By Rizwan Aseem
When I was growing up, the friends I hung out with were trash talkers. The books I read was trash fiction.
I was stupid and followed what each of them said blindly. So I got all my life lessons from doing stupid stuff, and falling flat on my face.
My friends and I made plans like robbing a video store (genius, right?) to make more money. We even organized a reunion of old class fellows to get the hot chicks in our college to like us (they obviously didn’t).
Our other ‘genius’ plans were equally hare-brained. Thankfully we never got in serious trouble, since most of our plans died before the end of the night.
I can tell you though that in my short time on this blue dot, I’ve picked up a few things. These are what I’ll share with you today. It won’t be the ‘end-all’ for things you should know about life - but it will be enough to keep you from falling on your face.
How Did I Pick Up These Life Lessons?
By analyzing the things I screwed up in my own life. By observing other people falling on their face.
I learned these things like someone going to the carnival and seeing other people play the games. Observing them on a deep level and then picking up the things that they do wrong and the things they do right.
I’m not a sage. If that’s someone you are looking for - go climb a mountain.
I’m not an expert. If that’s someone you are looking for - go do a PhD and become one.
Heck, I’m not even successful. If you’re looking to follow someone else’s definition of success - go to school and do what the teachers tell you to do.
Why You Should Read The Rest Of This Post
If you discover the 10 things that I talk to you here you will gain more success than you thought possible. You will gain more friends than you ever imagined.
Your family will love you for who you are, even when you don’t follow what they want you to be.
If you follow these, you will walk and talk without fear or doubt in your life. You won’t constantly look over your shoulder in life wondering if you’re taking the right steps or not.
Your friends will follow you to the ends of the world. They will think of you as the leader that you were always born to be. You will live large, be bold and confident, and get the things that you want in your life.
If you don’t do these things you will be relegated to the footnotes of life. You will live a small life. Your friends will forget you, your family will treat you like
Here Are The 10 Things You Should Be Informed About In Life.
You may disagree with some of them.
In fact, some of these will probably rub you the wrong way.
I’m not your mother, and I won’t tell you what you think is great. I’ll tell you what I found has worked for me.
You can disagree with it. But before you do - try it out in your life, see if it works for you and makes your life easier, simpler, better. See if make you happier. Then decide if you want to keep it in your life.
If it doesn’t then throw it out.
So here are the 10 things, like promised...
10. The Greatest Force In The World Is Compound interest
Or better yet, compounding. Compounding is the most powerful force on earth.
Consider this; If you gave me a single grain of sand when I was born. Then doubled that grain of sand for every year of my life. By the time I retire at 65 years of age, I would own all the grains of sand in the world.
Yes, all the grains of sand, including all the sand in the Sahara, Gobi, Arabian & Antarctica Deserts. I would own all the sand on the beaches of the world. Even the Australian outback.
What Exactly Is Compounding or Compound Interest Anyway?
Let’s look at it a little better. Suppose you have an apple. You can eat it, make apple pie out of it, or sow it to get an apple tree.
If you eat it. You’re the only one eating it. If you make apple pie out of it, maybe you can share it with your family maybe even invite a few of your friends.
But if you sow it, you won’t see it for a few years. You don’t even know if it’s giving you any benefit for the first few months. But as time passes, as the seeds comes out, you will start seeing it grow in your life.
After what seems like a long time you will see a tree. And still after what appears to be a longer time will it start giving fruit. Once it does it will keep giving you fruit for a eons.
You can now take the fruit and use it. You can now eat an apple for as long as you want. You can even give apples to your family and friends.
You can make an apple pie every day for the rest of your life. And give away this apple pie to your family and friends so they can share it with their family and friends.
BUT this is still just simple interest. It hasn’t compounded just yet.
How Will It Compound?
When you take the fruit from the tree and start sowing that.
So let’s imagine this for a second.
You had one apple and you planted it. Let’s say in 5 years it starts producing fruit. Each year it produces 5 bushels. Each bushel has about 100 apples.
So each year the tree produces about 500 apples. That’s a lot of apples.
You can take those apples and plant them. Getting another 500 trees in the second year.
For simplicity. Let’s say you will plant all the fruit from the first tree for 5 years only. Then you will start harvesting but not immediately.
And just to simplify this a little further, since you are planting all the apples from this tree for 5 years, we’ll assume that you wait for the last plantation to mature before you actually start to benefit from this plantation.
So you will only harvest when the fruit you planted in the 10th year mature - which will be in the 15th year.
How many apple would you be harvesting now?
More than you can imagine.
You planted 500 trees for 5 years. That’s 2,500 at the end of the 15th year giving you fruit. Plus the original tree, so 2501 trees giving you apples. But we’ll just round it to 2,500.
Each tree is now giving you 500 apples.
That’s... Wait for it... 1,250,000 apples. In the 15th year. You could keep planting these apples also. And in another year this will become astronomical.
To the tune of 1,250,000 X 500 in 5 years will be... More than I can multiply in my mind.
This is the gist of compounding... Now before you start poking holes like, where would you get the land to plant this, wouldn’t so many apples be wasted, or how would you harvest...
That’s just minutia. The point is to understand how big compounding can get from simple interest. Plus you can keep sowing the apples each year and they will keep multiplying the output at the end.
That’s all great, but do we ever really use compound interest in our life, like ever?
Here’s how compound interest impacts you in your life everyday.
Compound Interest On Your Money
For starters - it’s something that works against you every day.
If you buy something on a credit card. Lets say you max out a credit card. Then you only pay the minimum payment on it. It will take you 17 years to pay back the entire amount.
Not because the minimum payment is so low, but because you keep paying the interest. Plus every month that you accrue interest, the bank charges you interest on that also.
But there is a silver lining to this. You can use it to your benefit also.
If you invest a $1 a day, everyday for the rest of your life, compounding monthly at 10% interest you will have invested less than $19,000 in 50 years. But you will have in excess of $450,000 in your bank.
If you extend it to 60 years this amount will become nearly $1.2 million.
Is it too late to invest? NEVER. Make that $1 a day to $5 a day and in 60 years you will have nearly $6 million. That is the power of compounding.
But it doesn’t just apply to money. It applies to everything that you do in life.
Compounding In Your Life
It applies to your health. Try running a marathon today. Unless you already are a marathon runner, you can't. But if you spend focused time and energy of practicing running - you will run your first marathon in less than 6 months.
Your strength will compound. The first few week you won’t be able to run even a single mile. But by the end of the 6 months you will be running 26 miles.
The same applies to your mind. If you try to learn a subject on day 1. You will fail. Your mind won’t be able to make the connections. But if you keep trying everyday.
Little by little. Your mind will make the connections and in a year or two you will become the foremost expert.
Or relationships. If you propose to a girl the first day you meet, she will shoot you down. But if you court her over a period of time... She will say yes.
This rule or compounding effort applies to everything in life. Good or bad.
If you listen to gossip every day, you will eventually become a gossiper.
