving my life in a better direction, where I wasn't obsessing about what was wrong ... it also made me not feel physical pain so much, which is very liberating and kind of necessary if you want to do anything.
- Tracy DiNunzio

76. ... every single thing in your company breaks every time you roughly triple in size. 
...
How are you complicit in creating the conditions you say you don't want?
- Phil Libin

77. That's something I certainly hope to instill in my son: Don't worry about what your job is going to be ... Do things you are interested in, and if you do them really well, you are going to find a way to temper them with some good business opportunity. - Chris Young

78. Five days a week, I read my goals before I go to sleep and when I wake-up. There are 10 goals around health, family, business etc. with expiration dates and I update them every 6 months.
...
My parents always taught me that my day job would never make me rich. It'd be my homework.
- Daymond John

79. Don't try and find time. Schedule time. On Tuesdays, from 10 am to 12 noon, Noah schedules nothing but 'learning'. This is a great reminder that, for anything important, you don't find time. It's only real if it's on the calendar. My Wednesdays from 9 am to 1 pm are currently blocked out for "Creation - writing, podcast recording, or other output that creates a tangible 'after' product. I turn-off Wifi during this period to be as non-reactive as possible.
...
...most of their students started gymnastics as sedentary adults.
- Noah Kagan

80. The value of "I don't understand" ... try experimenting with saying 'I don't understand. Can you explain that to me?'
- Luis Von Ahn

81. Great men have almost always shown themselves as ready to obey as they afterwards proved able to command. - Lord Mahon
...
If you want great mentors, you have to become a great mentee. If you want to lead, you have to first learn to follow.
...
It's not about making someone look good. It's about providing the support so that others can be good.
...
Benjamin Franklin saw the constant benefit in making other people look good and letting them take credit for your ideas.
...
Bill Belichick, the four-time Super Bowl winning head coach ... thrived on what was considered grunt work, asked for it, and strove to become the best at precisely what others thought they were too good for.
...
Greatness comes from humble beginnings; it comes from grunt work. It means you are the least important person in the room - until you change that with results.
...
Say little. Do much. ... Be lesser, do more. Imagine if for every person you met, you thought of some way to help them, something you could do for them? And you looked at it in a way that entirely benefitted them and not you? The cumulative effect this would have over time would be profound: You'd learn a great deal by solving diverse problems. You'd develop a reputation for being indispensable. You'd have countless new relationships. You'd have an enormous bank of favours to call upon down the road.

82. Neil Strauss
... not accepting the norm is the secret to really big success and changing the world.
... 
Writer's Block - Whether it's ideas or writing, the key is temporarily dropping your standards. One of the best pieces of advice I've received for writing was a mantra: 2 crappy pages per day. ... Draft ugly and edit pretty.
...
Be vulnerable to get vulnerability.
...
Be open to whatever comes next. - John Cage
...
No matter what the situation may be, the right course of action is always compassion and love. - Barbara McNally

83. Be the silence that listens. - Tara Brach
...
What would this look like if it were easy?

83. Scott Belsky
Sometimes, you need to stop doing things you love in order to nurture the one thing that matters most.

... the dirty little secret is that every success was almost a failure.

84. Travel isn't just for changing what's outside, it's for reinventing what's inside.

85. Peter Diamandis
I talk to CEOs all the time, and I say, 'Listen, the day before something is truly a breakthrough, it's a crazy idea. If it wasn't a crazy idea, it's not a breakthrough; it's an incremental improvement. So where inside of your companies are you trying crazy ideas?
...
A problem is a terrible thing to waste. ... The world's biggest problems are the world's biggest business opportunities.
...
When 99% of people doubt you, you are either gravely wrong or about to make history.
...
The best way to become a billionaire is to help a billion people.
...
His affirmation mantra, which he repeats a number of times is: I am joy. I am love. I am gratitude. I see, hear, feel and know that the purpose of my life is to inspire and guide the transformation of humanity on and off the Earth.
...
Before bed, Peter always reviews his three "wins of the day."
...
If you haven't connected with what your purpose and mission in life is, then forget anything I've said. That is the number one thing you need to do: Find out what you need to be doing on this planet, why you were put here, and what wakes you up in the mornings.
...
The benefits of thinking 10X instead of 10%. When you go after a moonshot - something that's 10 times bigger, not 10% bigger - a number of things happen ...

