Think Straight: Change Your Thoughts, Change Your Life

by Darius Foroux

I hate assumptions. And yet, I assume things all the time. When someone doesn’t answer my email, I assume they don’t care. When someone apologizes, I assume it’s not genuine. When I have a headache, I assume I’m ill. I know I’m not practical because assumptions are not facts.

I like to avoid assumptions as much as I can. I prefer to look at facts and then draw conclusions.

Whatever you do, never waste your thoughts on other people’s ill-informed opinions and guesses.

I used to think that smart people are fast thinkers. “He thinks on his feet. He’s really smart.”

Every time I faced a problem, discussion, or when someone asked me a question, I thought, “QUICK, QUICK, QUICK!” Naturally, my first answers sucked.

Thinking things through takes time. Every time I gave a quick answer, I wasn’t thinking at all, I was impulsive.

Derek Sivers trained himself not to trust his first thoughts.

Why do we make things so complicated while we can easily solve these things by just taking an extra day to THINK?

“Please give me a day or two to think about it.” That’s all you need.

Training your mind happens in stages—and before you can move on to the next phase of your learning development, you have to get through a wall. I believe that both learning skills and developing yourself happen in stages. At the beginning of a new stage, things are easy to learn because everything is new. But the closer you get to the end of a stage, things get more difficult. In my case, I got headaches. But I wasn’t near the end yet because, after a short setback, I got back at it again. At some point, you hit a big wall. That’s the mental breakdown. It’s also a point at which you want to give up whatever you’re trying to achieve: Writing a book, starting a business, changing your career or leading a group of people. When you hit a wall, everything stops. The book all of a sudden seems useless, the business seems to fail, the career you want seems unreachable, and the people have stopped taking you seriously. All is lost.

When I reach a wall, I know I’m close to the next stage of my development. Instead of giving up, I’m happy. All I need to do, is to take a break, rejuvenate, and let my mind recover. I hang out with my friends. Play some table tennis with my brother at our office. Listen to my favorite artist like Jay-Z, Bob Dylan, Kendrick Lamar, or Bon Iver. Watch movies (a lot of them). I just take some time to relax and let my brain get stronger while I’m not thinking or working on anything. And then, I get back to where I left off. I use my energy to break through the wall. And it always works.

Before we invented language, we communicated and thought in images.

When I think, I talk to myself. And when I take notes, I also talk to myself.

My drawing skills haven’t improved, but my articles have. And one of the reasons is that I take time to think about how I can visually share my idea. I want readers to immediately “get” what I’m trying to share in the article by looking at my drawings.

“Conquer yourself rather than the world.” ― René Descartes

Knowing yourself is step one. Step two is acting on that knowledge.

Sometimes opportunities come my way and I feel like saying yes too quickly. But I have to take a step back. And ask myself: Is this really me? Very often, the answer is no. I’ve found that most things in life are not for me. Most jobs, opportunities, countries, people, parties, lifestyles, books—they’re all not for me. It’s about finding the things that are for me. Believe it or not, that’s a very small list.

I journal and make sure to read my notes once a week. That’s all I mean when I talk about reflecting. I do it for three reasons: It helps me to uncover my mistakes, so I can avoid them in the future. It helps me to value my progress when I read my past achievements. To get my thoughts in order so I can second guess myself. That helps me to make better

The reason is that we become too dependent on something when we give it too much importance.

Money is a replaceable resource. When you’re out of it, you can earn it back. You can’t say the same for time. Don’t spend too much time thinking about money.

Improve the quality of your thoughts, so you improve the quality of your actions.

Action > Thinking

At the end of the day, this is your life and the only way you can live with yourself is to follow your strongest desires. Just make sure you think straight so you eventually act on those thoughts.

Never Look Back

The only useful purpose I can think of for looking back is to learn.

So yes, look back, but don’t stare for too long. Life happens now.

Thinking is a double-edged sword. It can help you. But it can also destroy you.

James believed scientists wasted their time on abstract ideas and theories that had no impact on people’s lives.