A Young Person’s ManuScript:

What you do, matters

“The definition of Hell: The last day you have on earth, the person you became will meet the person you could have become.”

Hello, I'm Manu.

I direct a top startup accelerator for a world-renowned research university as part of a statewide economic development initiative. In my role, I coach a diverse array of ambitious young people on career — especially those inspired to pursue entrepreneurship. A significant portion of my time is spent thinking through career, vision, impact, and life goals, often in very uncertain and risky future scenarios.

Our entrepreneurs have built full-time companies across the globe, received prestigious recognition internationally, and raised millions of dollars for their ventures. Most importantly, they’re focused on developing a solid sense of purpose and a mission to drive real change. A lot of the thoughts in this manuscript derive from things they’ve taught me.

As I divulge in the lessons learned from tough conversations we've had with young change-makers, there are several biases that need to be acknowledged:

I work in technology and entrepreneurship.

I’m a male.

I’m 27.

I’m an American.

I have my own unique career ambitions — the list goes on. Take from this what you want, and nothing that you don’t. This isn’t meant to be all-encompassing, but rather a first draft at tackling the most common questions that we receive in dialogue from the young people we mentor. We’ve made cases on developing a healthy growth-oriented mindset, focusing on impact-driven careers, and collectively working towards the betterment of humanity. This is simply what has worked for myself and my circle, and should only be looked at as the first step to one day creating your own guide!

This isn’t meant to be a book and shouldn’t be read like one. Skim through whatever you like, click and explore the links, and most importantly, do your own thinking. This is not advice. Nothing matters until you actually take purposeful action.

The format of this manuscript is intertwined with personal experiences and anecdotes, followed by a main topic broken into chapters, and populated extensively with resources to stuff on the web. Hopefully, it's helpful. Please let me know how you'd improve it.

Table of Contents

"You only live once, but if you do it right, once is enough"—Mae West, American singer & actress.

You already own the most valuable asset in the world.

Your time.

If you're young, you have an unparalleled opportunity right now. Before a cubicle sucks your soul, before debt engulfs you, before a paycheck traps you, you have time. With few obligations, little baggage, and the freedom to learn, explore, and try, you can build the drive, optimism, and passion to accomplish anything.

You can do anything…but not everything. You now have the time to figure out what you do like and more importantly, what you don’t like.

Figuring out what you want to do with your life takes a ton of time, and it will likely change and evolve. This is why setting the right mindset and thinking early will pay unparalleled dividends in the long run.

It’s not about living a long life as much as it is about living a meaningful life. Building your purpose will give you tremendous direction in everything you do. It’s not enough to be hardworking and gifted. You must set a vision to strive towards, otherwise, you’re a ship without a captain. Hopefully, when you look back, you're satisfied with your course.

In the following chapters, we'll try to make a case on why you should spend your one life being happy, while accomplishing great things.

How to do great things

Nothing worth having comes easy. There is sacrifice in every decision you make, including the decision to be great.

Humanity’s capacity has no bounds. You could be a group of semi-literate kids in rural India teaching yourself the computer, a single mom dreaming of law school, a deaf-blind refugee who graduated from Harvard Law and surfs, or a teen skier who left a sandwich at the North Pole for her misogynistic trolls. Every day humans are redefining what is possible, and your impact can be magnified across the globe in a way that was not possible before.

In addition, you have access to the greatest tool of our time: the internet. The internet is a universal bridge of knowledge and community— you can find support there, make a living there, and most importantly, learn almost anything there.

Now is the time to do things that scare you, get comfortable being uncomfortable, and entertain outside perspectives. You can’t grow without being challenged.

Now is the time to think exponentially, and not linearly. You have unbelievable potential.

It may seem like you have forever to do this, but you don’t. Every day that you live, you are one day closer to death. So if you're not living how you want to, wake up.

Before the real world kills your dreams, get started today.

“The best time to do something significant is between yesterday and tomorrow.” — Zig Ziglar, American author.

“Aut inveniam viam aut faciam.” (I will either find a way, or make one) — General Hannibal Barca of Carthage, when told he couldn’t cross the snowy Alps with his war elephants to invade Rome. He did.