First of all, when you are going 10% bigger, you are competing against everybody. Everybody's trying to go 10% bigger. When you are trying to go 10 times bigger, you are there by yourself.

The second thing is, when you are trying to go 10 times bigger, you have to start with a clean sheet of paper, and you approach the problem completely differently. 

The third thing is when you try to go 10 times bigger versus 10% bigger, it's typically not 100 times harder, but the reward is 100 times more.
...
Is there a grand challenge or a billion person problem that you can focus on?

How would you disrupt yourself?
...
When given a choice... take both.

The best way to predict the future is to create it yourself.

If you can't measure it, you can't improve it.

86. Sophia Amoruso
I like to make promises that I'm not sure I can keep and then figure out how to keep them.
...
A day that ends well is one that started with exercise.

87. Get the long-term goal on the calendar before the short-term pain hits.
...
Make commitments in a high-energy state so that you can't back out when you are in a low-energy state.
...
I find that being in a good mood for creative work is worth the hours it takes to get in a good mood.
- BJ Novak

88. The wisdom of life consists in the elimination of non-essentials - Lin Yutang.
...
Discipline equals freedom. - Jocko Willink
...
Are you doing what you are uniquely capable of, what you feel placed here on Earth to do? 
...
Saying yes to less is the way out.
...
Large, uninterrupted blocks of time - 3 to 5 hours minimum - create the space needed to find and connect the dots. And one block per week isn't enough. ... For me, this means at least 3 to 4 mornings per week where I am in 'maker' mode until atleast 1 pm.
...
What blessings in excess have become a curse? Where do you have too much of a good thing?
...
Life favours the specific ask and punishes the vague wish.
...
All of my biggest wins have come from leveraging strengths instead of fixing weaknesses.
...
In practice, strictly making health # 1 has real social and business ramifications. That's a price I've realized I MUST be fine with paying or I will lose weeks or months to sickness and fatigue.

Making health #1 50% of the time doesn't work. It's all or nothing. If it's #1 50% of the time, you'll compromise precisely when it's most important not to.

89. If you are suffering from a feeling of overwhelm, it might be useful to ask yourself two questions:
i. In the midst of overwhelm, is life not showing me exactly what I should subtract?
ii. Am I having a breakdown or a breakthrough?

90. As Marcus Aurelius and Ryan Holiday would say, The obstacle is the way. This doesn't mean seeing problems, accepting them and leaving them to fester. Nor does it mean rationalizing problems into good things. It means using pain to find clarity. If pain is examined and not ignored, it can show you what to excise from your life.

Step one is always the same: Write down the 20% of activities and people causing 80% or more of your negative emotions. 

Step two is doing a 'fear-setting' exercise on paper, by answering 'What is really the worst that could happen if I stopped doing what I am considering? And so what? How could I undo any damage?'

91. The struggle ends when the gratitude begins. - Neale Donald Walsch

92. There is no way to happiness - happiness is the way. - Thich Nhat Hanh

93. What you seek is seeking you. - Rumi

94. Maria Popova 
If you are looking for a formula for greatness, the closest we'll ever get, I think, is this: Consistency driven by a deep love of the work.
...
Life is a continual process of arrival into who we are.
...
The really efficient laborer will be found not to crowd his day with work, but will saunter to his task surrounded by a wide halo of ease and leisure. There will be a wide margin for relaxation to his day. He is only earnest to secure the kernels of time, and does not exaggerate the value of the husk - the outer accoutrements of productivity like busyness, or a full calendar, or a clever auto-responder - not mistaking those for the kernel, the core and substance of the actual work produced. .... Those who work much, do not work hard.
- Henry David Thoreau

