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Put a Post-it on your computer screen or set an Outlook reminder to alert you at least three times daily with the question: Are you inventing things to do to avoid the important?
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Timothy Ferriss |
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What are the top-three activities that I use to fill time to feel as though I've been productive? These are usually used to postpone more important actions (often uncomfortable because there is a chance of failure or rejection). Be honest with yourself, as we all do this on occasion. What are your crutch activities?
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Timothy Ferriss |
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You need to figure out whether you're feeling like, "Fuck yeah!" or "No."
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Alison Gopnik's Scientist in the Crib
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Timothy Ferriss |
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What are bad recommendations you hear in your profession or area of expertise? Great, great question. In the world of writing, everyone wants to succeed immediately and without pain or effort. Really? Or they love to write books about how to write books, rather than actually writing . . . a book that might actually be about something. Bad advice is everywhere. Build a following. Establish a platform. Learn how to scam the system. In other w..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success? Do you have a "favorite failure" of yours? Many, many moons ago, I used to be a corporate lawyer. I was an ambivalent corporate lawyer at best, and anyone could have told you that I was in the wrong profession, but still: I'd dedicated tons of time (three years of law school, one year of clerking for a federal judge, and six and a half years at a Wall Street firm, to be e..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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In the last five years, what have you become better at saying no to? My biggest shift came after listening to a successful CEO talk about his philosophy for hiring people. When his company grew and he ran out of time to interview people himself, he had his employees rate new candidates on a 1-10 scale. The only stipulation was they couldn't choose 7. It immediately dawned on me how many invitations I was receiving that I would rate as a 7--..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Tracking anything is better than tracking nothing. If you are very overweight, very weak, very inflexible, or very anything negative, tracking even a mediocre variable will help you develop awareness that leads to the right behavioral changes. This underscores an encouraging lesson: you don't have to get it all right. You just have to be crystal clear on a few concepts.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Next was learning that 4,000 calories equals about a pound of fat. I know that's an oversimplification, but that's okay. Oversimplifying is one of the next things I'll mention as a tool. But if 4,000 is roughly a pound of fat, and my BMR makes it pretty easy to shave off some huge number of calories per day, it suddenly becomes very clear how to lose lots of weight without even doing any exercise. Add in some calculations on how many calori..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Ego is about who's right. Truth is about what's right.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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tablespoons, if you'd care to indulge). Will the body composition outcomes be the same? Of course not. Rule #2: The hormonal responses to carbohydrates (CHO), protein, and fat are different. There is no shortage of clinical studies to prove that beef calories7 do not equal bourbon calories. One such study, conducted by Kekwick and Pawan, compared three groups put on calorically equal (isocaloric) semistarvation diets of 90% fat, 90% protein..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Dr. B. J. Fogg, founder of the Persuasive Technology Lab at Stanford University, wrote his graduate dissertation with a far less aggressive commitment. Even if he came home from a party at 3:00 A.M., he had to write one sentence per day. He finished in record time while classmates languished for years, overwhelmed by the enormity of the task. Understanding this
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Success should not be measured by financial gain; true success is doing something you love for a living.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Look at it as a test drive of one to two weeks. If you want to walk an hour a day, don't start with one hour. Choosing one hour is automatically building in the excuse of not having enough time. Commit to a fail-proof five minutes instead. This is exactly what Dr. Fogg suggested to his sister, and that one change (the smallest meaningful change that created momentum) led her to buy running shoes and stop eating dessert, neither of which he ..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Avoid compulsively making things worse.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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We agreed I was going to make judgment calls on a range of issues on his behalf without checking with him. He told me, 'In order to move fast, I expect you'll make some foot faults. I'm okay with an error rate of 10 to 20%--times when I would have made a different decision in a given situation--if it means you can move fast.' I felt empowered to make decisions with this ratio in mind, and it was incredibly liberating." TF: "Foot faults" is ..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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If I believed this, how would it affect my decisions in the next week? Over the next 6 to 12 months?
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Timothy Ferriss |
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The best way I can describe the feeling is a Finnish word, "sisu"--the mental strength to continue to try even after you feel you've reached the limits of your abilities. I don't think failure is sometimes part of the process--it always is. When you feel you can't go on, know that you're just getting started."