Anecdote: No

My entire life I've been told no.

You're not an engineer; you can't start a company.

You don't know how to code; you can't build anything.

You're not good-looking; you won't find intimacy.

You have poor genetics; you can't bodybuild.

You're not experienced enough; you can't do this job.

No.

Prove people wrong.

The only 'no' I have is no regrets.

~ Time ~

The earliest fossil of an anatomically modern Homo sapiens dates back approximately 200,000 years. Despite that, it was only 5,000 years ago that writing was invented and recorded history started. Both seem like a long time ago until you realize that the Universe is 13.8 billion years old. Events that we perceive as ancient, such as the pyramids or the Buddha, are actually very recent in terms of actual history. We’re not at all as significant as we might think.

Acknowledging that we’re just a blip on the universal cosmos, it’s also important to note how much humans have accomplished. Today we live in the most democratic, peaceful, and technologically advanced societies in history, despite the staggering amount of negative media.

We’ve been here for a blink of an eye, yet our current actions threaten our existence. Whether you realize it or not, your actions matter.

As a young person, you have been gifted time. What will you do with it?

The Black Death pandemic affected Europe and Asia for centuries. In 1606, it arrived in London and forced the shutdowns of theatres. Faced with a ton of free time and limited work, playwright William Shakespeare composed King Lear, Antony & Cleopatra, and Macbeth.

In 1666, London was again ravaged by another epidemic of the bubonic plague. Issac Newton, a 23-year old student at Cambridge, retreated to his family estate 60 miles away from the university. Safe from disease, Newton was also now free to think, uninterrupted. This period became known as annus mirabilis — the “year of wonders.” It was here that an apple fell on his head and the world was gifted with the theory of gravity.

More recently, Nelson Mandela was imprisoned for over two decades in apartheid-era South Africa, with years spent as the lowest class of prisoner with very limited privileges. During this terribly difficult time, he read voraciously, wrote hundreds of letters, and formulated the plans and thoughts to end apartheid and become the first black President of South Africa.

The COVID-19 pandemic has lead to the largest economic downturn since the Great Depression.

But it's not the first downturn — and there is opportunity in chaos.

1890 was a tough time to launch a business. Not only was the world economy in recession as a result of the 1890 panic of Great Britain, but it also  faced a collapse of the U.S. economy and a run on the supply of gold. This was when Thomas Edison decided to launch his business. It survives today as General Electric.

During the Great Depression, Walt Disney decided to produce critically acclaimed films starring his company’s mascot, Mickey Mouse.

In 1973, the Western world was plagued by high inflation, high unemployment, and huge spikes in the prices of gas, officially ending post World War II economic expansion. Bill Gates had also started class at Harvard that fall. Two years later, during the recession, he would drop out to found Microsoft.

June 1, 1980, during another recession, Ted Turner, stepped in front of the camera to introduce the Cable News Network (CNN).

2001 changed the world forever with a dot com crash and the terrible events of 9/11. Yet a month later, Apple released the infamous iPod.

You have been gifted time. Once you spend it, you’ll never get it back. Things will change in the blink of an eye.

“The only constant in life is change” — Heraclitus, Greek philosopher.

~ Happiness ~

“The most important relationship in your life is the relationship you have with yourself. Because no matter what happens, you will always be with yourself.”― Diane Von Furstenberg, Belgian fashion designer.

You're already the best in the world at one thing. Being yourself. This is your biggest competitive advantage. Constantly think about the strategy of you.

You are the biggest project you'll ever work on. It pays to figure out happiness.

Figure out what you want to compound in life. Reading compounds. Exercise compounds. Drinking compounds. Lack of sleep compounds. Negative thoughts compound. Positive thoughts compound.

Mindset is everything.

Framing is a powerful method to be happy. Some things that have helped my mental attitude:

1. Gratitude.

   Being alive is a miracle.

2. Being present.

When I'm engaged in something, I try my best to stay in it. Could be conversation, thinking, reading, working. One thing at a time. Show up and don't make excuses.