95. Jocko Willink
Discipline equals freedom. ... if you want freedom in life - be that financial freedom, more free time, or even freedom from sickness and poor health - you can only achieve these things through discipline.
...
Most who've been successful for decades also have methods to cultivate gratitude.
...
If you want to be tougher mentally, it is simple: Be tougher. Don't meditate on it. ... Being tougher was, more than anything, a decision to be tougher.
...
What makes a good commander? 
The immediate answer that comes to mind is 'humility'. Because you've got to be humble, and you've got to be coachable. ... Later, when I was running training, we would fire a couple of leaders from every SEAL (The United States Navy Sea, Air and Land Teams) Team because they couldn't lead. And, 99.9% of the time, it wasn't a question of their ability to shoot a weapon, it wasn't because they weren't in good physical shape, it wasn't because they were unsafe. It was almost always a question of their ability to listen, open their mind, and see that, maybe, there's a better way to do things. That is from a lack of humility ... Stay humble or get humbled.
...
...step back and observe. ... detaching yourself from the situation, so you can see what's happening, is always critical.

96. Practice for mental toughness - ... push yourself harder than you believe you are capable of. You'll find new depth inside yourself. 

97. Think about how old you are right now and think about being a 10-year older version of yourself. Then think, 'What would I probably tell myself, as an older version of myself?' If you do this exercise and then start living the answers, I think you are going to grow exponentially faster than you would have otherwise.

98. What are actually my ultimate goals in life, and how can I optimize toward them?

99. What are your top 2 or 3 handicapping (limiting) beliefs?
a. What has each belief cost you in the past, and what has it cost people you've loved in the past? What have you lost because of the belief? See it, hear it, feel it?

b. What is each costing you and people you care about in the present? See it, hear it, feel it?

c. What will each cost you and people you care about 1, 3, 5 and 10 years from now? See it, hear it, feel it.

After you feel the acute pain of your current handicapping beliefs, you formulate 2 or 3 replacement beliefs to use moving forward. This is done so that 'you are not pulled back into old beliefs by old language patterns. One of my top 3 limiting beliefs was 'I'm not hardwired for happiness,' which I replaced with 'Happiness is my natural state.' Post this, I used Scott Adam's affirmation approach in the mornings to reinforce it. I experienced a huge shift in my life in the subsequent 3 to 4 weeks. Roughly a year later, I can say this: I've never been consistently happier in my entire adult life.

​100. With boys, there is an active encouragement - despite the possibility that they could get hurt - and guiding the son to do it, often on his own. When a daughter decides to do something that might have some risk involved, after cautioning her, the parents are much more likely to assist her in doing it. What is this telling girls? They are fragile and they need our help. This is acculturated so early. So, of course, by the time we are women and in the workplace or relationships, that's going to be a predominant paradigm for us: fear.

... I would say it's time to adopt a paradigm of bravery instead of a paradigm of fear. So, when you have a boy and a girl, or a man and a woman, facing the exact same situation, facing the exact same situation, there will be two emotional reactions to it that are sort of opposite. The man will be trying to access his bravery, and the woman will be accessing her fear.

- Caroline Paul

101. Courage takes practice. It's a skill you have to develop.
...
Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage. - Anais Nin
...
Named must your fear be before banish it you can. - Yoda, from Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back.
...
Action may not always bring happiness, but there is no happiness without action.
- Benjamin Disraeli
...
Most people will choose unhappiness over uncertainty.
...
Conquering Fear = Defining Fear
...
I am an old man and have known a great many troubles, but most of them never happened. 
- Mark Twain
... 
Usually, what we most fear doing is what we most need to do. That phone call, the conversation, whatever the action might be - it is the fear of unknown outcomes that prevents us from doing what we need to do. Define the worst case, accept it, and do it. ... A person's success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have. Resolve to do one thing everyday that you fear. 

102. Kevin Kelly
Productivity is for robots. What humans are going to be really good at is asking questions, being creative and experiences.
...
In a world of distraction, single-tasking is a superpower. 
...
Write to get ideas, not to express them - What I discovered, what is what many writers discover, is that I write in order to think. I'd say, I think I have an idea but when I begin to write it, I realize, 'I have no idea', and I don't actually know what I think until I try and write it ... That was the revelation.

