Here are 23 concepts I’ve found to be true in my life:
- No one cares as much about your possessions as you do.
- Don’t spend extensive time with someone you don’t want to become.
- The people who love you in real life are more important than people who like you on social media.
- Whatever you say before the word “but” gets relegated to minimal value.
- Forgiveness is not something you do for someone else… it is something you do for yourself.
- A great work ethic requires a great rest ethic.
- Meaningless ‘productivity’ is a form of procrastination.
- Speak with the confidence as if you are right… but listen with the humility as if you are wrong.
- Embrace detours. Life does not unfold in a straight line.
- You will usually get better results by praising good behavior rather than punishing bad behavior.
- The primary trait of being effective and efficient is knowing what you can disregard (ignore distractions).
- An effective way to better understand yourself is to spend time reflecting on everything you find irritating/annoying in others.
- Denying or deflecting a compliment deprives joy from the person giving it. Accept it with gratitude and graciousness (even if you don’t believe you deserve it).
- How you behave on your ‘bad days’ reveals way more about you than how you behave on your ‘good days.’
- Before you speak, ask yourself these 3 questions: Is it true? Is it helpful? Is it kind?
- Don’t believe everything you think.
- When you feel stuck, explain your problem to someone else. Simply articulating your problem will often present a solution.
- You are only as peaceful as the things that make you upset.
- Discipline is far more dependable than motivation. You make progress by making disciplined decisions consistently.
- If you were to repeat how you behaved today for the next 364 days, how much progress would you make in a year?
- At best, you only see about 10% of what another person is going through. Avoid the temptation to judge them on that limited snapshot. Also avoid the temptation to make assumptions about them based on such limited insight/info.
- Your time, energy, focus, and space are limited. Remove, ignore, giveaway, or throw out the things in your life that don’t bring you joy to make room for the things that do.
- If your perspective, position, and beliefs on one subject can be easily (and accurately) predicted from your opinions on another… you are most likely not a free thinker.