If you read, hear, or watch negative news everyday you will become sceptical & learn to become helpless.
So keep your eyes open to this. Use it for your benefit, and protect yourself from it if necessary.
Let’s get on with the 10 things you should know.
9. Never Buy Money
One of the most shocking phenomenon in the modern age is buying money. You buy money all the time. You buy money even when it is very expensive for you to buy money.
You’ll buy money more often than anything else that you buy. The worst thing is that we don’t even notice that we’re buying money.
What Do You Mean By “Buying” Money?
Buying money means that we spend money that we don’t have in the hopes that we will earn enough tomorrow to pay this off. And we’re willing to pay a premium to buy this money.
We fool ourselves by telling yourself that you’re collecting miles, points, bonuses etc. etc. etc.
This is such an excellent guise that we quickly fool ourselves without ever thinking about this. In fact the more you talk about not buying money, the greater opposition you will get.
There will be someone in the room telling you that you’re stupid to think like this. About the importance of buying money and how “you’re stupid” when you talk about not buying money.
It really drives people crazy. Try it the next time you meet your friends.
How Do We Buy Money Every Day?
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 truth is that there is a huge industry with tested methods to get you and me to buy money. It’s a commodity that the bank is selling to you.
You can think about it as it is, or you can put your head under a pillow and say they’re doing you a favor by giving you ‘credit’.
It’s the same thing. The bank isn’t a charity. It’s not doing philanthropy by giving you the credit. It’s making money doing this. Even after giving you all the points that you can buy the 50” TV from.
So understand that their job is to sell you the credit. In the form of a credit card, in the form of a mortgage, in the form of a car lease, in the form of a student loan, or in the form of anything else you want to finance.
Remodeling? Sure.
New furniture? Why not.
You can keep coming up with new ways to buy money and the bank will keep saying yes.
What Will Happen If You Don’t Buy Money?
The first thing that will happen is you will feel a little pinch in your finances for the first few months that you do this. This is because you’re so used to buying money that it will really hurt.
But once you get over the hump an interesting thing will happen. You’ll get all kinds of banks calling you up, giving you better rates, promotional items, bonus points, the kitchen sink basically to get you to sign up.
Now that you’re using cash, real cash, not credit, you’ll start thinking harder on your choice of things to buy.
Then another shocking thing will happen.
Your financial stress will start going down. Things won’t entice you that much. The shiny gadget that seemed like a must have, won’t seem like one.
Since you’ll be paying up front from you own hard earned money you’ll make wiser buying decisions. Your “stuff” will last you longer. You won’t need to replace, upgrade, and renew things as often.
What’s next on the list of 10 things you should know?
8. You Are Born With All The Knowledge & Experience You Need
You’re living in a world where you are bombarded with how inadequate you are. The news constantly tells you how another 19 year old created a software that some giant company bought for a frigging $1 billion.
Then you look at yourself and feel like sh*t for not doing the same.
But that’s not all, right after you’re done feeling sh*t for yourself, you start looking for ways to gain more knowledge, gain more experience, to become “better” than you are, to do things like ‘someone’ else.
This creates a vicious feedback look within you. This sucks.
Because you feel you don’t have knowledge and experience, you go out trying to get more knowledge and experience. But then when you have more knowledge and experience, you realize you are still inadequate.
This is not because you don’t have the knowledge or experience. That’s a lie. You have all the knowledge and experience you will ever need.
It is because you don’t have resourcefulness. Or more importantly you haven’t developed resourcefulness, yet.
But What Does ‘Becoming Resourceful’ Mean?
Resourcefulness is the feeling and confidence within you, that you can take care of things, that you can do things, that no matter how bad the situation is, you will overcome it.
It’s not your fault that you don’t have resourcefulness. Our generation is the most over-parented generation EVER.
Google ‘most over parented generation’ and you’ll find articles form Forbes, WSJ, Telegraph and 31 million other results telling you how having your parents do everything for you keeps you from growing up.
This is a serious problem. If you don’t make mistakes and learn from them, you don’t develop confidence in yourself to take care of yourself.
If you never got burnt by matches as a kid, then you’ll be a little bit scared of fire. But if you did, then learned how to handle them, you’ll be fine.
This act of developing the courage to take care of yourself is what I mean by resourcefulness.
You haven’t developed it, yet. You can do things today to develop your resourcefulness.
How Do You Develop Resourcefulness?
Go do things that you are uncomfortable doing. Do them alone, without telling your friends or family.
I’m not saying go down a shady street and buy cocaine. I’m saying go down the aisle in your grocery store and talk to the person who’s shopping there.
Strike up a conversation, see if you can find something common with them. You don’t have to ask their number, but just introduce yourself to a stranger.
If you’re really feeling brave, then goto a soup kitchen and volunteer for the night.
The more things that you do outside of your comfort zone the better you will become. The more you will develop your resourcefulness.
This is a skill like any other. Practice it and it gets better. The best part is becoming resourceful in one area of your life will help you in every other area of your life also.
But A Word Of Warning!
Don’t tell anyone that you’re doing this, or that you’ve done something outside of your comfort zone.
If you do tell them - then you lose all the resourcefulness you developed. It comes out as steam when you talk about it.
You’re doing it for yourself, not to boast to your friends how brave you are.
Think about this for a second. The less you talk about it the more it develops in yourself. The more you talk about it the less effective it is.
Sure there is the pleasure of telling your friends and family that you did something amazing, something outside of your comfort zone.
Bottle it up. Write it out if you have to in a secret diary. But don’t talk about it.
This is for you. This is your secret. This is how you build resourcefulness.
Let’s move on to number 7 on the list of things you should know.
7. Learn To Communicate At The 6th Grade Level
“Say What?”
“Communicate at what level?”
“Are you nuts?”
I hear you, I hear you... It’s one of the hardest things to do, and really counter intuitive.
You’ve spend years and year learning to communicate at a higher grade. You’ve spend your time sitting in boring classrooms, enduring dry teachers, drilling lessons in your head, and enduring poor grades to get to college.
Why Would You Want To Communicate At 6th Grade Level?
Here’s the thing, even though you’ve learned to communicate at the graduate level, most people don’t talk at that level.
(Unless you’re a stuck up Ph.D. wearing a tweed coat, then keep talking at your own graduate level and close this post.)
Most people communicate at the 6th grade level. Test it out.
Secretly record the next conversations you have with your friends, family, employers, clients, or your girlfriend.
Then get transcribe them, or give them to someone to transcribe. Then put them in a Kincaid-Flesch Readability Score finder and see the score.
You’ll quickly discover that every one of your conversations is at the 6th grade level. Some will be higher some will be lower. But most of them will be on the 6th grade level. That’s how most people communicate.
What Does It Mean To Communicate At 6th Grade Level?
Even though we communicate at this level all the time, we’re really bad at this.
How do I mean?
Try explaining ‘The Matrix’ to a 10 year old. Or what you do for a job? Or what your company does? Or what you would like to do? Explain these to to a 10 year old.