103. There is more freedom to be gained from practicing poverty than chasing wealth. Suffer a little regularly and you often cease to suffer.

104. Whitney Cummings
If something offends you, look inward ... That's a sign that there's something there.
...
Perfectionism leads to procrastination which leads to paralysis.
...
I think ultimately, sometimes when we judge other people, it's just a way to not look at ourselves; a way to feel superior or sanctimonious or whatever. My trauma therapist said every time you meet someone, just in your head say, 'I love you' before you have a conversation with them, and the conversation is going to go a lot better. ... just assume everybody is doing the best they can with what they have ...
...
... the way you do anything is the way you do everything.

105. Bryan Callen
Happiness is wanting what you have.
...
The difference between the people you admire and everybody else is that the former are the people who read.

​106. Alain De Botton
When people seem like they are mean, they are almost never mean. They are anxious.
...
Ultimately, to be properly successful is to be at peace as well.
...
The more you know what you really want, and where you are really going, the more what everybody else is doing starts to diminish.

107. Idleness is not just a vacation, an indulgence, or a vice: It is as indispensable to the brain as Vitamin D is to the body, and deprived of it we suffer a mental affliction as disfiguring as rickets. The space and quiet that idleness provides is a necessary condition for standing back from life and seeing it whole, for making unexpected connections and waiting for the wild summer lightning strikes of inspiration - it is, paradoxically, necessary to getting any work done.
...
Life is too short to be busy. 

108. Cal Fussman
Aim for the heart, not the head. Once you get the heart, you can go to the head. Once you get the heart and the head, then you'll have a pathway to the soul.
...
Listening is about being present, not just being quiet.
...
We all know the feeling of wanting to do something so well and so badly that we try too hard and can't do it at all.

109. Rick Rubin
How does Rick help artists who feel stuck? "Usually, I'll give them homework - a small, doable task. I'll give you an example. There was an artist I was working with recently who hadn't made an album in a long time, and he was struggling with finishing anything. He just had this version of a writer's block. But I would give him very doable homework assignments that almost seemed like a joke. 'Tonight, I want you to write one word in this song that needs five lines, that you can't finish. I just want one word that you like by tomorrow. Do you think that you could come up with one word?' "
...
So much of the job is more emotion and 'heart work' than it is 'head work'. The head comes in after, to look at what the heart has presented and to organize it. But the initial inspiration comes from a different place, and it's not the head, and it's not an intellectual activity.
...
Going to museums and looking at great art ... Reading great novels ... seeing a great movie ... reading poetry ... The only way to use the inspiration of other artists is if you submerge yourself in the greatest works of all time ...
(JG: A Business is a Work of Art. Those who lead it are artists. You will lead yourself and your business from good to great if you play the game like that.)

110. ... 80% of the world-class performers I've interviewed meditate in the mornings in some fashion. But what about the remaining 20%? Nearly all of them have meditation like activities.

111. Paulo Coelho
The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion.
...
I don't have researchers, no. No, no ... If you overload your book with a lot of research, you are going to be very boring to yourself and to your readers. Books are not here to show how intelligent and cultivated you are. Books are out there to show your heart, to show your soul, and to tell your fans, readers: You are not alone.

112. Even if you don't consider yourself a writer, putting thoughts on paper is the best way to:
a. develop ideas
b. review and improve your thinking
The benefits of even 30 minutes a week of scribbling can transfer to everything else that you do.

113. Two words for conflict resolution - Say less. That's it. Just say less.
...
Honor those who seek the truth, beware of those who've found it.
- Amanda Palmer

114. The limits of my language mean the limits of my world.
... 
Don't keep stuff to yourself. You are surrounded by smart people. Bring them in, Get other people's opinions. Share it with them. And most importantly, emotions is what matters. It's an emotional journey ...
...
Blind belief in yourself.

