Stop giving answers to your mind; start asking questions. It will force your mind to find a way. (Location 109)
There is no perfect time. The best time is now. If you want to travel the world, now is the best time. If you want to start a business, now is the best time. If you want to go to the gym, now is the best time. (Location 112)
“If you spend your time chasing butterflies, they’ll fly away. But if you spend time making a beautiful garden, the butterflies will come. Don’t chase, attract.” (Location 127)
There’s always something that you can do. Even if you can’t change the situation, you can always do the best possible thing. Blaming others does nothing. It doesn’t solve your problem. (Location 138)
If you want to find a solution, you will find it; it’s not that a solution doesn’t exist. It exists, and you know it deep inside of your heart. (Location 142)
Nobody cares. It would be best for you if you do things for yourself. You must act. You must find time. (Location 148)
Every action that you take or not take impacts your life. (Location 155)
There’s nothing wrong with making a mistake, but if you keep repeating the same error, there is something wrong. (Location 160)
If a mistake happens, learn from it and move on. Don’t waste your time. If you’re not moving forward, you’re making a second mistake. (Location 163)
You need to act. You can start today, or you can wait ‘till tomorrow. The choice is yours. (Location 170)
“The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second-best time is now.” — Chinese Proverb (Location 172)
“Success does not consist in never making mistakes but in never making the same one a second time.” — George Bernard Shaw (Location 182)
This simple tip will make you more productive: Don’t worry about it if it’s not your business. If something doesn’t affect you, don’t worry about it. (Location 185)
“Keep your attention focused entirely on what is truly your concern and be clear that what belongs to others is their business and none of yours.” — Epictetus (Location 190)
Life is not a sprint but a marathon. It’s long and hard. There is no reward for the quitters who quit halfway. You must reach the finish line to achieve something. (Location 232)
“A comfort zone is a beautiful place, but nothing ever grows there.” — Unknown (Location 240)
Growth demands that you step out of your comfort zone and do the hard things. (Location 245)
Keep it simple! Whenever you’re trying to do something new, always try to keep it as simple as possible. Don’t try to do too much at one time. Don’t overthink about all the things that can go wrong. (Location 255)
You need to have urgency. The urge to do things fast. Not urgency in getting the desired results but the urgency in doing the work. (Location 257)
Your first plan never works; you need to make adjustments. You may even need to change your plan altogether. Do it and do it as fast as possible. Speed is crucial. (Location 260)
“Most decisions should probably be made with somewhere around 70 percent of the information you wish you had…if you wait for 90 percent, in most cases, you’re probably being slow.” — Jeff Bezos (Location 263)
“If everyone is thinking alike, then somebody isn’t thinking.” — George S. Patton (Location 267)
You can’t do what everybody else is doing and expect different results. You can’t do what you have been doing in the past and predict a different outcome this time. Most of the time, the outcome is the same. (Location 271)
A goal that can’t be measured and has no time duration is not a goal. You’re just expecting a miracle to happen. (Location 280)
you don’t write down your goals on paper, you should start doing it now; you will not regret it. If you have clearly written goals and read them regularly, they will motivate you. (Location 283)
You don’t need any app to focus on your goals. I prefer writing things. You only need two things: pen and paper. That’s it. Don’t overcomplicate simple stuff. Anything more than that is just a waste of energy. (Location 288)
You can do two things. You can think long-term and do things that will be valuable for you in the long term, or you can satisfy your short-term pleasures and ignore the future. (Location 296)
You need to delay instant gratification, do hard things, take some stress, and make sacrifices so that you can achieve your future goals. (Location 301)
Don’t be afraid of taking risks. If you want to achieve anything in your life, you must jump from a comfortable position to an uncomfortable position. (Location 305)
“The biggest risk is not taking any risk… In a world that is changing really quickly, the only strategy that is guaranteed to fail is not taking risks.” — Mark Zuckerberg (Location 308)
“We must all suffer from one of two pains: the pain of discipline or the pain of regret.” – Jim Rohn (Location 335)
All things that are going to improve your life are hard. Always ask yourself this question: Will I regret not doing this in the future? If the answer is yes, it must be done no matter how hard it is. (Location 341)
“There’s no shortage of remarkable ideas; what’s missing is the will to execute them.” — Seth Godin (Location 346)
