This Just In… Great People Do Weird Things
Thanks for tuning in! This week’s post features: Tools of Titans by Tim Ferriss (book), Here’s How to Give Thanks by Ryan Holiday (blog post), The Battle Between Your Present and Future Self by Daniel Goldstein (ted talk) & more. Enjoy…
Book: Tools of Titans by Tim Ferriss (671 pgs)
Disclaimer: This is and (hopefully) will be the only book I write about that I haven’t finished. I was going to wait but I read enough to get the gist of it and it is worth mentioning now since last week Tim released a new book called Tribe of Mentors (under a year after releasing this).
From what I have found, it seems like Tribe of Mentors is based on a questionnaire Tim sent out to people mostly not on his podcast, while this book is Tim’s cliffnotes of sorts from guests of his podcast. It compiles over 100 world-class people and details what makes them great. It’s broken up into 3 main categories and a closing, which are:
- Healthy
- Wealthy
- Wise
- Conclusion and what I’ll call extras
I think the main takeaway is that great people do weird things. Every person that I have read about — so far — does something that the average person wouldn’t do and would consider weird. However, these people credit — at least partially — these weird thing to their success. We got Jaime Foxx, Ryan Holiday (featured below), Tony Robbins, Seth Rogen, and more. These people push themselves to do what the average person won’t, which is what sets them up for success. On a daily basis, they are accustomed to doing more and they’re not afraid of being different or labeled as weird because of it.
Use these people as models/mentors. Pick up things that you can implement and stick to, and maybe one day you will become a top performer and somebody will write about you.
Blog Post: Here’s How to Give Thanks by Ryan Holiday (5 mins)
Last week was Thanksgiving, unfortunately, I wasn’t able to be home with my family. In fact, I haven’t been home much in the past 6 years but I still found ways to be thankful (mostly that they let me venture and support me on this bizarre journey). Being thankful is defined as expressing gratitude and I know that good things happen when I express do this, but just like the holiday passed my thanks was as well.
In this post, Ryan offers another, more impactful, way to practice gratitude that will help you be grateful no matter what is happening in your life. His practice is to force yourself to be grateful for the things that are hard to be grateful for. This will make the bad times seem so bad, and the good times seem even better (perception is reality, see below).
Without gratitude we take things for granted, we lose all appreciation for what we have and feel entitled to the things we don’t. With gratitude, we get abundance and a happy mind. Its a practice by trying to not let your attitude influence when you express gratitude. Express gratitude towards the things you don’t think you should be thankful for and it will pour over into all areas of your life.
Ted Talk: The Battle Between Your Present and Future Self by Daniel Goldstein (15 mins 58 secs)
Considering I’ve been mixing up the stories of Oedipus and Odysseus without knowing it, this talk provides a nice and short reminder of The Odyssey.
Anyway, if you are up to date on your ancient writings, this talk talks about creating commitment devices in order to keep yourself disciplined and live your best life. By tying himself to a mast, Odysseus created a commitment device to ensure he wouldn’t succumb to the temptations of life, which is how Odysseus ties — pun intended — to this talk.
Commitment devices help us maintain self-discipline so we can get the results we want when temptations arise. There are clear benefits to having commitment devices in place, for example, commitment devices help us differentiate from an opportunity to be seized and a temptation to be resisted. They also help us stick to our word.
Last week we touched on discipline being more important inspiration, I didn’t realize that I was setting up commitment devices to help myself stay disciplined to write this every week.
Let me know what commitment devices you use, if any and let me know how they’re working out.
Bonus: Tea Consent by Blue Seat Studios (2 min 50 sec)
Being in Israel, I don’t follow the news in America much. However, every time I hear anything from America it seems like another person is getting accused of sexual violence. I don’t know what’s going on over there but I think everyone could use a reminder that this isn’t okay.
The orthodox Jewish culture — at least the one I am apart of — puts a lot of emphasis on the power of touch, sex and relationships (Orthodox Jews are supposed to follow a commandment called Shomer Negiah which pretty much means no touching of the opposite sex before marriage and once married only touching your spouse). Being in this environment for over a year, I have developed a sensitivity to news like this.
I don’t know if its a lack of education, morals, both, something else, or what but these selfish, aggressive acts are never okay. I don’t know what should be done about these people but if you are or if you know anyone that is or has been a victim of sexual violence my cousin is doing some great work at The Inner Truth Project. I’m sure she would love to help in any way possible.
After talking to my cousin about this apparent outbreak, She helped me see what is really going on. She said that this isn't new its just that “when you have this many people feeling empowered to come out and share their truth, we see what a real epidemic sexual violence truly is” and that the news is “not such a bad thing if it brings awareness.” Thanks for opening my eyes to a new perspective, I think this is a good intro to the quote of the week.
Note: This isn’t just a problem in America, it is a problem everywhere, definitely in Israel and quite possibly in orthodox circles also. But since the 6 people that read this at time of post are in America I’m catering to you guys.
Quote: “There is nothing either good or bad, but thinking makes it so” — William Shakespeare
Perception is reality. Perception is merely an interpretation of the facts, it’s these interpretations that evoke emotional responses. Every negative occurrence is negative because of how you dealt with it, every positive occurrence is positive because of how you dealt with it.
Until I talked to my cousin I thought the news about all of these people getting accused of sexual violence was terrible, I didn’t realize that the news could also be for the good. Think about an event in your life that you perceived as negative, try looking back now and view this event as objectively as possible, see if you can find some good in this particular situation and focus on that instead, and watch as the negativity fades and your life becomes more positive.
What was your favorite bullet in this post? If you had to pick only one bullet to keep in this post what would it be and why and if you had to get rid of one what would it be and why? Send a message or comment below.
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To your growth! Stay curious…
P.S. If you want my notes for the book above, send me an email with the subject “Notes for (insert book name)” and I will happily share.