Chances are you’ll struggle really hard to explain tough concepts to a young kid. This is primarily because we use big words when explaining big concepts instead of using small words.
By using big words we confuse the listener. By using small, single or double syllable words your message will get instantly understood.
Your message will come across to your audience and there will be no chance to get it mis-understood.
The problem though is, we’re not very good at communicating at that level.
How Do You Learn To Communicate At The 6th Grade Level?
Here are a few steps you can take to communicate at the 6th Grade Level.
These are a few steps you can take to improve your communication. The important thing is to practice then implement.
The more you talk at the 6th grade level the more your communication will get understood. You will be told you can really distill tough ideas and make them seem simple.
This skill alone will sky-rocket your success in your relationships, in work, in your life. Even when you are talking to your parents, or when you become a parent.
Let’s move on to the next thing that you should know in life.
6. Asking The Right Questions
When I was a teenager my dad would punish me all the time for not know the right answers. I was dead scared of talking to him, or even doing homework in front of him.
He wanted me to know all the answers.
The same was true of my teachers in school. They wanted me to know the right answers. To things that happened a 100 years ago, or things that a historical figure thought about a political situation.
I had to learn these things by heart. I never knew the right answers.
As I grew up - I discovered that the right answers won’t get me friends, love, or success at work. But the right questions would.
Why Asking Questions Is Better Than Knowing Answers?
If you ask the right questions you have a better chance of finding a good answer. If you think you have the answer then this thought will limit your ability to find a better answer.
Plus, the one asking questions is the one in control of the conversation. Look at any one on TV, the interviewer is always in control of the question because she’s the one asking the questions.
Even for a Presidential debate. The interviewer is in control.
Learn to ask questions.
But not just the ones that get asked in interviews. But simpler questions. Even the ones that will help you out in your life.
Questions help you clarify things in your own mind. The better quality questions you ask, others and yourself, the better your answers will become.
Asking the right questions is a skill. You’re not born with it, you don’t inherit it, you learn it.
How Do You Learn To Ask Better Questions?
There is only one way to ask better questions - by asking more questions.
There is no real method or technique. The more you ask the better you will get.
But sometimes you won’t have any one to ask a question to. That’s when it’s most important to ask questions.
Take a writing pad and write out questions. Write out questions about philosophy, economics, relationship - whatever.
The more questions you ask, the better you will become at asking questions.
So, Ask, ask, ask.
Let’s get on to the next thing you should know.
5. Be The Person Creating ‘Value’ For Others
No matter how bad the economy is, no matter how many people are getting fired, no matter how many people are unemployed, there is a group of people who will always make money.
If you understand this secret, no matter which way the economy is going you will make money. People will flock to you literally handing their money over to you.
Your friends will be shocked at how you keep doing better than them, even in a down economy, your employers will appreciate the hard work that you’re doing while the rest of the employees are getting sacked and you parents will be proud of you for taking care of everyone.
Here’s Why?
There are two kinds of people in the world. The people who have money to spend, and the people who create the value for which money is being paid for.
The people who have money - let’s call them Person A. And the people who are creating the value for which money is being exchanged, Person B.
When you go out and buy a cup of coffee. You’re person A. The coffee shop is Person B, in this example.
How Does This Impact You?
As long as you are person B - the person creating value in the world - you will keep getting paid. There will always be a demand for the person creating value in the world.
If you try to be person A, then you will quickly run out of money. If you’re person B you will always make money in the world.
But What Is Value?
Value is different for different people. But you can generalize it to - the emotional satisfaction of getting something, or using something, or getting a problem solved.
The more you create emotional satisfaction for other people, the more value you will create. The more value you create, the more valuable you will become to other people.
This value can be translated into a number of things.
You can create better relationships for yourself, with your friends, family, employers - even get a girlfriend or a spouse.
You can create better products for your business that help satisfy the emotional needs of your customers, or your employees, your suppliers and your consumers.
So become a person who creates value in the world.
This value can later be translated into money if you want, promotions at work, better relationships and more power for you.
Implement this in your life and figure out how you can create more value for other, how you can solve problems for other people and reduce someone else pain.
The more urgent the problem or pain that you solve, the greater the value you create.
So let’s move on to the next thing you should know in your life.
4. Leave Things Better Than You Find Them
One of the best things you can understand in your life is leaving things better than you find them.
What this means is - no matter what situation, place, job, relationship or anxiety you are in - you leave that place better than you found it.
Before I tell you...
Why You Should Leave Things Better Than You Found Them?
Let me tell you a story. About a town in a fictional place.
Imagine that there are a 100 residents living there. Each year 5 residents leave and 5 new ones come in. But the residents who are leaving, leave the place worse than they found it.
Not by much. Just by 5% worse. This is enough that you would notice something was wrong, but wouldn’t be able to pin point exactly what was wrong. Or how bad the situation was.
So you buy a house, don’t take care of the yard, let the paintwork peel off, don’t clean the gutters, just for the last few months before you leave making the house 5% worse.
This happens each year. 5 residents leave, and 5 new come in. The ones leaving, leave the place 5% worse.
But just to make it really interesting, lets say that the houses in this location are worth $1million each. When we start and the price of the whole neighborhood goes down when even a single house’s price goes down.
So what happens in 20 years. The original residents all get replaced by people who are new.
But here is what is worst. The value of this town was $100 million when we started.
Care to bet what it’s value is when the last original resident leaves...
Here’s a hint: much worse than you actually think.
Since every time some one leaves they leave the place 5% worse.
Which means that the value of their house goes down 5% and so does the value of every one else’s house.
The first 5 residents who leave, leave their house worth only 950,000. A loss of “only” $50,000. In 20 years the value of this house will now be worth only $358,486 a whopping loss of 64.5%
The community has lost a whopping $64.5 million in value. Just because some people left this place 5% worse.
What Happens If You Leave It Better Than You Found It?
Let’s look at the situation in reverse. What happens when you leave the same town 5% better.
So you buy a house, do some renovation in it, making it a little better, and now you sell it for 5% more. So you sell your house for $1.05 million.
Your house sells for $50,000 more than what you got it for. This happens every year for each of the people who leave. In 20 years all the residents are gone selling their houses.
What happens to this town’s value?
The people who come in on the 20th year, they pay a whopping $2.65 million. This is 265% better than if you did nothing, and an outrageous 740% higher than if you let it get worse.
Just by leaving things 5% better than you found them. Just like that.
How Do You Really Leave Things Better Than You Found Them?
This is something that the developed countries have learned a lot faster than the developing countries. That’s the motto they follow.
Leave things better than you found them.
If you buy a car, fix the dents in it, get a new paint job, wash the upholstery, clean up the carpets. But don’t do it when you buy it so you can use it, but do it even when you are about to sell it.
Give it to someone else in a condition that they don’t have to do much work on it.