3. Half-full as opposed to half-empty.

Always try to see opportunity. If things are not doing well, I take it as a learning moment and move on. No regrets, only gratitude for both good and bad experiences.

4. Acceptance.

A lot of times things are outside of your control. You hold the key to yourself—there's nothing you can do about the other things.

5. Growth.

If you're the same person you were last year, that's not progress. When looking at novel opportunities or activities, it's helpful to think about how they could compound your growth. Don't do things just to do them; ask why. Reason from first principles.

"There is no way to happiness—happiness is the way" — Thich Nhat Hanh, Buddhist monk.

~ Inner strengths ~

Kids today are overwhelmed with being “well-rounded”. Parents are busy shuttling their children from swimming lessons, to violin practice, to chess club, all the while striving for straight As. Exposure is great; generalization is overrated.

Society rewards savants. So spend time capitalizing on your strengths and developing them.

American psychologist Howard Gardner described 9 types of intelligence:

1. Naturalist: the ability to discriminate among living things and features of the natural world. This ability was clearly of value in our evolutionary past as hunters, gatherers, and farmers; it continues to be central in such roles as a botanist or chef.

2. Musical: the capacity to discern pitch, rhythm, timbre, and tone.

3. Logical-mathematical: the ability to calculate, quantify, consider propositions and hypotheses, recognize patterns and relationships, and carry out complete mathematical operations.

4. Existential: the sensitivity and capacity to tackle deep questions about human existence, such as the meaning of life.

5. Interpersonal: the ability to understand and interact effectively with others. It involves effective verbal and nonverbal communication, the ability to note distinctions among others, sensitivity to the moods and temperaments of others, and the ability to entertain multiple perspectives.

6. Bodily-kinesthetic: the capacity to manipulate objects and use a variety of physical skills. This intelligence also involves a sense of timing and the perfection of skills through mind–body awareness. Athletes, dancers, and surgeons exhibit this.

7. Linguistic: the ability to think in words and to use language to express and appreciate complex meanings, seen in readers, writers, and speakers.

8. Intra-personal: the capacity to understand oneself and one’s thoughts and feelings, and to use such knowledge in planning and directing one’s life. It is evident in psychologists, spiritual leaders, and philosophers.

9. Spatial: the ability to think in three dimensions. Core capacities include mental imagery, spatial reasoning, image manipulation, graphic and artistic skills, and an active imagination. Sailors, pilots, sculptors, painters, and architects all exhibit this.

Whether or not these hold, the fact remains that you might be good at a few things, bad at some things, and probably great at an even smaller amount of things. What can you, uniquely, be world-class at? That’s where your unique advantage lies in life.

A good way to start understanding yourself is to ask yourself and others good questions. Socrates had a great method for questions. Examples listed below:

1. Questions for clarification:

• Why do you say that?

• How does this relate to our discussion?

• What exactly does that mean?

• Can you give me an example?

2. Questions that probe assumptions:

• What could we assume instead?

• How can you verify or disapprove that assumption?

3. Questions that probe reasons and evidence:

• Why is that happening?

• What evidence is there to support what you are saying?

4. Questions about viewpoints and perspectives:

• What would be an alternative?

• What is another way to look at it?

• Would you explain why it is necessary or beneficial, and who benefits?

5. Questions that probe implications and consequences:

• What generalizations can you make?

• What are the consequences of that assumption?

• What are you implying?

6. Questions about the question:

• What was the point of this question?

• Why do you think I asked this question?

• What does that mean?

So, what are you a knowledge expert in?

~ Minimalism ~

A rich life with less.

We're exposed to thousands of ads daily. Luxury products are necessities. As we make just enough money, we get hooked on the hedonic treadmill. Lifestyle creep is freakishly simple. It's easy to want things.

Minimalism doesn't start or end with finances. Simplifying your communication, your living, and your structures will free you. If you value your time, you'll never be richer than you are now. Always chase freedom—the ability to decide what you want to do with your time.

My focus on life experiences rather than material goods has been the single biggest contributor to my financial stability and happiness.

