Sean's Notes

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Source: Video: Jordan Peterson's Powerful Life Advice Will Change Your Future* Part 1:

Don't suffer any more stupidly than you have to*. FP

Before you ask yourself "what could I do to improve myself" you first need to consider why you should even bother. Two main reasons: First: while suffering may be unavoidable, suffering more than what's necessary is avoidable... so improving your life helps you avoid "avoidable suffering". Second: Your improvement also affects those around you, improving yourself reduces their suffering as well.

You do actually care about your life, even if your apathy won't let you admit it.* FP

Pain, by definition, comes with the desire to be removed; otherwise, it wouldn't be called pain. So, the pains in your life (suffering), whatever they are, come with a (by definition) desire to be reduced]. No one would say "my situation wouldn't be any different if I didn't have this painful situation*." So, you do care no matter how apathetic you may claim to be.

Here is my thoughts on this thing.

The mind is set (mindset) through conscious action. "Getting your act together" isn't about thinking correctly as much as it's about acting correctly.* FP

Where to start? This question alone overwhelms many who are looking to improve their lives, even if they deeply understand "why" they need to improve. It's overwhelming because there are so many problems in the world*#, both internally and externally.

The key is to start where you can start... Literally:

.
Ask: "if I wanted to spend 10 minutes making this room better, what would I have to do?
. You have to give your mind a genuine aim by specifically asking the question. You've given your mind an instruction and it can listen and act, observe! You will notice things will start to "announce" themselves as needing to be repaired. This act can be done with something as simple as a room, or as complex as a relationship... but practice with something easy to define*.

Don't try and fix things you are unqualified to fix*. FP

Once you harness your ability to identify problems you must learn to identify what you can fix & what you can't. As you improve yourself as a person you will observe real problems that you would like to fix. It will be tempting to stretch yourself beyond your limits.

It takes humility, to admit you're unqualified to fix a thing, or that you need help to fix it. If you can't acknowledge you're the wrong person to fix the situation you
(1.) it is unlikely that you'll help that person. (You're unqualified.)
, and
(2.) it's very likely that you'll get hurt yourself.
or someone else. Be humble enough to get someone qualified to help you or the situation. And be strong enough to get yourself out of a situation where your "help" isn't being put to use.

Life-changing shifts start in the mundane, you can't hope to fix big problems if you can't manage small ones.* FP

Many attempt to improve their lives through ill-considered dramatic changes or unreachable goals, setting themself up (often intentionally) for failure. They think that's how improvement happens, not with simple things

. Exactly wrong:

"The things you do every day, those are the most important things you do."

. The things you do daily* take up a large portion of your life*, and improving them gives you momentum to expand & work on larger problems in your life*. Compounding math shows us how. The slow but steady improvement is straightforward, 1% improvement a day, a week, a month, when done consistently, leads to dramatic (compounding) change over time.

The act of purposefully instructing your mind to genuinely pursue a goal (take aim) does a strange thing... it literally changes your perception of the world... it reconfigures itself around that aim*. Positive or negative, it follows your aim... So,

. Consider where you are in life, problems you can observe, how much of your situation is due to the wrong aim, or the lack of an aim? Likely a decent amount if you're being honest with yourself. True, life is hard, situations outside of our control do have a dramatic influence on your direction. But it's worth considering, out of the things you can control, are you aiming at the things you genuinely want?