If you buy a house, put a deck in, clean out the gutters regularly, put in new heating pipes, do a nice weather resistant paint job on it, fix the roofing, update the insulation.
Do this throughout the time you live there. Make this your habit.
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.
Heck, fill up the refrigerator with soda every once in a while or make your team a cup of coffee.
Become the person that will be missed when you leave the neighborhood, the workplace, the friend circle, the relationship.
Make this your habit. If you meet someone on the street, leave them better than you found them.
Compliment them on their tie, their new haircut, or the remarkable coincidence of meeting them that made their day.
The more you leave things better than you found them, the better things around you will become.
“I know...” novel concept!!!
Let’s look at the top 3 things that you should know.
3. 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.
I learned to play the guitar in 30 days using just this method. Before this the only thing I could play was a few notes strung together - just enough to impress the girls.
I discovered this rule and quickly learned to play the guitar. Now if I tell anyone that I’ve only been playing for 6 months and I taught myself how to play, they don’t believe me.
If I can do it, you can do it, too.
But What Is The 20 Minute M&N Rule
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.
But here the magical thing. The 20 minutes that you practice at night is more important, since sleep is when the brain combines everything that you’ve learned in the day.
During sleep your brain starts accumulating all the things it learned in the day. New connections are made in the brain cells which support your learning.
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 more you practice, the more myelin gets laid down.
The more myelin gets laid down, the easier it is to practice. This is a great virtuous cycle that gets established.
This process is improved when you sleep. Since during sleep your body is recharged and rejuvenated.
Just by doing this little technique you will be able to quickly pick up any skill you want, learn any language you want to learn, or even learn tough subjects faster.
Just follow this rule - the first week will be tough, but as you implement this in your life it will get easier and easier, until you pick up new skills like clockwork without even thinking about them.
Lets move on to the second last most important thing that you should know in life.
2. 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.
Most people don’t have this ability. They think they do, but they don’t. They see the outside world like they ‘think’ about it.
The outside world in their minds is colored with their own childhood experiences, upbringing biases, things that their parents said, the punishments they got from their teachers.
Not based on the truth or accurate thinking.
What Is Accurate Thinking Anyway?
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.
This is not something that comes naturally to us. Especially when we are talking to people we’ve known for a long time, whose opinions we treat as fact.
Like parents saying things like, “if you don’t study hard, you’ll never get a job in your life,” or “I don’t know why this child turned out to be such a problem for me. All the rest of them were fine.”
Like your friends saying things like, “you such a loser that’s why you’re alone.”
Or, “you should dump that b*tch, I saw her talking to that guy, she’s probably a slut anyway.”
Or, “I don’t trust him, you shouldn’t marry him. He seems like such a player, since he’s so nice to every one.”
Listen to the opinion, but understand that this is just an opinion. You don’t need to accept it. In fact discard this opinion all together.
Make your decisions based on facts that you collect from a number of resources.
Not just your parents who might be having a hard time in their own life and blaming it at you.
Nor your friends who might be single and lonely and don’t want to see you happy. Listen to them, but discard their opinions. You don’t have to argue with them, or discuss with them either. Just ignore the opinion.
How Do You Develop Accurate Thinking?
Here’s is how you can develop accurate thinking in your own life.
Just these things alone will keep your mind on the right track to accurately think. Separate fact from fiction, opinion from proof. Then take the fact and implement it in your life.
This alone will change your life. You don’t have to confront anyone when you discover an opinion and try to change it.
Just remember the quote from Dead pool. “Opinion are like a$$holes, everyone has one, and everyone thinks everyone else’s stink.”
Just leave it at that, and move on in your life. Focus on finding facts from the opinion and you will be successful.
Finally, let’s look at the most important thing you should know in life.
1. You Matter
When I was 18, I was in a motorcycle crash.
My friend was driving. I was sitting behind him. He'd just gotten a slick looking 250cc racing bike and I wanted to experience the thrill of riding a motorbike.
It was the first time that I'd even seen a 250cc motorbike, let alone ride on one. Both of us, young and stupid. He had a helmet on. I did not.
We were probably doing 80 when the car in front of us indicating right, turned left. Swerving right into our path. He couldn't stop the bike in time and we ran into it's side.
As I tumble rolled over the hood of the car, flying in the air I realized I did not want to die. Not today.
I hadn't loved enough. I hadn't lived enough. I hadn't traveled enough. I did not want to die.
I hit the road and started rolling toward the pavement. The only thought in my mind was 'I'm not wearing a helmet and the pavement is fast approaching me'. 'Don't die today!'
I stopped mere inches before I hit the pavement. My clothes ripped, my knees and elbow bleeding. Thankfully I had rolled as I'd fallen on the road, so no bones were broken.
I realized then, just for a split second. I mattered.
The Most Important Lesson Of Your Life
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.
This is the most important thing that you should know in life.
You matter.
Don’t let your friends tell you that you don’t. Don’t listen to them when they bring you down with negative remarks. Ditch them if they make fun of your for trying new things.
You matter. What you do matters. What you think matters. Everything about you matter.
Sometimes your parents won’t tell them that you matter. It’s not because you don’t matter. It’s because no one told them that they matter.
Their parents were too busy thinking about themselves, your parents were probably wondering whether they matter or not. So if you read this, tell your parents that you care about them, that they matter too.
But before you do that, remember that no matter what they say in return, whether they hang up on you, scream at you, or become sarcastic at your gesture - you matter.
You don’t need your parents to tell you that you matter. You DO matter.
Sometimes your siblings will tell you, they hate you and wish you were dead. Don’t listen to them. They just wish someone told them that they matter. Tell your siblings that you love them, and they matter to you.
But before you do that, understand that they resent you because you get more love and attention from your parents. Remember, even if you didn’t get attention - you matter.
Sometime your boss will throw your stuff out of his office, tell you what a loser you are and that you’re fired effective immediately. This might be the time when you're thinking about jumping in front of a bus.
Don’t do that. You matter. It matters to the world that you bring your gifts to the world.
It matters that you share your gifts. You might not be seeing your gifts just yet, but they are brilliant and amazing.
Let the world see them.
Because You Matter.
When I was growing up, the friends I hung out with were trash talkers. The books I read was trash fiction.
I was stupid and followed what each of them said blindly. So I got all my life lessons from doing stupid stuff, and falling flat on my face.
My friends and I made plans like robbing a video store (genius, right?) to make more money. We even organized a reunion of old class fellows to get the hot chicks in our college to like us (they obviously didn’t).
Our other ‘genius’ plans were equally hare-brained. Thankfully we never got in serious trouble, since most of our plans died before the end of the night.
I can tell you though that in my short time on this blue dot, I’ve picked up a few things. These are what I’ll share with you today. It won’t be the ‘end-all’ for things you should know about life - but it will be enough to keep you from falling on your face.
How Did I Pick Up These Life Lessons?
By analyzing the things I screwed up in my own life. By observing other people falling on their face.
