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by
Eric Barker
Self-compassion beats self-esteem.
When challenged, focus on improving your skills—not doing well or looking good. Studies show “get-better goals” increase motivation, make tasks more interesting, and replenish energy.
In a study titled “Self-Kindness When Facing Stress,” they found that being compassionate with yourself was actually correlated with being wise.
Yes, to be the very best you must be a little nuts in the effort department.
Without an IQ of 120, very few people end up producing anything that will be groundbreaking and remembered in the history books. But the twist is that as long as you’re past the 120 mark, many studies show more IQ points have little effect. What makes the difference? Not luck. It’s all those hours. A Manhattan Project physicist IQ of 180 might be nice, but those 60 points don’t make the difference that more hours will.
one of the critical elements of a great mentor wasn’t just secret knowledge and emotional support; it was pushing you harder.
Research shows ambition alone is predictive of success, and motivation predicts career success better than intelligence, ability, or salary.
Combine them with tons of hours
“Those who stayed very involved in meaningful careers and worked the hardest, lived the longest.” Meaningful work means doing something that’s (a) important to you and (b) something you’re good at.
Eran Shor, a professor at McGill University, found that being jobless increases premature mortality by a whopping 63 percent.
However, there are a few things that can put a permanent dent in how often you smile, like suffering a serious illness or getting divorced. Or losing your job. In fact, happiness levels do not fully recover even after you get a new job. Being out of work can leave a mark that lasts a lifetime.
Remember how I said that working too hard was one of the biggest regrets people had on their deathbed? Definitely true. But what was the number-one regret? “I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.”
the source of Ted’s rage was his inability to satisfy the perfectionist ambitions that he set for himself.
One study found people high in perfectionism were 33 percent less likely to have satisfying relationships.
What was number four in that list of biggest regrets of the dying? “I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.”
working like crazy when you’re not obsessively passionate has some serious negative effects. In Japan, this has gotten completely out of hand. It is not unheard of for people to literally die from overwork. The problem has become so prevalent the Japanese have a name for it: karōshi.
So burnout is the flip side of grit.
success does not lead to happiness as often as happiness leads to success.
Sometimes more is not the answer. Sometimes more isn’t even possible. Sometimes we need to relax and have fun—and maybe act a little bit crazy—to be at our best.
A playful attitude was associated with better grades.
when you’re tired it’s harder to stay happy.
Ten hours of work when you’re exhausted, cranky, and distracted might be far less productive than three hours when you’re “in the zone.”
“Energy, not time, is the fundamental currency of high performance.”
Having fun, getting sleep, and taking vacations may take time away from work but can more than make up for it in terms of quality and engagement.
When HBR talked to those top 6 percent of earners working sixty or more hours a week, they found “more than 69 percent believe they would be healthier if they worked less extremely; 58 percent think their work gets in the way of strong relationships with their children; 46 percent think it gets in the way of good relationships with their spouses; and 50 percent say their jobs make it impossible to have a satisfying sex life.”
The problem is that in the quest for “What makes me feel good” there’s no finish line. It’s a pie-eating contest and first prize is more pie.
We love choices and the twenty-first century has given us nearly infinite choices. With technology, we now always have the choice to be working. The office doors don’t close at five P.M. anymore. Every minute we spend with friends or playing with our kids is a minute we could be working. So every moment is a decision. That decision didn’t exist in the past. But having it in the back of our heads all the time is enormously stressful.
We love having choices. We hate making choices. Having choices means having possibilities. Making choices means losing possibilities. And having so many choices increases the chance of regret. When work is always a choice, everything is a trade-off.
We can’t sequence relationships. They need regular, consistent attention.
“We are always getting ready to live, but never living.”
You need a personal definition of success. Looking around you to see if you’re succeeding is no longer a realistic option. Trying to be a relative success compared to others is dangerous. This means your level of effort and investment is determined by theirs, which keeps you running full speed all the time to keep up. Vaguely saying you want to “be number one” isn’t remotely practical in a global competition where others are willing to go 24/7. We wanted options and flexibility. We got them. Now there are no boundaries. You can no longer look outside yourself to determine when to stop. The
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Evaluating life by one metric turns out to be a key problem. We can’t use just one yardstick to measure a successful life. In Just Enough the authors refer to it as a “collapsing strategy”—collapsing everything into one barometer of whether or not our life is on track.
A favorite quote of mine by Warren Buffett sums that up: “I always worry about people who say, ‘I’m going to do this for ten years; I really don’t like it very well. And then I’ll do this . . .’ That’s a lot like saving sex up for your old age. Not a very good idea.”
Being reactive doesn’t just hurt your chances of getting what you want; it also reduces your chances of real happiness.
Without a plan, we do what’s passive and easy—not what is really fulfilling.
The importance of control goes all the way down to the neuroscience level. Quick summary: when you’re stressed out, you literally can’t think straight. Under stress, your center of rational thought—the prefrontal cortex—just throws up its arms and quits. Your limbic system, that ol’ lizard brain of emotions, takes the reins.
Remember, emphasizing the negative can feel crummy, but it’s the path to improvement. That’s what the experts do.
Remember, you cannot maximize two things that are both dependent on the same resource: time.
A study in the Journal of Occupational Health Psychology showed that getting more clarity about what you’re expected to do reduces strain when work demands are high.
What was fascinating was that increasing people’s free time had no effect on their happiness, but scheduling that time in advance made all the difference.
As neuroscientist Daniel J. Levitin explains, when you’re concerned about something and your grey matter is afraid you may forget, it engages a cluster of brain regions referred to as the “rehearsal loop.” And you keep worrying and worrying. Writing your thoughts down and making a plan for tomorrow switches this off.
