16) Performer & Learner

There are two kinds of people: those who see life as a performance and those who see life as a work in progress. Performers and learners. The strange irony is that our educational system is designed to produce performers, not learners. The emphasis is on successful performance rather than successful learning. There are penalties for failure and rewards for accomplishment as if failure and learning were separate. When it’s safe to talk about mistakes, people are more likely to report errors and less likely to make them. Learned this great piece of knowledge from the book “Creating”.

17) Game of Work

Why could ten people at the company picnic display amazing teamwork and motivation for each other, but those same ten people could totally fail to achieve harmony in office, and worse, spend all day downgrading each other? Because in sports, a player has constant feedback on how he or she is doing ­ the score is known and the effort necessary to win is established. In work, feedback is unreliable, inconsistent, and often non-existent. At work you seldom know the score or what it takes to win. You get feedback at the end of the year in the form of appraisal. We don’t know if we won or lost today. Using game mechanics like scoreboard, feedback loop, etc. office work can become as exciting as a sport. From the book “Game of Work” by Charles A Coonradt.

18) Talk like TED

When the top 500 TED Talk speakers were interviewed, their #1 secret was ‘passion’. They do it for love, they don’t do it for money. Passion leads to mastery and your presentation is nothing without it. Science shows that passion is contagious. You cannot inspire others unless you are inspired yourself. The most popular TED speakers don’t have a “job.” They have a passion, an obsession, a vocation, not a job. These people are called to share their ideas. Motivated and energized speakers are always more interesting and engaging than bored and passive ones. Invite passionate people into your life. Identifying your passion is one step, but you must share it and talk about what motivates you with other people. Most important, link yourself with others who share your passion. Thanks to the book “Talk like TED” by Carmine Galo.

19) Action Action

We think motivation causes action. In fact it’s the opposite. Action causes motivation. When do you feel great and enthusiastic? While going to the gym or while coming back home from the gym? The latter. Why? Because you have already taken some action in the gym and that motivates you to go to the gym the next day. Conversely, when you fail to go to the gym one day, you see a series of days you don’t go to the gym. Because you failed to take action today, that demotivates you to take action on the next day. Motivation from a seminar, speech or YouTube videos will last for a few days. For a long-lasting and continuous motivation, take some physical action no matter small or big. P.S. Talking, thinking or googling are not actions. From the book “My Planned Funeral” by Booklet Guy. 

20) Pleasure of Shopping

Pleasures’ are immediate, short-lived. Once the stimulus disappears, the pleasant feelings fade. Sugary foods, orgasm, video games, shopping, watching a movie, hanging out with friends. ‘Gratifications’ put you in flow state. Time stops, you are fully immersed in the activity. Teaching, mountain biking, reading a book, dancing or a deep conversation with someone. Gratifications create lasting happiness; pleasures don’t. When a movie is over, the pleasure is over as well. When we help people in need or go rock-climbing, satisfaction lasts much longer. Pleasures are easy to attain while gratifications take effort. Going for a run takes effort; playing video games doesn’t. Reading a book after a hard day’s of work requires effort; switching on the TV doesn’t. If we want real happiness, we’re better off focusing on gratifications rather than pleasures. From the book “Authentic Happiness” by Martin Seligman. 

21) Frequency or Intensity?

When we look for joy, we often focus on the big moments. Graduating from college. Getting married. Having a child. Getting a job. But happiness is the frequency of positive experiences, not the intensity. How we spend our days is how we spend our lives. Rather than waiting until we're happy to enjoy the small things, we should go and do the small things that make us happy. After a depressing divorce, a friend of mine made a list of things she enjoyed--listening to musicals, seeing her nieces and nephews, looking at art books, eating flan - and made a vow to do one thing on the list after work each day. Happiness is the joy you find on hundreds of forgettable Wednesdays. “An American Childhood” by Annie Dillard. 

22) Being Creative

Being creative sounds like a hard and abstract task. But creativity isn’t limited to writing, painting, and singing. Every time you make a decision, you have to engage in creative thinking. The easiest way to practice creative thinking is to come up with more options for a decision. For example, take the task of buying packaged milk. Most of us have our favorite brand, so we run straight to section seven and grab a box of Amul skimmed milk. But what if you considered a new option? How will Almond milk feed my nutritional needs? You’re thinking creatively! Our school system has us wired to believe there’s only one answer to each question, but that’s rubbish. Instead of looking for the only option, think about how you can find the best out of many. That’s creativity. From “How Successful People Think” by John Maxwell. " 