I learned these things like someone going to the carnival and seeing other people play the games. Observing them on a deep level and then picking up the things that they do wrong and the things they do right.
I’m not a sage. If that’s someone you are looking for - go climb a mountain.
I’m not an expert. If that’s someone you are looking for - go do a PhD and become one.
Heck, I’m not even successful. If you’re looking to follow someone else’s definition of success - go to school and do what the teachers tell you to do.
Why You Should Read The Rest Of This Post
If you discover the 10 things that I talk to you here you will gain more success than you thought possible. You will gain more friends than you ever imagined.
Your family will love you for who you are, even when you don’t follow what they want you to be.
If you follow these, you will walk and talk without fear or doubt in your life. You won’t constantly look over your shoulder in life wondering if you’re taking the right steps or not.
Your friends will follow you to the ends of the world. They will think of you as the leader that you were always born to be. You will live large, be bold and confident, and get the things that you want in your life.
If you don’t do these things you will be relegated to the footnotes of life. You will live a small life. Your friends will forget you, your family will treat you like
Here Are The 10 Things You Should Be Informed About In Life.
You may disagree with some of them.
In fact, some of these will probably rub you the wrong way.
I’m not your mother, and I won’t tell you what you think is great. I’ll tell you what I found has worked for me.
You can disagree with it. But before you do - try it out in your life, see if it works for you and makes your life easier, simpler, better. See if make you happier. Then decide if you want to keep it in your life.
If it doesn’t then throw it out.
So here are the 10 things, like promised...
10. The Greatest Force In The World Is Compound interest
Or better yet, compounding. Compounding is the most powerful force on earth.
Consider this; If you gave me a single grain of sand when I was born. Then doubled that grain of sand for every year of my life. By the time I retire at 65 years of age, I would own all the grains of sand in the world.
Yes, all the grains of sand, including all the sand in the Sahara, Gobi, Arabian & Antarctica Deserts. I would own all the sand on the beaches of the world. Even the Australian outback.
What Exactly Is Compounding or Compound Interest Anyway?
Let’s look at it a little better. Suppose you have an apple. You can eat it, make apple pie out of it, or sow it to get an apple tree.
If you eat it. You’re the only one eating it. If you make apple pie out of it, maybe you can share it with your family maybe even invite a few of your friends.
But if you sow it, you won’t see it for a few years. You don’t even know if it’s giving you any benefit for the first few months. But as time passes, as the seeds comes out, you will start seeing it grow in your life.
After what seems like a long time you will see a tree. And still after what appears to be a longer time will it start giving fruit. Once it does it will keep giving you fruit for a eons.
You can now take the fruit and use it. You can now eat an apple for as long as you want. You can even give apples to your family and friends.
You can make an apple pie every day for the rest of your life. And give away this apple pie to your family and friends so they can share it with their family and friends.
BUT this is still just simple interest. It hasn’t compounded just yet.
How Will It Compound?
When you take the fruit from the tree and start sowing that.
So let’s imagine this for a second.
You had one apple and you planted it. Let’s say in 5 years it starts producing fruit. Each year it produces 5 bushels. Each bushel has about 100 apples.
So each year the tree produces about 500 apples. That’s a lot of apples.
You can take those apples and plant them. Getting another 500 trees in the second year.
For simplicity. Let’s say you will plant all the fruit from the first tree for 5 years only. Then you will start harvesting but not immediately.
And just to simplify this a little further, since you are planting all the apples from this tree for 5 years, we’ll assume that you wait for the last plantation to mature before you actually start to benefit from this plantation.
So you will only harvest when the fruit you planted in the 10th year mature - which will be in the 15th year.
How many apple would you be harvesting now?
More than you can imagine.
You planted 500 trees for 5 years. That’s 2,500 at the end of the 15th year giving you fruit. Plus the original tree, so 2501 trees giving you apples. But we’ll just round it to 2,500.
Each tree is now giving you 500 apples.
That’s... Wait for it... 1,250,000 apples. In the 15th year. You could keep planting these apples also. And in another year this will become astronomical.
To the tune of 1,250,000 X 500 in 5 years will be... More than I can multiply in my mind.
This is the gist of compounding... Now before you start poking holes like, where would you get the land to plant this, wouldn’t so many apples be wasted, or how would you harvest...
That’s just minutia. The point is to understand how big compounding can get from simple interest. Plus you can keep sowing the apples each year and they will keep multiplying the output at the end.
That’s all great, but do we ever really use compound interest in our life, like ever?
Here’s how compound interest impacts you in your life everyday.
Compound Interest On Your Money
For starters - it’s something that works against you every day.
If you buy something on a credit card. Lets say you max out a credit card. Then you only pay the minimum payment on it. It will take you 17 years to pay back the entire amount.
Not because the minimum payment is so low, but because you keep paying the interest. Plus every month that you accrue interest, the bank charges you interest on that also.
But there is a silver lining to this. You can use it to your benefit also.
If you invest a $1 a day, everyday for the rest of your life, compounding monthly at 10% interest you will have invested less than $19,000 in 50 years. But you will have in excess of $450,000 in your bank.
If you extend it to 60 years this amount will become nearly $1.2 million.
Is it too late to invest? NEVER. Make that $1 a day to $5 a day and in 60 years you will have nearly $6 million. That is the power of compounding.
But it doesn’t just apply to money. It applies to everything that you do in life.
Compounding In Your Life
It applies to your health. Try running a marathon today. Unless you already are a marathon runner, you can't. But if you spend focused time and energy of practicing running - you will run your first marathon in less than 6 months.
Your strength will compound. The first few week you won’t be able to run even a single mile. But by the end of the 6 months you will be running 26 miles.
The same applies to your mind. If you try to learn a subject on day 1. You will fail. Your mind won’t be able to make the connections. But if you keep trying everyday.
Little by little. Your mind will make the connections and in a year or two you will become the foremost expert.
Or relationships. If you propose to a girl the first day you meet, she will shoot you down. But if you court her over a period of time... She will say yes.
This rule or compounding effort applies to everything in life. Good or bad.
If you listen to gossip every day, you will eventually become a gossiper.
If you read, hear, or watch negative news everyday you will become sceptical & learn to become helpless.
So keep your eyes open to this. Use it for your benefit, and protect yourself from it if necessary.
Let’s get on with the 10 things you should know.
9. Never Buy Money
One of the most shocking phenomenon in the modern age is buying money. You buy money all the time. You buy money even when it is very expensive for you to buy money.
You’ll buy money more often than anything else that you buy. The worst thing is that we don’t even notice that we’re buying money.
What Do You Mean By “Buying” Money?
Buying money means that we spend money that we don’t have in the hopes that we will earn enough tomorrow to pay this off. And we’re willing to pay a premium to buy this money.
We fool ourselves by telling yourself that you’re collecting miles, points, bonuses etc. etc. etc.
This is such an excellent guise that we quickly fool ourselves without ever thinking about this. In fact the more you talk about not buying money, the greater opposition you will get.