Discipline means doing anything that needs to be done. (Location 349)
Never avoid doing the things you want to do just because they’re hard. (Location 350)
Procrastination means avoiding doing a task that needs to be done by giving excuses to do it later. (Location 354)
You must look in both directions: present and future. You must enjoy the present but not at the cost of your future. By being lazy, you don’t enjoy both your present and future. (Location 362)
DO IT NOW “Only put off until tomorrow what you are willing to die having left undone” — Pablo Picasso (Location 364)
A lot of people are just way too focused on learning than doing. Learning is great but it will not be enough. You must put in the work to get things done. Stop looking for hacks before you even begin. First, start and then learn about various methods to do things faster. (Location 374)
You should ask yourself whether you’re working on the right thing. There is no point in doing things that shouldn’t be done at all. (Location 411)
You’ll spend a lot of time doing some kind of work. If you don’t choose what you want, somebody will choose it for you, and you may not like it. (Location 421)
Learn to prioritize You can’t do everything. We have limited energy and must spend it in the best way possible. You don’t want to spread it too much to risk exhaustion and no results. You’re more likely to give up if you see no results and are exhausted too much. You need to focus your energy on selected tasks. The lesser, the better. (Location 441)
Attract, don’t chase Don’t chase anything. Don’t run after anything. Work to make yourself better so that everything is attracted to you. Focus on yourself. Everything else will take care of itself. (Location 444)
The biggest reason people remain lazy is that they keep thinking that they aren’t good enough. You are great. Start doing. In the end, everything will be okay. (Location 451)
“Perfectionism is a disease. Procrastination is a disease. ACTION is the cure.” — Richie Norton (Location 457)
If you’re painting or creating something, then yes, it should be as perfect as possible. But if you’re doing something like cutting grass, which is going to regrow in a few weeks, (Location 467)
You should be able to turn on and off the switch of perfectionism. Sometimes it’s needed, and sometimes it’s not. Don’t make a default setting of always being a perfectionist. Change it according to circumstances. Don’t hide your laziness with perfection. (Location 469)
Here is an excellent quote by Shane Parish: “If a decision is reversible, make it as soon as possible. If it is irreversible, make it as late as possible”. (Location 472)
Think big! Even if you fail, that will still be better than the regret of never trying to push your boundaries. (Location 508)
“The man who chases two rabbits catches neither.” — Confucius (Location 524)
Multitasking means doing more than one thing at a time. It sounds good, but it doesn’t work. We can’t focus on multiple important things at the same time. (Location 529)
As the saying goes, “The devil is in the details.” You need to have complete focus on whatever you’re doing at the moment. Switching tasks will reduce your focus, and you’re more likely to make tiny mistakes that can have a huge impact. (Location 532)
3 Tips That Will Make You More Productive: 1) Avoid switching tasks. Work on one task with complete focus and then move to another task. 2) Remove all distractions you can from the work you’re doing. Be completely focused on the task at hand. 3) Turn off all the non-important notifications on your phone. (Location 538)
Take a Nap When you work for an extended period with focus, your mind energy will get reduced. The best thing you can do is to take a nap. It may not be possible for everybody, but if you can do it, then it’s worth it; you will be more energized to work with more focus. (Location 550)
No Interruptions We work best when we aren’t constantly disturbed by others. It takes some time for our mind to get into a flow state to achieve maximum output, and if you’re constantly distracted by things, you will not be able to focus properly, and your productivity will suffer. (Location 555)
Most Important Thing If you must do multiple things first, you must know which one is important. You must remove all the non-important tasks that will not help you achieve your goals. (Location 559)
Developing a daily routine is super important. You must have some routine that you would follow. Without a proper routine, you won’t be consistent with your work. (Location 570)
A daily routine would help you stay consistent. It will make you more focused and will help you finish important tasks. Without routine, we prefer doing the easy task, not the important one. (Location 573)
To change who you are, you must change what you do daily. (Location 576)
A routine helps your mind to stop thinking all the time about what to do next. You can adjust your routine to make it as perfect as possible. I suggest you do it right now: look back at yesterday and see what can be improved. (Location 577)
