How to Live: 27 conflicting answers and one weird conclusion

by Derek Sivers

You can appreciate your country from abroad, once it’s not your only option.

You make it the best through your commitment to it. Your dedication and actions make any choice great.

When a decision is irreversible, you feel better about it. When you’re stuck with something, you find what’s good about it. When you can’t change your situation, you change your attitude towards it. So remove the option to change your mind.

When people say you’re a person of good character, they mean you’re not just good, but consistently so. You’re defined by what you do repeatedly. Your habits create your character.

New habits are what you’re trying. Old habits are who you are.

Falling in love is easy. Staying in love is harder. Enthusiasm is common. Endurance is rare.

Marriage is for getting through the times when you’re not in love. Expect things to get bad. Your mutual commitment gives you the security to weather the storms, knowing they won’t destroy the relationship. Be loving even when you’re not feeling loving.

Commitment gives you peace of mind. When you commit to one thing, and let go of the rest, you feel free. Once you decide something, never change your min...

People destroy relationships with an angry over-reaction. The metaphors for “blowing off steam” or “venting” are wrong. Expressing your anger doesn’t relieve it. It makes you angrier.

Actions often have the opposite of the intended result. People who try too hard to be liked are annoying. People who try too hard to be attractive are repulsive. People who try too hard to be enlightened are self-centered. People who try too hard to be happy are miserable.

Change your need to change things. In your most peaceful moments, your mind is quiet. You’re not thinking you should be doing anything else. When everything feels perfect, you say, “I wouldn’t change a thing.” So, live your whole life in this mindset.

Don’t hope. Hope is wanting things to be different than they are. Wanting to change yourself is self-loathing. There’s no deeper happiness than wanting nothing. Desire is the opposite of peace.

People will appreciate your silence, and know that when you speak, it must be important. Shallow rivers are noisy. Deep lakes are silent.

When a problem is bothering you, it feels like you need to do something about it. Instead, identify what belief is really the source of your trouble. Replace that belief with one that doesn’t bother you. Then the problem is solved. Most problems are really just situations.

Observe yourself. Your own mind is the best laboratory. It’s also the most private and peaceful place to work.

Live where nothing is happening. Move to a quiet place with lots of nature and no ambition. Doing nothing is normal there. Walk and appreciate nature for hours a day. Your life and mind will be tranquil and serene. Peace is the absence of turmoil.

The stock market takes money from the active traders and gives it to the patient.

Imagine your future self judging your current life choices. When making a decision, ask yourself how you’ll feel about it when you’re old.

We overestimate what we can do in one year. We underestimate what we can do in ten years.

When you’re young, time goes slowly because everything is new. When you get older, time flies by, forgotten, because you’re not having as many new experiences.

Go make memories. Do memorable things. Experience the unusual. Pursue novelty. Replace your routines. Live in different places.

To enjoy your past is to live twice. Nostalgia links your past and present.

Nostalgia protects against stress and boredom, and improves your mood. Nostalgia makes you more optimistic, more generous, more creative, and more empathetic. Nostalgia is memories minus the pain. Being nostalgic makes you less afraid to die.

Make a story for the things you want to remember. Never make a story for the things you want to forget.

The more something means to you, the more you’ll remember it. Give moments meaning to remember them. Take away meaning to forget.

Making memories is the most important thing you can do with your life. The more memories you create, the longer and richer your life feels. Making memories is how to live.

Mastery is the best goal because the rich can’t buy it, the impatient can’t rush it, the privileged can’t inherit it, and nobody can steal it. You can only earn it through hard work.

People don’t fail by choosing the wrong path — they fail by not choosing. Make your choice, then make a lifetime commitment to constant improvement. The passion comes after you start getting good.

You need ritual, not inspiration. Every day, no matter what, you must practice. Your practice ritual is your highest priority — an unbreakable commitment. Stubbornly protect this time against the demands of the world.

Focus means head down. Big picture means head up. The more you’re doing of one, the less you’re doing of the other. If you’ve been head-down on a task for too long, lift your head up to make sure you’re going the right way. Don’t do well what you shouldn’t do at all.

You’ll be living a lesson that everyone should learn. Random stuff happens. All you can control is your response. Every day, you’ll practice how to react to chaos: with dignity, poise, and grace.

Everything good comes from some kind of pain. Muscle fatigue makes you healthy and strong. The pain of practice leads to mastery. Difficult conversations save your relationships.

But if you avoid pain, you avoid improvement. Avoid embarrassment, and you avoid success. Avoid...

The goal of life is not comfort. Pursuing comfort is both pathetic and bad for you. Comfort makes you weak and unprepared. If you overprotect yourself from pain, then every little challenge will feel unbearably difficult.

Therefore, the way to live is to steer towards the pain. Use it as your compass. Always take the harder option. Always push into discomfort. Ignore your instincts.

Choosing pain makes it bearable. It loses its power to hurt you. You become its master, not victim.

A daily ritual of hard exercise gives a great perspective on life’s other pains.

Socially, try to get rejected. Learn about “rejection therapy”. Make audacious requests that you think will be denied. This removes the pain of rejection. And you’ll be surprised how often they say yes.

Be absolutely honest with everyone. Stop lying, completely. You lie when you’re afraid. You lie to avoid consequences. Always say the truth. Take the painful consequences.

You weren’t meant to be idle. You weren’t built for sitting and staring at screens. You live to push, pull, climb, and grow.

The most exhilarating experiences in your life so far were daring. Your proudest moments were overcoming a struggle. The be...

Since you can’t avoid problems, just find good problems. Happiness isn’t everlasting tranquility. Happiness is solving good problems.

The easy road leads to a hard future. The hard road leads to an easy future. Steering towards the pain is how to live.

When people ask the meaning of life, they’re looking for a story. But there is no story. Life is a billion little moments. They’re not a part of anything.

People think they’ll do something later. They think they’ll have more time in the future than they do today, as if later is a magical time when everything will happen.

The pleasure of buying a new thing disappears in days, even hours. So much misery comes from indulgences in current junk.

Ignore all marketing and advertising. Nobody is pushing what really matters. Friendships, nature, family, learning, community. The best things in life aren’t things.

The world of news is noisy, because they have to hype it. They try to get you to pay attention to something that’s not actually important. They create a false sense of urgency, social status, fear, shock, or any tricks possible to manipulate your psychological triggers, and ultimately help them profit. By contrast, the truly important things are quiet. Life is incredibly peaceful when you shut out the noise.

When you need a coat, table, or house, find one old and used. They’re incredibly well-crafted — sturdier and more beautiful than anything new. They’ll outlive you.

Before trying to improve something old, find out why it is the way it is. Never assume people in the past were ignorant. They did it that way for good reasons. Study the past — understand Chesterton’s fence — before thinking you know better.