There will be someone in the room telling you that you’re stupid to think like this. About the importance of buying money and how “you’re stupid” when you talk about not buying money.
It really drives people crazy. Try it the next time you meet your friends.
How Do We Buy Money Every Day?
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 truth is that there is a huge industry with tested methods to get you and me to buy money. It’s a commodity that the bank is selling to you.
You can think about it as it is, or you can put your head under a pillow and say they’re doing you a favor by giving you ‘credit’.
It’s the same thing. The bank isn’t a charity. It’s not doing philanthropy by giving you the credit. It’s making money doing this. Even after giving you all the points that you can buy the 50” TV from.
So understand that their job is to sell you the credit. In the form of a credit card, in the form of a mortgage, in the form of a car lease, in the form of a student loan, or in the form of anything else you want to finance.
Remodeling? Sure.
New furniture? Why not.
You can keep coming up with new ways to buy money and the bank will keep saying yes.
What Will Happen If You Don’t Buy Money?
The first thing that will happen is you will feel a little pinch in your finances for the first few months that you do this. This is because you’re so used to buying money that it will really hurt.
But once you get over the hump an interesting thing will happen. You’ll get all kinds of banks calling you up, giving you better rates, promotional items, bonus points, the kitchen sink basically to get you to sign up.
Now that you’re using cash, real cash, not credit, you’ll start thinking harder on your choice of things to buy.
Then another shocking thing will happen.
Your financial stress will start going down. Things won’t entice you that much. The shiny gadget that seemed like a must have, won’t seem like one.
Since you’ll be paying up front from you own hard earned money you’ll make wiser buying decisions. Your “stuff” will last you longer. You won’t need to replace, upgrade, and renew things as often.
What’s next on the list of 10 things you should know?
8. You Are Born With All The Knowledge & Experience You Need
You’re living in a world where you are bombarded with how inadequate you are. The news constantly tells you how another 19 year old created a software that some giant company bought for a frigging $1 billion.
Then you look at yourself and feel like sh*t for not doing the same.
But that’s not all, right after you’re done feeling sh*t for yourself, you start looking for ways to gain more knowledge, gain more experience, to become “better” than you are, to do things like ‘someone’ else.
This creates a vicious feedback look within you. This sucks.
Because you feel you don’t have knowledge and experience, you go out trying to get more knowledge and experience. But then when you have more knowledge and experience, you realize you are still inadequate.
This is not because you don’t have the knowledge or experience. That’s a lie. You have all the knowledge and experience you will ever need.
It is because you don’t have resourcefulness. Or more importantly you haven’t developed resourcefulness, yet.
But What Does ‘Becoming Resourceful’ Mean?
Resourcefulness is the feeling and confidence within you, that you can take care of things, that you can do things, that no matter how bad the situation is, you will overcome it.
It’s not your fault that you don’t have resourcefulness. Our generation is the most over-parented generation EVER.
Google ‘most over parented generation’ and you’ll find articles form Forbes, WSJ, Telegraph and 31 million other results telling you how having your parents do everything for you keeps you from growing up.
This is a serious problem. If you don’t make mistakes and learn from them, you don’t develop confidence in yourself to take care of yourself.
If you never got burnt by matches as a kid, then you’ll be a little bit scared of fire. But if you did, then learned how to handle them, you’ll be fine.
This act of developing the courage to take care of yourself is what I mean by resourcefulness.
You haven’t developed it, yet. You can do things today to develop your resourcefulness.
How Do You Develop Resourcefulness?
Go do things that you are uncomfortable doing. Do them alone, without telling your friends or family.
I’m not saying go down a shady street and buy cocaine. I’m saying go down the aisle in your grocery store and talk to the person who’s shopping there.
Strike up a conversation, see if you can find something common with them. You don’t have to ask their number, but just introduce yourself to a stranger.
If you’re really feeling brave, then goto a soup kitchen and volunteer for the night.
The more things that you do outside of your comfort zone the better you will become. The more you will develop your resourcefulness.
This is a skill like any other. Practice it and it gets better. The best part is becoming resourceful in one area of your life will help you in every other area of your life also.
But A Word Of Warning!
Don’t tell anyone that you’re doing this, or that you’ve done something outside of your comfort zone.
If you do tell them - then you lose all the resourcefulness you developed. It comes out as steam when you talk about it.
You’re doing it for yourself, not to boast to your friends how brave you are.
Think about this for a second. The less you talk about it the more it develops in yourself. The more you talk about it the less effective it is.
Sure there is the pleasure of telling your friends and family that you did something amazing, something outside of your comfort zone.
Bottle it up. Write it out if you have to in a secret diary. But don’t talk about it.
This is for you. This is your secret. This is how you build resourcefulness.
Let’s move on to number 7 on the list of things you should know.
7. Learn To Communicate At The 6th Grade Level
“Say What?”
“Communicate at what level?”
“Are you nuts?”
I hear you, I hear you... It’s one of the hardest things to do, and really counter intuitive.
You’ve spend years and year learning to communicate at a higher grade. You’ve spend your time sitting in boring classrooms, enduring dry teachers, drilling lessons in your head, and enduring poor grades to get to college.
Why Would You Want To Communicate At 6th Grade Level?
Here’s the thing, even though you’ve learned to communicate at the graduate level, most people don’t talk at that level.
(Unless you’re a stuck up Ph.D. wearing a tweed coat, then keep talking at your own graduate level and close this post.)
Most people communicate at the 6th grade level. Test it out.
Secretly record the next conversations you have with your friends, family, employers, clients, or your girlfriend.
Then get transcribe them, or give them to someone to transcribe. Then put them in a Kincaid-Flesch Readability Score finder and see the score.
You’ll quickly discover that every one of your conversations is at the 6th grade level. Some will be higher some will be lower. But most of them will be on the 6th grade level. That’s how most people communicate.
What Does It Mean To Communicate At 6th Grade Level?
Even though we communicate at this level all the time, we’re really bad at this.
How do I mean?
Try explaining ‘The Matrix’ to a 10 year old. Or what you do for a job? Or what your company does? Or what you would like to do? Explain these to to a 10 year old.
Chances are you’ll struggle really hard to explain tough concepts to a young kid. This is primarily because we use big words when explaining big concepts instead of using small words.
By using big words we confuse the listener. By using small, single or double syllable words your message will get instantly understood.
Your message will come across to your audience and there will be no chance to get it mis-understood.
The problem though is, we’re not very good at communicating at that level.
How Do You Learn To Communicate At The 6th Grade Level?
Here are a few steps you can take to communicate at the 6th Grade Level.
- Practice, practice, practice. That’s the only way to communicate at the 6th grade level.
- Find difficult topics in your life and distill them down to the 6th grade level.
- When you watch a classic movie, read a technical article, learn a new principle, write it out at the 6th grade level.
- Every time you are tempted to use ‘big’ words, pick up a thesaurus and find a simpler word. An easier word. Then use this word in your conversation.
