Effectiveness

Everyone only does something when it furthers their own interests.  How can you cooperate with them, and live well with them?

We all fail.  It's what happens next that matters.  Do you accept your part in the failure, assess what needs to change, and set about growing your skills so that you can succeed?

Or do you blame others and let the failure, all failure, become a wall of fear and denial against which you will never again test yourself?

Can you replace unreliable drama-filled people with reliable things?  Can you simplify your life into toys, things, and games?

We're social animals - is satisfying, or partially satisfying, your social needs with computers and objects at least some solution?

The results in your life are proportional to the effort that you put in.  Once you accept this, you can rethink the dream of sitting on a couch and having food brought to you, and accept with pleasure that effort improves your life, and the life of those you care about

We cherish the idea that we're completely free.  And we are... but some choices are self-destructive, and others limit or prohibit futures that we may prefer.

Instead of grappling constantly with a wealth of choices in this world of abundance, consider the future you intend to live and take choices off the table that limit or preclude that future.  Don't even consider them.

Complaining isn't free.  It's not like watching a sunset - pointless, but fun.  Complaining prevents you from squaring off with the problems that you face.

You may not be in a position to solve your problems, accept them, or change the situation, but complaining prevents you from defining them and being clear in your mind about them.

Long-term changes to your life can't be made by willpower.  Make incremental change into habits, and then do it again and again.

Before you can do this you must comprehend that large shifts in your choices will take time, and will be made in steps.

Should you specialize or stay general?  How deeply should you focus in your interests and your career.

Like Sheepism, both specializing and staying general are good solutions to the abundance we experience in modern life.  But both solutions exclude the deep focus, or the broad variety, of the other.  Difficult as it is, to experience more you have to challenge yourself, and be both.

Know what big things you are accomplishing.  Understand how you make the world, and the lives of those you love, better.  This is your purpose.

Once you know this, your day-to-day tasks gain meaning, because doing them gives you progress toward your purpose.  Meaning isn't external - it's inside you, in doing tasks that connect to your purpose.

You spend time and resources trying to make others believe that you are better than you are.

This episode discusses what you gain from doing so, what you give up, and how you can allocate your attention and resources for a better long term.