Think for a moment and ask yourself: “what is the best time for me to wake up, which will make me more productive and help me achieve my goals?” (Location 588)
“All of humanity’s problems stem from our inability to sit quietly in a room alone” — Blaise Pascal (Location 594)
Distractions are like the Trojan Horse. They destroy your focus and productivity. Be completely aware of hidden distractions. Distractions are costly. Even if something distracted you for 2 minutes, 10 minutes are wasted because refocusing takes time. (Location 605)
“Half of the troubles of this life can be traced to saying yes too quickly and not saying no soon enough.” — Josh Billings (Location 618)
If we keep listening to others, then we will have no time to listen to ourselves. (Location 630)
We need to learn how to say no to opportunities that we have no interest in, and if we try to do everything, we will get nothing done. As the saying goes, to be everywhere is to be nowhere. (Location 632)
If you’re saying yes to everything, then there is a chance that you’re not focused on your goals, or you have no goals, which is even worse. (Location 634)
Here is an excellent quote by Seneca: “If you don’t know what port you sail to, no wind is favorable.” (Location 637)
“20 years from now, the only people who will remember you worked late are your kids.” — Sahil Bloom (Location 643)
The goal of becoming more productive is not to work more, but the opposite. The goal is to get your work done in less time so (Location 646)
We should measure productivity by how much work we get done, not by how much time we spend. (Location 650)
Doing less essential things instead of the most important thing is also procrastination. (Location 653)
the essential things are hard to do, so instead of doing the hard work, they start doing easy things that make them appear busy. (Location 656)
Life is very short. Don’t waste all your life working and then when you’re old wishing you did things differently. Think about all the things you will regret when you’re old. Enjoy your life. You may never get a chance to do the things you can do now. (Location 658)
Some tasks have more value in your life than others. You don’t want to get distracted by less important tasks. You want to dedicate as much time as possible to the things that matter. (Location 668)
“If the ladder is not leaning against the right wall, every step we take just gets us to the wrong place faster.” — Stephen Covey (Location 672)
Work on your own dreams, not the dreams of others. (Location 676)
There is no reward for being busy all the time. Don’t be busy just for the sake of being busy. Be productive instead. Work on things that move you towards your goals, not away. (Location 678)
“Wisdom is knowing what to do next; Skill is knowing how to do it, and Virtue is doing it.” — David Starr Jordan (Location 683)
There is no overnight success. It takes a long time for success to happen, but this also doesn’t mean sitting there and doing nothing. The crop didn’t grow independently; the farmer had to plant it, take care of it, and be patient. (Location 699)
Impatient With Action and Patient with Results (Location 702)
“A man who is a master of patience is master of everything else.” — George Savile (Location 714)
There is nothing as perfect timing to start anything new. You can start today and make some progress, or you can keep waiting for the ideal time. The perfect time is now. There is no better time than today to start moving toward your goals. (Location 717)
Consistency Is Key To be great at anything, you must do it daily and for a long time. (Location 720)
To become a better writer, you need to write every day. To become a better speaker, you need to speak every day. (Location 723)
Do What You Say If you love to procrastinate, you will not honor your words. If you say that you’re going to do something and then you don’t do it, then soon people will stop trusting you. (Location 734)
Do what you say. Stop saying things and then just be lazy. Honor your word and do the things you say. (Location 738)
Surround Yourself with the Right People “You are the average of the five persons you spend the most time with.” — Jim Rohn (Location 741)
If your friends read books, you’ll also start reading books. (Location 746)
You adopt the habits of the person who is very close to you. Their good or bad habits become yours. (Location 748)
if you surround yourself with positive people, you will become a positive person. You must think about who you’re surrounding yourself with. (Location 757)
Change Your Circle to Change Your Thinking If you want to change your thoughts, you must change everything you do. You must change the people you hang around with. (Location 760)
“Close the window that hurt you, no matter how beautiful the view is,” (Location 765)
Don’t Take Advice from Everyone Don’t take advice on matters from someone you dislike exchanging places with. (Location 767)
“If they don’t have what you want, don’t listen to what they say.” — Alex Hormozi (Location 777)
Stop taking advice from people you don’t want to become. (Location 779)