- If you have to use ‘and’ or a ‘comma’ then use a full stop instead.
- Talk in paragraphs which have short sentences. Use these paragraphs to communicate your concepts.
These are a few steps you can take to improve your communication. The important thing is to practice then implement.
The more you talk at the 6th grade level the more your communication will get understood. You will be told you can really distill tough ideas and make them seem simple.
This skill alone will sky-rocket your success in your relationships, in work, in your life. Even when you are talking to your parents, or when you become a parent.
Let’s move on to the next thing that you should know in life.
6. Asking The Right Questions
When I was a teenager my dad would punish me all the time for not know the right answers. I was dead scared of talking to him, or even doing homework in front of him.
He wanted me to know all the answers.
The same was true of my teachers in school. They wanted me to know the right answers. To things that happened a 100 years ago, or things that a historical figure thought about a political situation.
I had to learn these things by heart. I never knew the right answers.
As I grew up - I discovered that the right answers won’t get me friends, love, or success at work. But the right questions would.
Why Asking Questions Is Better Than Knowing Answers?
If you ask the right questions you have a better chance of finding a good answer. If you think you have the answer then this thought will limit your ability to find a better answer.
Plus, the one asking questions is the one in control of the conversation. Look at any one on TV, the interviewer is always in control of the question because she’s the one asking the questions.
Even for a Presidential debate. The interviewer is in control.
Learn to ask questions.
But not just the ones that get asked in interviews. But simpler questions. Even the ones that will help you out in your life.
Questions help you clarify things in your own mind. The better quality questions you ask, others and yourself, the better your answers will become.
Asking the right questions is a skill. You’re not born with it, you don’t inherit it, you learn it.
How Do You Learn To Ask Better Questions?
There is only one way to ask better questions - by asking more questions.
There is no real method or technique. The more you ask the better you will get.
But sometimes you won’t have any one to ask a question to. That’s when it’s most important to ask questions.
Take a writing pad and write out questions. Write out questions about philosophy, economics, relationship - whatever.
The more questions you ask, the better you will become at asking questions.
So, Ask, ask, ask.
Let’s get on to the next thing you should know.
5. Be The Person Creating ‘Value’ For Others
No matter how bad the economy is, no matter how many people are getting fired, no matter how many people are unemployed, there is a group of people who will always make money.
If you understand this secret, no matter which way the economy is going you will make money. People will flock to you literally handing their money over to you.
Your friends will be shocked at how you keep doing better than them, even in a down economy, your employers will appreciate the hard work that you’re doing while the rest of the employees are getting sacked and you parents will be proud of you for taking care of everyone.
Here’s Why?
There are two kinds of people in the world. The people who have money to spend, and the people who create the value for which money is being paid for.
The people who have money - let’s call them Person A. And the people who are creating the value for which money is being exchanged, Person B.
When you go out and buy a cup of coffee. You’re person A. The coffee shop is Person B, in this example.
How Does This Impact You?
As long as you are person B - the person creating value in the world - you will keep getting paid. There will always be a demand for the person creating value in the world.
If you try to be person A, then you will quickly run out of money. If you’re person B you will always make money in the world.
But What Is Value?
Value is different for different people. But you can generalize it to - the emotional satisfaction of getting something, or using something, or getting a problem solved.
The more you create emotional satisfaction for other people, the more value you will create. The more value you create, the more valuable you will become to other people.
This value can be translated into a number of things.
You can create better relationships for yourself, with your friends, family, employers - even get a girlfriend or a spouse.
You can create better products for your business that help satisfy the emotional needs of your customers, or your employees, your suppliers and your consumers.
So become a person who creates value in the world.
This value can later be translated into money if you want, promotions at work, better relationships and more power for you.
Implement this in your life and figure out how you can create more value for other, how you can solve problems for other people and reduce someone else pain.
The more urgent the problem or pain that you solve, the greater the value you create.
So let’s move on to the next thing you should know in your life.
4. Leave Things Better Than You Find Them
One of the best things you can understand in your life is leaving things better than you find them.
What this means is - no matter what situation, place, job, relationship or anxiety you are in - you leave that place better than you found it.
Before I tell you...
Why You Should Leave Things Better Than You Found Them?
Let me tell you a story. About a town in a fictional place.
Imagine that there are a 100 residents living there. Each year 5 residents leave and 5 new ones come in. But the residents who are leaving, leave the place worse than they found it.
Not by much. Just by 5% worse. This is enough that you would notice something was wrong, but wouldn’t be able to pin point exactly what was wrong. Or how bad the situation was.
So you buy a house, don’t take care of the yard, let the paintwork peel off, don’t clean the gutters, just for the last few months before you leave making the house 5% worse.
This happens each year. 5 residents leave, and 5 new come in. The ones leaving, leave the place 5% worse.
But just to make it really interesting, lets say that the houses in this location are worth $1million each. When we start and the price of the whole neighborhood goes down when even a single house’s price goes down.
So what happens in 20 years. The original residents all get replaced by people who are new.
But here is what is worst. The value of this town was $100 million when we started.
Care to bet what it’s value is when the last original resident leaves...
Here’s a hint: much worse than you actually think.
Since every time some one leaves they leave the place 5% worse.
Which means that the value of their house goes down 5% and so does the value of every one else’s house.
The first 5 residents who leave, leave their house worth only 950,000. A loss of “only” $50,000. In 20 years the value of this house will now be worth only $358,486 a whopping loss of 64.5%
The community has lost a whopping $64.5 million in value. Just because some people left this place 5% worse.
What Happens If You Leave It Better Than You Found It?
Let’s look at the situation in reverse. What happens when you leave the same town 5% better.
So you buy a house, do some renovation in it, making it a little better, and now you sell it for 5% more. So you sell your house for $1.05 million.
Your house sells for $50,000 more than what you got it for. This happens every year for each of the people who leave. In 20 years all the residents are gone selling their houses.
What happens to this town’s value?
The people who come in on the 20th year, they pay a whopping $2.65 million. This is 265% better than if you did nothing, and an outrageous 740% higher than if you let it get worse.
Just by leaving things 5% better than you found them. Just like that.
How Do You Really Leave Things Better Than You Found Them?
This is something that the developed countries have learned a lot faster than the developing countries. That’s the motto they follow.
Leave things better than you found them.
If you buy a car, fix the dents in it, get a new paint job, wash the upholstery, clean up the carpets. But don’t do it when you buy it so you can use it, but do it even when you are about to sell it.
Give it to someone else in a condition that they don’t have to do much work on it.
If you buy a house, put a deck in, clean out the gutters regularly, put in new heating pipes, do a nice weather resistant paint job on it, fix the roofing, update the insulation.
Do this throughout the time you live there. Make this your habit.
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.
Heck, fill up the refrigerator with soda every once in a while or make your team a cup of coffee.
Become the person that will be missed when you leave the neighborhood, the workplace, the friend circle, the relationship.