What do you actually need? 80/20 your life (the Pareto principle is a simple rule that states that 80% of outcomes are caused by 20% of inputs. For example, 80% of your daily outfits are probably only from 20% of the total clothes you own).

Minimalism gives you leverage. When you don't think about compensation, titles, and career in a linear fashion, you are well-positioned to make exponential leaps. With health, happiness, and purpose, you can live an impactful and fulfilling life.

Minimalism will also allow you to focus on your own voice rather than others. You won't be greedy for validation anymore. You'll have a good answer to the following question:

"Would you rather be the world’s greatest lover, but have everyone think you’re the world’s worst lover? Or would you rather be the world’s worst lover but have everyone think you’re the world’s greatest lover?" — Warren Buffet

Can you do the things you want to do, today, without the money?

An American investment banker was at the pier of a small coastal Mexican village when a small boat with just one fisherman docked. Inside the small boat were several large fin tuna. The American complimented the Mexican on the quality of his fish and asked how long it took to catch them.

The Mexican replied, “Only a little while.”

The American then asked why he didn’t stay out longer and catch more fish.

The Mexican said he had enough to support his family’s immediate needs.

The American then asked, “But what do you do with the rest of your time?”

The Mexican fisherman said, “I sleep late, fish a little, play with my children, take siesta with my wife, Maria, stroll into the village each evening where I sip wine and play guitar with my amigos. I have a full and busy life.”

The American scoffed. “I am a Harvard MBA and could help you. You should spend more time fishing and with the proceeds, buy a bigger boat, and with the proceeds from the bigger boat, you could buy several boats. Eventually, you would have a fleet of fishing boats. Instead of selling your catch to a middleman, you would sell directly to the processor, eventually opening your own cannery. You would control the product, processing, and distribution. You would need to leave this small coastal fishing village and move to Mexico City, then LA and eventually NYC, where you will run your expanding enterprise.”

The Mexican fisherman asked, “But how long will this take?”

To which the American replied, “Fifteen to twenty years.”

“But what then?”

The American laughed and said that’s the best part. “When the time is right, you would announce an IPO and sell your company stock to the public and become very rich; you would make millions.”

“Millions?” asked the fisherman. “Then what?”

The American said, “Then you would retire. Move to a small coastal fishing village where you would sleep late, fish a little, play with your kids, take siesta with your wife, stroll to the village in the evening, sip wine, and play guitar with your amigos!”

~ People ~

sonder

noun. the realization that each random passerby is living a life as vivid and complex as your own—populated with their own ambitions, friends, routines, worries and inherited craziness—an epic story that continues invisibly around you like an anthill sprawling deep underground, with elaborate passageways to thousands of other lives that you’ll never know existed, in which you might appear only once, as an extra sipping coffee in the background, as a blur of traffic passing on the highway, as a lighted window at dusk.

I used to compare myself to people all the time. Envy is ever-present in today’s social media-driven world. And it did nothing for me because you always on see parts of a person; there’s so much more than meets the eye.

Moving forward I've actively tried to remember a few things when interacting with people:

1. Judgment.

   It is human nature to judge. I try my best to give everyone the benefit of the doubt. Whatever they are, whatever they do, I try my best to understand that I am in no place to judge. Welcome contrarian perspectives.

2. Apologize.

   More often than not in my life, I've been on the wrong side of things. My only regrets are that I didn't apologize. It takes nothing to apologize and means everything to forgive.

3. Saying thanks.

   You can never say thank you enough. This means acknowledging your employees, your bosses, your partners. Whenever you get a chance, praise people and give them the kudos they deserve.

4. Roses and thorns.

   When giving feedback to someone, I've found it helpful to sandwich the critique between two positive remarks. I always stress that we're playing on the same team.

5. Listen.

   I'm never the smartest person in the room. I'm of the belief that everyone has some value to bring to the table. Listening does not mean be silent. True listening includes the above components pulled together in a way in which the other party wants to share and open up freely.

   It all comes down to people.