Stop listening to other people’s opinions about how you should live your life and what you should do. Their advice is completely useless. It’s your life; live the way you want to. (Location 779)
“I am an old man and have known many troubles, most of which never happened.” — Mark Twain (Location 785)
When you don’t believe in yourself? The worry starts to appear. All types of negative thoughts start to enter your mind. You start worrying about things with a very low chance of happening. (Location 789)
Worrying can only be destroyed by one thing, and that is through action. (Location 791)
Worrying is natural. We all worry about jobs, business, health, money, family, etc. You must classify your worries into two parts: 1) The things that you can control, and you can do something about. 2) The things you can’t control, and you can’t do anything about. (Location 795)
Make a new rule to never worry about anything that you can’t control, and if you can control it, then act immediately and do something about it. In both cases, there should be no worry. (Location 805)
Do the Hard Thing First “The cold water doesn’t get warmer if you jump late.” — Unknown (Location 809)
Here’s a simple tip to become more productive and feel better: the hardest work you have for the entire day should be done first. No matter how hard it is, it needs to be done first. (Location 812)
There is no other way. You have the option to choose one of the following: Easy Choices = Hard Life Hard Choices = Easy Life (Location 826)
This is the harsh truth of life. You have to make hard choices in the short term to live an easy life in the long term. (Location 830)
Being lazy is easy in the short run, but it will make your life harder in the long run. Doing is hard; not doing is even harder. Going to the gym is hard, but not being healthy is even harder. (Location 830)
There is no reward in life for doing the easy thing. In life, you will be rewarded for the hard things you can do. Everybody can do the easy thing. It’s the hard things that count. To get better results, start doing hard things. (Location 837)
Picture Your Future Self Whenever you’re feeling lazy and don’t want to do the work, start thinking about your future self. How will you feel about not doing it in the future? How will you handle the regret? Now imagine how your life will look in the future if you do the hard work instead of procrastinating. (Location 850)
Your future is always created by you in the present. The actions you take will reflect how your future will look. (Location 857)
“People do not decide their futures; they decide their habits, and their habits decide their futures.” ― F. M. Alexander (Location 859)
Delegate If you want to do a few small things right, do them yourself. Learn to delegate if you want to do great things and make a big impact. — John C. Maxwell (Location 862)
Other people can help us do the things we don’t have time to do. (Location 869)
If you have any task that needs to be done and you have no time to do it, it’s a low-value task, which means that even if you don’t do it by yourself and instead hire someone else, it will not make a difference. (Location 870)
Make a list of all the non-important tasks you need to do every day, how much time it takes to do them, and how much money it will take for someone else to do them. You will see that you’re doing things that can be easily outsourced and very cheaply that take a lot of time daily. Try this for a few things, and then see how it goes. (Location 874)
Even if somebody else does around 90% of a good job, it’s worth it. Also, there is a high chance that somebody else will do a better job than us. (Location 877)
“I constantly see people rise in life who are not the smartest, sometimes not even the most diligent, but they are learning machines.” — Charlie Munger (Location 883)
Learn What Is Useful Don’t learn anything just for the sake of learning it. Learn things that can improve your life. (Location 887)
Think about what you’re learning, whether that is useful or not. If not, don’t spend time learning it. (Location 889)
No Laziness While Learning You can’t be lazy if you’re trying to learn something. (Location 891)
“If you can speed read it, it isn’t worth reading.” — Naval Ravikant (Location 898)
Focus more on the quality of the books you read. Also, stop reading the same type of books. Read a variety of books. Don’t stick to the same type of books. Read fiction. Read non-fiction. Read self-help. Read history. Read philosophy. Read biographies. Read Autobiographies. Read everything. (Location 903)
“The tragedy in life doesn’t lie in not reaching your goal. The tragedy lies in having no goal to reach.” — Benjamin E. Mays (Location 916)
Anything that can be done in under five minutes should be done now. (Location 941)
Set deadlines; the task will never be finished without deadlines. (Location 946)
Don’t become a perfectionist when it’s not required. (Location 951)