115. It's very, very hard to stay silent, and it's very, very important to have that self-control.
...
Trying to get everyone to like you is a sign of mediocrity. You'll avoid the tough decisions, and you'll avoid confronting the people who need to be confronted. - Colin Powell
...
If you want to improve, be content to be thought foolish and stupid. - Epictetus
...
Sometimes, the best way to defuse or defeat attackers is to ask short questions and keep them talking - Why do you say that?, Why do you ask?, Why would you say something like that? ...
...
... it is so much less work just to be yourself.
...
Cynicism is a disease that robs people of the gift of life.
...
You have to believe in your capacity. You have to believe that your capacity is greater than you could probably imagine. ... God has given us talents and faculties, and it's up to us to discover them, expand them to their maximum, and use them for maximum service in the world. 
...
Believe in yourself more deeply. You are bigger than that. Dream bigger.

116. Naval Ravikant
The most important trick to be happy is to realize that happiness is a choice that you make and a skill you develop. You choose to be happy, and then you work at it. It's just like building muscles.
...
Reading (learning) is the ultimate meta-skill and can be traded for anything else.
...
Earn with your mind, not your time.
...
Total honesty at all times. It's almost always possible to be honest and positive.
...
Watch every thought. Always ask - Why am I having this thought?
...
All greatness comes from suffering.
...
Love is given, not received.
...
Mathematics is a language of nature.
...
Every moment has to be complete in and of itself.

117. What you are is good enough for whatever it is you are doing. 
...
You are smart enough. You can do it. ... there's something stupid in us that just makes us feel like we are not good enough, we are not smart enough.
- Glenn Beck

118. Tara Brach
There's a mystic who says there's only one really good question, which is, 'What am I unwilling to feel?'
...
​Inviting Mara to Tea
This being human is a guest house,
Every morning a new arrival.

A joy, a depression, a meanness,
Some momentary awareness comes
as an unexpected visitor.

Welcome and entertain them all! ...
The dark thought, the shame, the malice,
meet them at the door laughing,
and invite them in.

Be grateful for whoever comes,
because each has been sent
as a guide beyond.
- Rumi

The poem relates to actively recognizing anger and other types of what we consider 'negative' emotions. Rather than trying to suppress something or swat it away, we say to the emotions / ourselves, 'I see you.' This counter-intuitively helps to dissolve or resolve the issue. ... Fighting emotions is like flailing in quicksand - it only makes things worse. Sometimes, the most proactive 'defense' is a mental nod and wink.

... When Mara (small mind) visits us, in the form of troubling emotions or fearsome stories, we can say, 'I see you, Mara' and clearly recognize the reality of craving and fear that lives in each human heart. By accepting these experiences with the warmth of compassion, we can offer Mara tea rather than fearfully drive him away. Seeing what is true, we hold what is seen with kindness. We express such wakefulness of heart each time we recognize and embrace our hurts and fears.

Our habit of being a fair-weather friend to ourselves - of pushing away or ignoring whatever darkness we can - is deeply entrenched. But just as a relationship with a good friend is marked by understanding and compassion, we can learn to bring these same qualities to our own inner life.

119. Sam Kass
... the key in any kind of high pressure situation is that 75% of success is staying calm and not losing your nerve. The rest you can figure out, but once you lose your calm, everything else starts falling apart fast.
...
Never serve anything you wouldn't want to eat.
...
One difference between home cooks and pros is acidity level. When you think it's ready, add another lemon. Pros bump up the acidity level. It's one of the secrets. We add a little more acid and it makes everything taste better.
...
... passion comes from a combination of being open and curious, and really going all-in when you find something that you are interested in.

120. Richard Betts
If you are lucky, you have someone when you are young who doesn't talk down to you, who speaks to you as a serious person and exhorts you to take something seriously, to take work seriously.
...
What do you think financially successful people who are generally unhappy have in common? ... Misplaced goals. I think chasing the financial is not the right way to do it. ... if you work for the awards (rewards), you don't do good work. But if you do good work, the awards (rewards) will come.
...
Love yourself. ... You've got to love yourself before you can love others. Without it, nothing productive is going to happen, and we can all bang our heads on the wall.