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Timothy Ferriss |
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What advice would you give to a smart, driven college student about to enter the "real world"? What advice should they ignore? Advice: Follow your intellectual curiosity over whatever is "hot" right now. If your curiosity ever leads you to a place where society eventually wants to go, you'll get paid extremely well. Do everything you were going to do, but with less angst, less suffering, less emotion. Everything takes time. Ignore: The news..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Note from Tim Ferriss: I asked Tim to share a fun piece of related background. Here it is. In early 2015, Elon reached out to schedule a call. He said he had read some Wait But Why posts and was wondering if I might be interested in writing about some of the industries he's involved in. I flew out to California to meet with him, tour the Tesla and SpaceX factories, and spend some time with the executives at both companies to learn the full ..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Rave reviews of the books Sapiens, Poor Charlie's Almanack, Influence, and Man's Search for Meaning, among others
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Timothy Ferriss |
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What is the book (or books) you've given most as a gift, and why? Or what are one to three books that have greatly influenced your life? What purchase of $100 or less has most positively impacted your life in the last six months (or in recent memory)? My readers love specifics like brand and model, where you found it, etc. How has a failure, or apparent failure, set you up for later success? Do you have a "favorite failure" of yours? If you..
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Anais Nin, which I see every day: "Life shrinks or expands in proportion to one's courage."
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Timothy Ferriss |
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A good general strategy is reasoning counterfactually: if someone tells you that X is true, ask yourself--(i) what would they say if X really is true, and (ii) what would they say if X is false? If the answer to (i) and (ii) is "they will say roughly what they just said now," then their words provided you with exactly zero information."
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Timothy Ferriss |
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The Biology of Desire: Why Addiction Is Not a Disease by Marc Lewis.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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The Passion Trap: How to Right an Unbalanced Relationship by relationship therapist and psychologist Dean C. Delis.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Getting Real: The Smarter, Faster, Easier Way to Build a Successful Web Application, which is available for free at gettingreal.37signals.com.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Rework and Remote: Office Not Required.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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It's not what you look at that matters, it's what you see."--Henry David Thoreau"
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Our fears are always more numerous than our dangers."--Seneca the Younger"
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Timothy Ferriss |
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A complex system that works is invariably found to have evolved from a simple system that worked. A complex system designed from scratch never works and cannot be patched up to make it work. You have to start over, beginning with a working simple system."--John Gall"
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Timothy Ferriss |
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While people often say there's not enough time, remember that you'll always have less attention than time. Full attention is where you do your best work, and everyone's going to be looking to rip it from you. Protect and preserve it.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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What policy was I following that produced this bad outcome, and do I still expect that policy to give the best results overall, occasional bad outcomes notwithstanding?
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Timothy Ferriss |
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All courses of action are risky, so prudence is not in avoiding danger (it's impossible), but calculating risk and acting decisively. Make mistakes of ambition and not mistakes of sloth. Develop the strength to do bold things, not the strength to suffer." -Niccolo Machiavelli"
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Life of Well-Being, Wisdom, and Wonder, and The Sleep Revolution: Transforming Your Life, One Night at a Time.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Memories, Dreams, Reflections by Carl Jung.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Think for yourself while being radically open-minded." Ray Dalio"
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Timothy Ferriss |
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you've crossed a psychological boundary by establishing yourself to the asker as someone who is interested in the type of request being made. Research shows we're remarkably committed to maintaining a consistent sense of external identity, even if we only established it to begin with out of politeness.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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I do not believe in work-life balance. I believe that if you view your work as a calling, it is a labor of love rather than laborious. When your work is a calling, you are not approaching the amount of hours you are working with a sense of dread or counting the minutes until the weekend. Your calling can become a life-affirming engagement that can provide its own balance and spiritual nourishment.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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The Barefoot Investor by Scott Pape.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Brain.fm app
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Always ask: What am I missing? And listen to the answer.
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Timothy Ferriss |
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Macro
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Timothy Ferriss |
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He said the HP mantra was "MBWA." Translation: Managing By Wandering Around. It stands for being in touch, being human--and learning from everyone."
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Timothy Ferriss |