First, there’s always a simple solution than what you are currently doing. Second,
you don’t need a smart plan always. The former is to remind yourself when you are
unnecessarily complicating something. The latter is not to fret over useless tasks.
Q and A
Life boils down to the Q&A session we have with ourselves. Why did the car hit me? Karma. Why was I fooled
by a financial scam? Stupidity. What emotions usually get the best of me? Anger. Why do I eat junk food? No reason.
Why do I go to college? fun. And on and on.
Watch this Q&A more carefully, as this shapes how we experience and wish to experience this life we got.
Problems
At least up to 90-95% of our problems are already solved by someone else. You need to just find them. That’s all.
It could be getting food at home, summarising the whole book for you, learning to plumb, watching a Korean documentary or
anything wild, someone already did it for you. In this day and age, to find the wisdom of Himalayan monks
all you need is an app.
You are the problem
Polish writer Stanislaw J. Lee notes that no one drop ever thinks that it caused the flood. When throwing
away a chocolate wrapper we don’t think that we lay the foundation for the garbage mountain. When gossiping
about a colleague behind their back we don’t think we caused their mental breakdown. When sharing fake news
that might kill people or polarise one community against the other we don’t think we started the wildfire.
Remember that you are part of the ripple that builds the wave.
Perfectionism
There’s no perfect person. Even the greats like Gandhi, Steve Jobs, and Einstein were a bunch of walking flaws
and yes, it is true when people say never meet your heroes. Yes, there is no perfect family, friend, partner
or book, movie, or song.
There’s no perfect time to start writing, do business, be on diet, propose to your girlfriend, or apply to
your dream MNC. You will never have enough to start the game or take a bold step.
There’s no perfect result. The painting you drew still needs a color upgrade, and the blog needs more coherence
and structure, your performance in the job/exam can be better, the dish needs more salt, and so on.
These are the facts. Deal with it.
Negotiation
The two most powerful techniques in negotiation are: making them feel they got a better deal and
not saying yes quickly. Give away psychological satisfaction to others and you just focus
on output. And sell yourself not in a state of desperation but to fill their anticipation.
Stupidity-Tolerance Quotient
Scratching my beard over a Shakespearean quote—“ The fool doth think he is wise but the wise man knows himself to be a fool.” has given me an interesting observation to fire up my sleeping neurons.
Why does a fool doesn’t admit that he’s a fool? The obvious answer is he’s stupid or has no prudence. But is it so?
I think society should be put to blame for this and not any individual per se.
As a society, we never encourage stupidity. A simple math mistake is enough to brand a kid as “dumb” and ridicule him. The whole class and sadly even the tutor joins in this upsetting parade. Obviously, the grading system makes things even worse.
This puts the kid in a kind of “fear coma” and haunts him in his otherwise playful dreams. Further, it kills his intuition and a curiosity to learn things and become wise, if there’s anything as such.
This starts a dangerous and sick loop from which the fragile mind never comes out. No help is given to the “Dull” mind and no chance to correct the follies. Not knowing what to do, the kid takes the shortcut.
He starts rote memorization of stuff and lives in this ignorant-fear bubble without salvation unless a miracle happens so. By this logic,
the fool doesn’t think he’s wise but portrays himself as wise out of sheer helplessness at least to a point in his life. I know this isn’t an excuse for a fool to remain ignorant thorough out his life but this system puts such habits in the mind and pushes him into the path of stupidity.
The solution can be raising the stupidity-tolerance quotient I.e. the ability of the collective society to tolerate foolishness and idiocy. And give permission to stay foolish as often as one can.
As an old African proverb reminds us— it takes a village to raise a child. Here it takes a society to make one wise. The rest as Shakespeare in his Hamlet says is silence.
Attend more funerals
Funerals teach you hard truths about life than any classic book or world-class mentor. First, it takes away
at least to an extent the fear of death. Second, the indifference of people to your life and how brief the time
is between life and death. Third, you will understand the equality of fates and no one remembers the love, fights, and the whole pointless dramas of your life. Fourth, the tears are directly proportional to the inheritance you
leave behind. Fifth and final, the dead are more easily forgiven than the living ones.
Procrastination
The best way to beat it is task simplification and clarification. Achieving something like a super body is abstract
and vague. But building a six-pack body in 6 months and an action plan of doing 50-100 pushups and pull-ups
every day at 5 A.M. and keeping the required gear for that in your home is clear, simple, and specific. Vague
dreams never come to fruition but direct ones will.
Aim Low
In the initial stages of starting a task, do not aim high. The dream should not be something like becoming a highly successful author but writing 250 words every day. When the skill set, discipline set, heart, and mindset are not ready yet we should not aim at the sky as it only leads to disappointment and dejection.
Thy Vox 