121. Mike Birbiglia
Only emotion endures.
...
I try to write before my inhibitions take hold of me. I try to do 7 am. ... You don't want to think consciously about what you are putting on the page. A lot of times, I'll write in my journal as though it will never be seen by anyone, and then more often than not, the things that I put in my secret journal are the things I publish.
...
... the best thing to do is give people questions they are not expecting.
...
Don't waste your time on marketing, just try to get better ... And, also, it's not about being good; it's about being great.

122. ... if you don't regularly appreciate the small wins, you will never appreciate the big wins. 
...
... if you try to approach every problem with your moral compass, first and foremost, you are going to make a lot of mistakes. You are going to exclude a lot of possible good solutions. You are going to assume you know a lot of things, which in fact you don't, and you are not going to be a good partner in reaching a solution with other people who don't happen to see the world the way you do. - Stephen J. Dubner
...
A back-off week, or deload, is a planned reduction in exercise volume or intensity. ... I've used deloading outside of sports to decrease my anxiety to at least 50% while simultaneously doubling my income. ... I feel that the big ideas come from these periods. It's the silence between the notes that makes the music. ... importance of creating large, uninterrupted blocks of time, during which your mind can wander, ponder, and find the signal amidst the noise. If you are lucky, it might even create a signal, or connect two signals (core ideas) that have never shaken hands before. I've scheduled deloading phases in a few ways: roughly 8 am to 9 am daily for journaling, .. 9 am to 1 pm every Wednesday for creative output (i.e writing, interviewing for the podcast); and 'screen free Saturdays', when I use no laptops and only use my phone for maps and coordinating with friends via text (no apps). Of course, I still use 'mini-retirements' a few times a year. ... Deloading blocks must be scheduled and defended more strongly than your business commitments. The former can strengthen and inform the latter, but not vice-versa. ... Create slack, as no one will give it to you. This is the only way to swim forward instead of treading water. - Tim Ferris
...
A person's success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have. - Tim Ferris, The 4-Hour Work Week

123. Josh Waitzkin
... ending the work day with very high quality, which for one thing means you are internalizing quality overnight. 
...
Hemingway had a practice of ending his writing sessions mid-flow and mid-sentence. This way, he knew exactly where to start the next day, and he could reliably both end and start his sessions with confidence. 
...
One of my most beautiful memories of Marcelo is in the world championship, right before going to the semifinals. He's napping on a bleacher. Everyone's screaming and yelling, he's asleep on the bleacher. I can't wake him up.

He finally took a stumble into the ring and you've never seen a guy more relaxed before going into a world championship fight. ... He can turn it off so deeply, and man, when he goes in the ring, you can't turn it on with any more intensity than he can. His ability to turn it off is directly aligned with how intensely he can turn it on, so I train people to do this, to have stress and recovery undulation throughout their day.

Interval training (often at midday or lunch break) and meditation together are beautiful habits to develop to cultivate the art of turning it on and turning it off.
...
We are talking about Marcelo embodying the principle of quality in all these little ways (eg. specific cleaning protocols for the gym, having people tidy their uniforms in class). These little ways, you could say don't matter, but they add up hugely. ... the little things are the big things. Because they are a reflection. This may sound cliched, but how you do anything is how you do everything.
...
... most people think they can wait around for the big moments to turn it on. But if you don't cultivate 'turning it on' as a way of life in the little moments - and there are hundreds of times more little moments than big - then there's no chance in the big moments ... I believe that when you are not cultivating quality, you are essentially cultivating sloppiness.
...
Lateral thinking or thematic thinking, the ability to take a lesson from one thing and transfer it to another, is one of the most important disciplines that any of us can cultivate.

​124. Brene Brown
Lean into discomfort. ... Give vulnerability a shot. Give discomfort its due. Because I think he or she who is willing to be the most uncomfortable is not only the bravest, but rises the fastest. 
...
The big question I ask is - When I had the opportunity, did I choose courage over comfort? ... How that translates to more than 30 million video views - I went to the TED Event and I experimented. I really put myself out there. I talked about my own breakdowns, my spiritual awakening. I talked about having to go to therapy ... and I remember driving home and thinking, 'I will never do that again.' She then watched the popularity of her video explode, now totaling more than 31 million views on TED.com and YouTube. 'If I look back, my takeaway from that experience was this: If I am not feeling a little bit nauseous when I am done, I probably didn't show up like I should have shown up.
...
​People always think you gain trust first and then you are vulnerable with people. But the truth is, you can't really earn trust over time without being somewhat vulnerable first.
...
The word 'successful' and 'success' has been such a dangerous word in my research. ... Be clear that your ladder is leaning against the right building.

