The grand illusion of life is that our minds have the capacity to understand reality. But human minds didn’t evolve to understand reality. We didn’t need that capability. A clear view of reality wasn’t necessary for our survival. Evolution cares only that you survive long enough to procreate. And that’s a low bar. The result is that each of us is, in effect, living in our own little movie that our brain has cooked up for us to explain our experiences.
People think they follow advice but they don’t. Humans are only capable of receiving information. They create their own advice. If you seek to influence someone, don’t waste time giving advice. You can change only what people know, not what they do.
Focus on your diet first and get that right so you have enough energy to want to exercise.
If you believe people use reason for the important decisions in life, you will go through life feeling confused and frustrated that others seem to have bad reasoning skills. The reality is that reason is just one of the drivers of our decisions, and often the smallest one.
In the long run, any system that depends on your willpower will fail.
If you want to understand UFOs, reincarnation and God, do not study UFOs, reincarnation and God. Study people.
If you believe people use reason for the important decisions in life, you will go through life feeling confused and frustrated that others seem to have bad reasoning skills.
I pursued a conscious strategy of managing my opportunities in a way that would make it easier for luck to find me.
On all the important stuff, we are emotional creatures who make decisions first and rationalize them after the fact.
The Knowledge Formula: The More You Know, the More You Can Know.
Good ideas have no value because the world already has too many of them.
Successwise, you’re better off being good at two complementary skills than being excellent at one.
A lie that makes a voter feel good is more effective than a hundred rational arguments.
This was my first exposure to the idea that one should have a system instead of a goal. The system was to continually look for better options.
Goal-oriented people exist in a state of continuous presuccess failure at best, and permanent failure at worst if things never work out. Systems people succeed every time they apply their systems, in the sense that they did what they intended to do. The goals people are fighting the feeling of discouragement at each turn. The systems people are feeling good every time they apply their system.
The system-versus-goals model can be applied to most human endeavors. In the world of dieting, losing twenty pounds is a goal, but eating right is a system. In the exercise realm, running a marathon in under four hours is a goal, but exercising daily is a system. In business, making a million dollars is a goal, but being a serial entrepreneur is a system.
Reality has a pulse, a rhythm, for lack of better words.
Inaccurate worldviews are the only kind there is.
Consider the people who routinely disagree with you. See how confident they look while being dead wrong? That’s exactly how you look to them.
If something is legal and profitable, it will happen, a lot.