23) Not Only Happiness

Happiness and fulfilment, both are equally important. For example, I get tremendous happiness in reading and summarizing books. That’s my passion. But I don’t enjoy recording the summaries in my voice. I have to switch off the fan that makes me sweat a lot, close the door and windows to reduce background noise which stops the room’s ventilation, throat pains due to continues voice recording with energy. But audio book summary is the heart of our mission Make India Read. I have to do it even if I don’t like because when we want to convert our passion into a mission, we need to perform not-so-enjoyable activities surrounding your passion. Doing only what we ‘like’ will make us happy. But doing what we like and also doing what we don’t like that’s associated with the activities we like, will give us happiness as well as a sense of meaning and fulfilment when we go to bed at night. - Booklet Guy

24) I don't know

The more uncertain people are, the more they defend their ideas. When less sure of the situation or subject, they should ideally become flexible. But they don’t. They argue extra hard to convince themselves when they are unsure about the subject. We should honestly define what we do know and stick to those areas. Warren Buffet says, “Know your circle of competence and stick within it. The size of that circle is not very important; knowing its boundaries, however, is vital. Never be afraid to say ‘I don't know.’ Learned this idea from the book “The Snowball: Warren Buffett and the Business of Life” written by Alice Schroeder.

25) Grounded

Whenever I feel that success is getting into my head, I read this and get back to the ground: 1. Whatever you know, somebody knows it better. 2. Whatever you do, there are thousands of others trying to do the same thing at the same time. 3. Whatever you do will be rapidly outdated by technological advancement. 4. You are only as good as your last performance. 5. Building trust and credibility is a continuous process, not a one-time event. From the book “My Planned Funeral” by Booklet Guy.

26) Asset or Liability?

The poor and middle class don’t become rich because they buy liabilities that they think are assets. Assets create income, and liabilities create expenses. For example, most people think of a house as an asset. By the accounting definition, it is, but in reality, your home results in cash moving out of your pocket – the home loan EMI’s, insurance, property tax, maintenance and, worst of all, the missed opportunities from having your money stuck in your house instead of available to work for you. Instead of pretending your house is an investment, acknowledge it as an expense. If you want a house (or a bigger house than you already have), first create assets that generate enough cash flow to pay for the liability that a house is. From Robert Kiyosaki’s book “Rich Dad, Poor Dad”.

27) Less Wrong

I am not an exception. Like most of us, I too get the thought of abandoning a book after reading 20 pages. Every morning, like others, I am also tempted to hit the snooze button at 5 am. In the gym, as most do, my heart cries to quit on the 9th rep. I too crave for a pav bhaji over green salad. We all are walking flaws. The goal is not to be a perfectionist but to do a little less wrong every day. To make a small choice every time between what I like to do and what I ought to do. I was inspired to write this after reading 12 books on habits. From the book “My Planned Funeral” by Booklet Guy.

28) Purpose over Liking

Albert E.N.Gray spent a lifetime trying to discover the common denominator of success. He concluded that the successful person has formed the habit of doing things that failures don't like to do. Successful people don't like doing them either. But their dislike is subordinated to the strength of their purpose. Nobody likes to give pain to the muscles in the gym. Yet successful people subordinate the pain to the higher purpose of being healthy. Subordinate your dislikes to a strong purpose. We may not enjoy every task on the path towards the goal. But success is about doing things that make us uncomfortable. From the book “Million Dollar Habits” by Brain Tracy. 

29) Luck hates Loneliness

‘It’s impossible to be lucky alone,’ says Phillipe Gabiliet professor of Psychology. No man is an island. Just imagine. If you were to sit alone inside the room, cut off from the outside world. How would opportunities reach you? To succeed, quit the cabin. Get out in the sun and meet people who are smarter than you, who are more successful than you, who are happier than you. Googling is not enough. Pick up the phone, ask for meet ups, get annoying responses. Yes, that will make you uncomfortable. But your success is directly proportionate to the number of uncomfortable conversations you make. If you think you are the smartest in the room, change the room. Because your income is the average of five people you meet most often. From the book “13 Steps to Bloody Good luck” by Ashwin Sanghi. 

30) Character Failure

90% of leadership failures are character failures. One cannot do right in one area of life while he is occupied in doing wrong in any other area. A CEO cheating on his wife will also fail as a leader of the company. He will not be sought as a trustworthy leader by his fellow officers. He can’t be right in office while he is wrong at home. Life is one indivisible whole. A survey of 54000 people asking them to identify the essential qualities of a leader like expertise, motivator, visionary, etc. ‘integrity’ was the number one response. Today we have come to believe that the only things we need for success are talent, skill and hard work. But history has taught us that over the long run, who we are is more important than who we appear to be. From the book “The 8th Habit” by Stephen Covey.