125. People's IQs seem to double as soon as you give them responsibility and indicate that you trust them.
...
What if I could only subtract to solve problems?
...
What if I did the opposite for 48 hours?
...
Could it be that everything is fine and complete as is?
...
What would this look like if it were easy?
...
You don't need to go through life huffing and puffing, straining and red-faced. You can get 95% of the results you want by calmly putting one foot in front of the other. ... Slow is smooth. Smooth is fast. ... Luxury, to me, is feeling unrushed.
...
Be sure to look for simple solutions. If the answer isn't simple, it's probably not the right answer.

126. I kept wondering how Tyrin Turner was always in shape. He said: 'Man, I'm trying to tell you, the pull-up bars are everything.'
...
You are either great or you don't exist. ... Good isn't good enough.
​- Jamie Foxx

127. Bryan Johnson
... entrepreneurs have the ability to author their lives with companies.
...
What can you do that will be remembered in 200 to 400 years?
...
I broke all their sales records following this really simple formula of just selling honesty and transparency in a broken industry.
...
One time as a kid, I wondered - if you fill a milk gallon jug full of gasoline and you lit it on fire, what would happen? ... As expected, it produced quite a flame. ... the lawn is on fire. It is getting worse and worse. Anyway, mom and I put the fire out and then the only thing she says to me is - Bryan, you probably should not do that again, and I said, 'All right, that is fair.'
​(lesson on parenting)
...
This is a story about a tiger named Mohini that was in captivity in a zoo. She has been confined to a 10-by-10-foot cage with a concrete floor for 5 or 10 years. She was rescued and finally released into this big pasture: With excitement and anticipation, they released Mohini into her new and expensive environment, but it was too late. The tiger immediately sought refuge in a corner of the compound, where she lived for the remainder of her life. She paced and paced in that corner until an area 10-by-10 feet was worn bare of grass. ... Perhaps the biggest tragedy in our lives is that freedom is possible, yet we can pass our years trapped in the same old pattern. ... Oftentimes, everything you want is a mere inch outside of your comfort zone. Test it.

128. You don't find time, you make time. ... Khaled Hosseini wrote The Kite Runner in the early mornings before working as a full-time doctor. Paul Levesque often works out at midnight. It it's truly important, schedule it. ... If it isn't on the calendar, it isn't real.
...
Every morning, what I do is based on the Morning Pages by Julia Cameron in The Artist's Way (A spiritual path to higher creativity). It's 3 longhand pages where you just keep the pen moving for 3 pages, no matter what. No censoring, no rereading. It's the closest thing to magic I've come across. If you really do it every day in a real disciplined practice, something happens to you subconscious that allows you to get to your most creative place. - Brian Koppelman
...
Being deeply loved by someone gives you strength, while loving someone deeply gives you courage. - Lao Tzu
...
You have gifts to share with the world.