"I know that I know nothing" - Socratic Paradox

~ Opportunity ~

“Every morning in Africa a gazelle wakes up. It knows it must move faster than the lion or it will not survive. Every morning a lion wakes up and it knows it must move faster than the slowest gazelle or it will starve. It doesn't matter if you are the lion or the gazelle, when the sun comes up, you better be moving.” — Roger Bannister, neurologist who ran the first sub-4-minute mile.

Today, things are being democratized at an unprecedented rate. Most people still haven't realized how much they can do on the internet.

Similarly, your impact has been magnified as well. You can get in touch with anyone in the world. Your thoughts can be read by anyone in the world. You have access to unlimited information.

Barriers are being broken down in every industry. It has never been easier to start something or have your voice heard.

Filmmakers are no longer restricted to Hollywood. They're on YouTube.

Models are no longer restricted to agencies. They're on Instagram.

Teachers are no longer restricted to school. They're on Coursera.

Labels and careers are being disrupted and leveled in such a way where more and more opportunities arise—and the scope of 'successful' careers has diversified. Passion projects are nowhere near as risky as they used to be. It's easier to have your hands in many different pies and create something truly unique.

In 14th century Italy, the Medici family used their immense wealth to patron poets, sculptors, scientists, and philosophers. Diverse ideas from different fields and cultures thrived in the ideal of humanism here, which sparked the Renaissance.

Similarly, the internet has exponentially expanded the diverse ideas you can incorporate into your own thinking. You can be a yogi and an accountant. An attorney who runs an Etsy store. A student who is a professional gamer. Create your own flavor.

There has never been a better time in history to do what you want. We're going to make the case on why you should strive to do great things.

“Those who do not move, do not notice their chains.” ― Rosa Luxemburg, Polish philosopher

“Never give up on what you really want to do. The person with big dreams is more powerful than one with all the facts.” — Albert Einstein.

Anecdote: Cold

After graduating, I decided to tour the world. During my mini-odyssey, I decided against the medical path and instead believed that I could impact more people through entrepreneurship. I used the last of my money to fly to the heart of entrepreneurship; Silicon Valley.

I arrived in San Francisco with $1000. Median rent was around $3000. I'm not good at math.

In my backpack were four pairs of pants, six button-up shirts, my laptop and phone, water bottle, and a bag of protein powder. To no surprise, I found several people sleeping in the airport already. I found a spot in terminal one where I had landed, next to an employee café, charged my phone, and curled up on top of my backpack to prevent anyone from stealing it. I didn’t remove my jacket or boots because I didn’t want anyone taking them. I slept poorly. The ground was hard and cold, and I switched positions constantly because my limbs ached.

I woke up when I heard airport security come around, and rushed to the bathroom to brush my teeth. This was my life for the next few months. I'd stand in line at soup kitchens, search for public bathrooms, and always try to find WiFi. I was officially homeless.

I spent weeks in the Bay as a vagabond, trying to meet people and learn about internet marketing, design, and product. One day my ‘coffee chats’ led me to the Stanford campus. Soon it was night and I needed to sleep. Just hours ago, I had snuck into a lecture at the Stanford MBA program. Now I was wrapped up on top of that same building, freezing my butt off. I only had a pathetic jacket to keep me warm. California was supposed to be warm.

Over the weeks, to my surprise, I made some buddies who were also homeless, with dreams of being entrepreneurs. Together we enjoyed living frugally, making decisions based on perceived risk-reward, and finding ways to optimize our experience.

Instead of paying for parking, one person slept in the car while another went into the library to study. We ran into Planet Fitness every day saying that we left our wallets in the locker, and used the opportunity to shower. We found a startup incubator that we climbed into every night after the employees left to sleep in. We'd run out in the morning before they arrived.

When I eventually told my friends back home this story, they thought I was crazy. Rightfully so.

But in my head, this is what I wanted to do. My plan was not to necessarily have the plan figured out, but to show up—because I believed that all of this would lead to something, someday.

~ A case for following your dreams ~

“Why care now? Because so much is at stake, too little is done, and if we wait until later, caring may no longer matter,” — Global Challenges Foundation, 2018 Report

How many of you actually remember your dreams and ambitions from childhood?

