Keywords:: PermanentNote
Reference: R: Mastery by Robert Greene; Naval Ravikant
“Most people overestimate what they can do in one year and underestimate what they can do in ten years.” — Bill Gates quote
When you have two choices to make, always choose the one that is more painful in the short-term. Why? Because usually, short-term things make us sick and unhappy.
Short-term activities are the ones that seem great at the moment but usually have negative consequences in the future. They tend to be pleasurable things. Every time you perform them you get a satisfying spike of dopamine. However, once you're finished you feel an emptiness that can only be filled by performing that activity again. Furthermore, to get the same amount of pleasure you need to get more of them unless you want the levels of pleasure to fall. Why? Because you get desensitized. These are things such as watching porn, playing video games, eating junk food, binge-watching Netflix, social media, and so on.
Long-term activities are usually things that don't bring immediate gratification but provide benefits in the future. They are like seeds that can grow into something big, if you nurture them. Examples of long-term activities are reading books, playing sports, exercising, healthy eating, meditation, and so on.
Those activities tend to compound. That means that if you do them regularly for a long enough period, they can bring you massive amounts of success or misery.
One of the reasons for this is that each time we do something it gets a little bit easier the next time. This means that we get the same results from less work. It eventually gets to the point where the same amount of effort you put in the first time, results in incomparably more results. The same is true for negative things. It's easier to perform short-term activities with each iteration. This can lead you to very dark places if you don't catch yourself early enough.
Another thing that relates to that is that people are consistent. Smart people will eventually succeed if you give them a long-enough timeframe. So, you shouldn't worry if you succeeding now. You should worry if you're on the right trajectory toward success.
Einstein's words fit very well to this situation: “Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the world. He who understands it, earns it ... he who doesn't ... pays it.”
Relevant notes:
PN: The growth mindset: Growth mindset is a long-term perspective on live because you treat each situation as a thing you can learn from to improve. Even if it's painful in the moment, you know that it will bring fruits in the future.
PN: The secret to entrepreneurship is to start small The best trajectory to success is figuring what you're good at, and start helping other people with it. And giving it away.
PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term: if you want to be productive in the long term, you need to avoid burnout
PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term: successful people delay gratification
You'll come down from your path (PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term)
PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term: a similar mechanism that helps with making better decisions is to lengthen the time horizon when faced with two or more options, and picking the one that yields better results in the longterm (it's usually the one that is harder in the short term)
PN: Play the long-term game, PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term: making plans early in your life can immense consequences.
Throughout this process, you must acquire a future-oriented perspective. It's about choosing long-term activities over short-term ones. The most successful people are the ones who see the longest time horizon of their actions. More on that here: PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term
Another practice is to create a purpose or life task. Humans are driven by vision and goals. If we don't have a direction in life, we fall into misery because we don't see the consequences of our actions. There is no intrinsic meaning to life, therefore, you must create it. Goals give us meaning.
Long term vision [[2](PN: Play the long-term game),3]. If you know what you want to achieve or at least the direction you want to go, the world becomes your library. We all know the situation when we talk with someone about a particular car, let's say a red Audi. After the conversation, you suddenly start noticing those cars everywhere. It's similar to goals. Once you know it, you will almost magically start noticing things that can bring you closer to your objective. It's almost as puzzles.
"Be stubborn on the vision, but flexible on the details" – Jeff Bezos quote
PN: Pick the long-term over the short-term: when low in motivation, keep the long-term in mind