129. Robert Rodriguez
There's freedom in limitations. ... Excuses are a dime a dozen. In the case of Entrepreneurship, the "I don't have" list - I don't have funding. I don't have connections etc. - is a popular write-off for inaction. But lack of resources is often one of the critical ingredients for greatness.
...
Jack Ma, founder of China's Alibaba Group, is worth an estimated $20 to $30 billion, and he explains the secret of his success this way: There are 3 reasons why we survived: We had no money, we had no technology, and we had no plan. Every dollar, we used very carefully.
...
Turn weaknesses into strengths, bugs into features. ... nothing ever goes according to plan ... nothing is going to work at all. So you go: How can I turn it into a positive and get something much better than if I had all the time and money in the world? ... I want all of them to not have enough money, not enough time, so that we are forced to be more creative. Because that's going to give it some spark that you can't manufacture.
...
Don't follow the herd, stumble instead. It's good not to follow the herd. Go the other way. If everyone's going that way, you go this other way. You are gonna stumble, but you are also gonna stumble upon an idea no one came up with ... I always found success by just going the opposite way. There was too much competition over there. If everyone's trying to get through that one little door, you are in the wrong place.
...
Failure is not necessarily durable. Remember that the things they fire you for when you are young are the same things that they give lifetime achievement awards for when you are old. - Francis Ford Coppola
...
I'm there to learn. I'm not there to win; I'm there to learn because then I'll win, eventually ...
...
You have to be able to look at your failures and know that there's a key to success in every failure.
...
If you have a positive attitude, you can look back. ... You can go back and you can look at it and go, 'Oh, that wasn't a failure. That was a key moment of my development that I needed to take, and I can trust my instinct. I really can.'
...
You don't need to know. Trust comes first. ... creativity is a meta-skill. Robert routinely plays guitar on set and invites master painters to set to teach the actors during breaks. He believes that if you develop creativity, trust and getting started often take care of the rest: 'The technical part of any job is 10%. 90% is creativity.'
...
You get in your own way - thinking that you needed to know something, a trick or a process, before it would flow. If you got out of the way, it would just flow. ... suddenly, you've given yourself permission to let it flow. ... You are just opening up the pipe and the creativity flows through. And as soon as your ego gets in the way, and you go, 'I don't know if I know what to do next' you have already put 'I' in front of it and you've already blocked it a little bit. 'I did it once, but I don't know if I can do it again.' It was never you. The best you can do is just get out of the way so it comes through.
...
They say knowing is half the battle. I think the most important is the other part - not knowing what's going to happen but trusting that it will be there when you put the brush up to the canvas. It's going to know where to go. ... The trust comes first.
...
Even if I didn't know what to do, I just had to begin. For a lot of people, that's the part that keeps them back the most. They think, 'Well, I don't have an idea, so I can't start.' I know you'll only get the idea once you start. It's this totally reverse thing. You have to act first before inspiration will hit. You don't wait for the inspiration and then act, or you are never going to act, because you are never going to have the inspiration, not consistently. ... You don't have to know. You just have to keep moving forward.
...
​When people say, 'You do so many things. You are a musician, you are a painter, you are a composer, you are a cinematographer, you are the editor. You do many different things.' 

I go, 'No, I only do one thing. I live a creative life. When you put creativity in everything, everything becomes available to you.' 

... How you journal things; how you cross-reference, how you present things, how you inspire your crew, how you inspire other people around you, how you inspire yourself - it's all creative. And, if you say you are not creative, look at how much you are missing out on just because you've told yourself that. I think creativity is one of the greatest gifts that we are born with that some people don't cultivate, that they don't realize it could be applied to literally everything in their lives.
...
You never have to be upset about anything. ... Everything is for a purpose. ... It is really how you look at it, and the way you look at it is so important. If you can have a positive attitude, look at it, and say, 'Let me see, what can I learn from this?' ... Why would you ever get upset about anything? ... You are upset because something didn't go according to plan? It might be for a good reason.

130. ... when things are going bad, there's going to be some good that will come from it. ... When things are going bad, don't get all bummed out, don't get startled, don't get frustrated. ... Accept reality, but focus on the solution. Take that issue, take that setback, take that problem, and turn it into something good. Go forward.
...
You must want to be a butterfly so badly, you are willing to give up being a caterpillar.
- Sekou Andrews
...
What should I do with my life? ... Enjoy it.
___________________________________________________________________________

The value of reading a book is not just the sense of joy one gets while reading or even learning, greater value lies in reflecting on the learnings and taking actions, even if it is one tiny action, as an outcome of those learnings.

Reflect on your learnings from the key ideas in the book by answering the below questions:

1. What do you now see that you hadn't seen before?

2. What do you now understand that you hadn't understood before?

3. What did you learn that would make a difference to your life, personally and professionally?

4. What action(s) will you take as an outcome of the answers to the above three questions?

5. By when would you take those actions?

Wishing you the joy of the journey to come home to yourself.

Love,
Jyoti.