As kids, our educators and family members encourage our wildest dreams to be athletes, artists, astronauts, presidents, and singers. Follow your heart.

Perhaps this is because they don’t take our ideas seriously and attribute them to childhood naivety.

Because, as soon as we get into high school, the tone changes completely: get good grades, go to college, graduate with a degree, find a job, buy a house, get married, have kids, retire. The 'good life'. Be pragmatic, reasonable, and rational. Don't shoot for the moon because it’s too risky. Pursue ‘realistic’ careers, and compete for ‘normal’ jobs. Enter the rat race.

Why is it important for people to follow what they love?

So many people in unfulfilling paths have similar grievances: terrible bosses, horrible hours, lack of upward mobility, and regression in stimulation and learning. Is it really a shocker that people are unhappy at work and burning out? Pointless meetings, unrefreshing lunch breaks, and dozens of excuses to pull out YouTube and Instagram. These are serious detriments to not just the employees, but to the employers — happy and engaged employees are better employees. These inefficiencies cost the economy billions of dollars annually. No job will ever be close to 100% satisfaction — there’ll always be things you hate about work. But to have that be the most prevalent feeling about what you do for a third of your life? Yikes.

It actually might be riskier to not follow your passions.

Artificial intelligence and automation are projected to disrupt millions of jobs forever. Jobs will disappear and new jobs will be created. It is all the more imperative to seek a path that allows you to follow your wildest, most creative dreams in this age of computers. It is not optional, it's necessary for the future workforce to think outside of the box and use these technologies to enhance their capabilities, evolve, and adapt.

Will Robots Take My Job?

^ yes. You’re living in a world where nothing is guaranteed. New jobs that never existed before, new technologies, new ideas—the rate and scope of change is exponential today. There was a world pre-9/11, pre-COVID, pre-08 financial crisis. There was a world without Uber, iPhone, & Google. The future belongs to those who take control and realize nothing is for granted. Entire industries are being disrupted in under a year. It’s in the best interest of future generations to pursue their dreams — they risk being obsolete if they don’t start thinking deeper, imagining future scenarios, and creating their own careers.

Human health will be greatly enhanced, leading to longer and healthier lifespans, which will likely increase the amount of time we spend working and learning. It’ll become necessary to become lifelong partners to education, evolution, and creativity. We’ll work multiple careers. We’ll work anywhere. It’s work-life integration.

As the world becomes increasingly flat and connected, the internet becomes an unparalleled tool to empower people across the globe with ideas and information, further democratizing the opportunity to drive real change from diverse corners. It’s easier than ever to research different paths, connect with like-minded people, and make a living pursuing something you really enjoy.

You’re going to spend your best years working. Might as well do something you like. Many people end up in dead-end jobs hating every minute of it. And before you know it, it could all be over (life, that is). Thinking deeply about how you want to map out your work will significantly boost your happiness.

“You’ve got to find what you love. And that is as true for your work as it is for your lovers. Your work is going to fill a large part of your life, and the only way to be truly satisfied is to do what you believe is great work. And the only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle. As with all matters of the heart, you’ll know when you find it. And, like any great relationship, it just gets better and better as the years roll on. So keep looking until you find it. Don’t settle…Your time is limited, so don’t waste it living someone else’s life. Don’t be trapped by dogma — which is living with the results of other people’s thinking. Don’t let the noise of others’ opinions drown out your own inner voice. And most important, have the courage to follow your heart and intuition. They somehow already know what you truly want to become. Everything else is secondary.”  —  Steve Jobs

~ Extinction ~

“It is not the strongest of the species that survives, nor the most intelligent. It is the one that is most adaptable to change”  —  Charles Darwin

Among great apes, evolutionary processes favored the development of complex social behaviors. The human neocortex is much larger than the other primates and comprises many of the areas involved in cognition, such as conscious thought, language, behavioral and emotion regulation, and empathy. Our brains developed to support our survival in community, and we’re realizing again just how much we depend on each other for our well-being and health. Isolation was deadly in the past and continues to be deadly today. Staying together was and is critical to our survival as a species.