Make this your habit. If you meet someone on the street, leave them better than you found them.
Compliment them on their tie, their new haircut, or the remarkable coincidence of meeting them that made their day.
The more you leave things better than you found them, the better things around you will become.
“I know...” novel concept!!!
Let’s look at the top 3 things that you should know.
3. 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.
I learned to play the guitar in 30 days using just this method. Before this the only thing I could play was a few notes strung together - just enough to impress the girls.
I discovered this rule and quickly learned to play the guitar. Now if I tell anyone that I’ve only been playing for 6 months and I taught myself how to play, they don’t believe me.
If I can do it, you can do it, too.
But What Is The 20 Minute M&N Rule
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.
But here the magical thing. The 20 minutes that you practice at night is more important, since sleep is when the brain combines everything that you’ve learned in the day.
During sleep your brain starts accumulating all the things it learned in the day. New connections are made in the brain cells which support your learning.
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 more you practice, the more myelin gets laid down.
The more myelin gets laid down, the easier it is to practice. This is a great virtuous cycle that gets established.
This process is improved when you sleep. Since during sleep your body is recharged and rejuvenated.
Just by doing this little technique you will be able to quickly pick up any skill you want, learn any language you want to learn, or even learn tough subjects faster.
Just follow this rule - the first week will be tough, but as you implement this in your life it will get easier and easier, until you pick up new skills like clockwork without even thinking about them.
Lets move on to the second last most important thing that you should know in life.
2. 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.
Most people don’t have this ability. They think they do, but they don’t. They see the outside world like they ‘think’ about it.
The outside world in their minds is colored with their own childhood experiences, upbringing biases, things that their parents said, the punishments they got from their teachers.
Not based on the truth or accurate thinking.
What Is Accurate Thinking Anyway?
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.
This is not something that comes naturally to us. Especially when we are talking to people we’ve known for a long time, whose opinions we treat as fact.
Like parents saying things like, “if you don’t study hard, you’ll never get a job in your life,” or “I don’t know why this child turned out to be such a problem for me. All the rest of them were fine.”
Like your friends saying things like, “you such a loser that’s why you’re alone.”
Or, “you should dump that b*tch, I saw her talking to that guy, she’s probably a slut anyway.”
Or, “I don’t trust him, you shouldn’t marry him. He seems like such a player, since he’s so nice to every one.”
Listen to the opinion, but understand that this is just an opinion. You don’t need to accept it. In fact discard this opinion all together.
Make your decisions based on facts that you collect from a number of resources.
Not just your parents who might be having a hard time in their own life and blaming it at you.
Nor your friends who might be single and lonely and don’t want to see you happy. Listen to them, but discard their opinions. You don’t have to argue with them, or discuss with them either. Just ignore the opinion.
How Do You Develop Accurate Thinking?
Here’s is how you can develop accurate thinking in your own life.
- Develop your reasoning. Reasoning is of two types. The first type of reasoning is when necessary facts on which to base your facts are not available. This is called “inductive reasoning.” The second type of reasoning is when you have facts to base your thinking on and deduce results. This is called “deductive reasoning”.
- Never accept the opinions of other people as a fact. Whoever they are, parents, teachers, friends, bosses. Unless you’ve confirmed the source of those opinions and the source satisfies you of the opinions accuracy.
- Remember to analyze free advice before implementing it in your life. Most free advice will be worthless and in most cases cost you dearly. Specially if that free advice is unsolicited.
- Whenever you hear gossip, or slander - understand that this will be ‘biased opinion’. Whoever is gossiping to you will be biased against the person she is talking about.
- Whenever you ask someone for advice, don’t tell they why you want the advice or for what reason you’re seeking this advice. If your advisor knows about your reason for seeking advice, she will look to please you instead of giving you honest advice.
- Don’t believe things without proof. No matter what there is in the universe, it can be proved. If it cannot be proved then it does not exist.
- Ask everyone, “How do you mean?”. Make this a habit. What this means is asking others to explain where they got the information, and what they mean by it. Thus getting them to tell you more information.
Just these things alone will keep your mind on the right track to accurately think. Separate fact from fiction, opinion from proof. Then take the fact and implement it in your life.
This alone will change your life. You don’t have to confront anyone when you discover an opinion and try to change it.
Just remember the quote from Dead pool. “Opinion are like a$$holes, everyone has one, and everyone thinks everyone else’s stink.”
Just leave it at that, and move on in your life. Focus on finding facts from the opinion and you will be successful.
Finally, let’s look at the most important thing you should know in life.
1. You Matter
When I was 18, I was in a motorcycle crash.
My friend was driving. I was sitting behind him. He'd just gotten a slick looking 250cc racing bike and I wanted to experience the thrill of riding a motorbike.
It was the first time that I'd even seen a 250cc motorbike, let alone ride on one. Both of us, young and stupid. He had a helmet on. I did not.
We were probably doing 80 when the car in front of us indicating right, turned left. Swerving right into our path. He couldn't stop the bike in time and we ran into it's side.
As I tumble rolled over the hood of the car, flying in the air I realized I did not want to die. Not today.
I hadn't loved enough. I hadn't lived enough. I hadn't traveled enough. I did not want to die.
I hit the road and started rolling toward the pavement. The only thought in my mind was 'I'm not wearing a helmet and the pavement is fast approaching me'. 'Don't die today!'
I stopped mere inches before I hit the pavement. My clothes ripped, my knees and elbow bleeding. Thankfully I had rolled as I'd fallen on the road, so no bones were broken.
I realized then, just for a split second. I mattered.
The Most Important Lesson Of Your Life
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.
This is the most important thing that you should know in life.
You matter.
Don’t let your friends tell you that you don’t. Don’t listen to them when they bring you down with negative remarks. Ditch them if they make fun of your for trying new things.
You matter. What you do matters. What you think matters. Everything about you matter.
Sometimes your parents won’t tell them that you matter. It’s not because you don’t matter. It’s because no one told them that they matter.
Their parents were too busy thinking about themselves, your parents were probably wondering whether they matter or not. So if you read this, tell your parents that you care about them, that they matter too.
But before you do that, remember that no matter what they say in return, whether they hang up on you, scream at you, or become sarcastic at your gesture - you matter.
You don’t need your parents to tell you that you matter. You DO matter.
Sometimes your siblings will tell you, they hate you and wish you were dead. Don’t listen to them. They just wish someone told them that they matter. Tell your siblings that you love them, and they matter to you.
But before you do that, understand that they resent you because you get more love and attention from your parents. Remember, even if you didn’t get attention - you matter.
Sometime your boss will throw your stuff out of his office, tell you what a loser you are and that you’re fired effective immediately. This might be the time when you're thinking about jumping in front of a bus.
Don’t do that. You matter. It matters to the world that you bring your gifts to the world.
It matters that you share your gifts. You might not be seeing your gifts just yet, but they are brilliant and amazing.
Let the world see them.
Because You Matter.