The Parkinson’s Law This was introduced by Cyril Northcote Parkinson. The law means that the work expands to fill the time allotted for completion. So, if you allow yourself 2 hours to finish a task, it will take 2 hours, but if you only have 1 hour, you will find a way to complete the task in an hour. This is great if you cannot start a project or it takes too long to complete. (Location 972)
The Four Rules of IKIGAI: 1) Do what you love 2) Do what you’re good at 3) Do what the world needs 4) Do what you can be paid for (Location 981)
Kaizen It means focusing on small improvements every day and not waiting for big improvements but trying to become 1% better every day. Instead of setting a big goal, we should divide it into multiple small goals and tackle each of them one by one. (Location 989)
Shoshin It’s a concept from Zen Buddhism that means approaching things with a beginner’s mindset. (Location 992)
“If your mind is empty … It is open to everything. In the beginner’s mind, there are many possibilities, but in the expert’s mind, there are few.” — Shunryu Suzuki (author of Zen Mind, Beginner’s Mind) (Location 995)
Hara Hachi Bu This means to stop eating after you’re 80% full. If you eat too much, you’re more likely to feel lazy. (Location 999)
Shinrin-yoku Shinrin in Japanese means “forest,” and yoku means “bath.” It means that one should spend more time with nature. Spending time with nature is the best way to deal with stress. Whenever you’re feeling stressed or overwhelmed, go for a walk. (Location 1003)
Wabi-sabi This means that instead of perfection, one should find beauty in imperfection. (Location 1007)
Gaman It means to show patience and perseverance when things get too hard. When you go on a journey it’s not going to be all pleasant. There will be a lot of times when things will go wrong. (Location 1014)
Every day is important. You need to both move forward and look back. You must reflect on your actions to check whether you’re doing the right things. (Location 1020)
You can never improve something that you can’t track. (Location 1022)
here’s what you must do every night before you go to sleep: 1) Take a pen and paper and write whatever you have accomplished throughout the day. Write down all the good and bad things you did throughout the day. Do it hour by hour, and you will see how much time you wasted on things that didn’t improve your life even a tiny bit. 2) Write down the things that you’re going to do tomorrow. Make a short to-do list. Don’t make it too long. Planning your day is super important. It keeps you focused on the important tasks so you don’t get distracted by less important tasks. This simple exercise every day will make you aware of how you’re spending your time every day: where you’re wasting your time, and how you can remove those distractions from your life that don’t add any value. 3) Narrow[JP1] down your list. You will feel exhausted if you try to do too many things in a day. There is nothing wrong with being exhausted but the problem is that when you try to do too many things generally, you start doing the things that aren’t that valuable. You start doing tasks that will not move you toward your goals. (Location 1024)
You can only do three high-value tasks. What are those three things going to be? (Location 1037)
Move your body every day, no matter whether it’s physical work or some sort of exercise. Go for a run early in the morning or when you feel overwhelmed during work go for a walk. (Location 1042)
If you have no purpose, then you will never have the energy to do anything. (Location 1049)
Make sure that you’re drinking plenty of water throughout the day. (Location 1052)
Take Risks If you’re not taking risks, then you will not have the motivation to do things. Our mind needs constant challenges to keep it alert, and if you’re doing the same task over and over, then your motivation will decrease. (Location 1056)
Anything that you need to do should be done as fast as possible. (Location 1070)
A new rule you should always follow is that whatever can be done under 5 minutes should be done now. You cannot delay the task for tomorrow. It must be done now. (Location 1086)
As Benjamin Franklin said: “Beware of little expenses - a small leak will sink a great ship.” (Location 1088)
Do this one thing right now: list all the small things you need to do. (Location 1093)
The two-day rule is simple: you would not miss anything for two days straight. You can miss it for one day if you must but never for two days. (Location 1098)
Wake up and start doing things differently. You will get the same results if you keep doing your current work. You must change what you do to change the results you want. (Location 1115)
Your future can only be changed by the things you do in the present. Each day is important. Each hour is important. Each moment is important. (Location 1118)
One day, just like this book, your life will end. Do the things you want to do. Travel the places you want to. Read the books you want to. Surround yourself with the people you want to. Time is running out. Start living. (Location 1143)
Additional highlights (merged from duplicate imports)
The goal of becoming more productive is not to work more, but the opposit