Many existential crises will challenge us— climate change will destroy our planet, artificial intelligence will become smarter than us, and nuclear security will continue to threaten our world. We must prepare for future black swans.

What are you going to do to ensure our survival?

Despite the astonishing amount of progress that humans have made in this short amount of time, our species faces the very real threat of extinction. Surely not like the dinosaurs did — which according to many was due to an asteroid collision, right?

Niklas Boström is a Swedish philosophy professor and director of the Future of Humanity Institute at the University of Oxford, renowned for his work on existential threats. He estimates that the chances of an asteroid with the size to wipe out life on earth hitting our planet at being 1 in 5000 in a century. That’s more likely than you dying in a plane crash.

Natural perils like this dwarf in comparison to threats that are manmade. With every technology we create, we have the potential to use it for good or misuse it, and as individuals, we have little care for what repercussions our daily actions might have for humanity. Boström’s work suggested that it’s likely that we’ll face a catastrophe that will kill over a billion people in our lifetime and that there’s close to a 1 in 5 chance of human extinction this century.

Despite that, more money is spent on luxury goods than on climate change, nuclear security, poverty, pandemics, and AI safety research combined. This showcases our limited foresight in facing problems until they’ve encroached on our doorstep.

An additional thought on the possible future of our civilization revolves around the Fermi Paradox: the contradiction between the lack of evidence for extraterrestrial civilizations despite the mathematically high chance for the probability of their existence.

The basics of the argument:

• There are billions of stars in the Milky Way similar to our Sun.

• With high probability, some of these stars have Earth-like planets and may have already developed intelligent life.

• Some of these civilizations may have developed interstellar travel.

• Even at the slow pace of currently envisioned interstellar travel, the Milky Way galaxy could be completely traversed in a few million years.

• And since many of the stars similar to the Sun are billions of years older, this should provide plenty of time for aliens to make contact with us.

According to this line of reasoning, the Earth should have already been visited by an extraterrestrial civilization. But why not?

Several answers have been proposed: aliens already live amongst us, we’re too far away from each other in the vast universe, and aliens have chosen to isolate themselves.

One theory is uniquely interesting, which states that it is the nature of intelligent life to destroy itself. The reason we haven’t met aliens is maybe that the curse of all advanced civilizations is that they self-destruct. Looking at the challenges we face this century, that suddenly doesn’t seem too far-fetched. Our progress as a species also threatens our survival, with challenges ranging from rapid climate change to nuclear weapons.

So while this is the most prosperous time in human history, it is probably also the most pivotal — a period in which not just your actions but our actions truly matter for the future of humankind.

And the future is long. The average mammalian species exists for about one million years. Homo sapiens have been around for about 300,000 years. That means that the majority of humanity hasn’t even been born yet.

~ We are all connected ~

“All of the rocky and metallic material we stand on, the iron in our blood, the calcium in our teeth, the carbon in our genes were produced billions of years ago in the interior of a red giant star. We are made of star-stuff.”  —  Carl Sagan, American astronomer.

Ātman is the first principle in Hinduism — the concept of a universal soul that is everywhere and inside everything, connecting all of existence in spiritual oneness. In some schools of Hindu philosophy, it is equated with Brahman, the highest cosmic principle in Hinduism. Brahman is a gender-neutral metaphysical concept that states that there is a single binding unity behind all that exists in the universe. Some believe that there exists only a single thing at all, the universe, which can only be artificially and arbitrarily divided into other things that we create names for.

The universe and the soul inside each being is Brahman, and the universe and the soul outside each being is also Brahman. The universe is Brahman. You are Brahman. We are Brahman. There is no difference between “you” and “I”. The Upanishads, texts that form the basics of Hinduism, use the example of rivers, some of which flow to the east and some to the west, but ultimately all merge into the ocean and become one.

Knowing oneself comes with the actualization that we are all connected, which is the deepest level of existence possible. Knowledge of Ātman means that one realizes the divine within oneself, the divine in others, and in all living beings.

This connection to everything forms the basics of the highest ethical virtue in Hinduism and Jainism; ahimsa (compassion and nonviolence). All living beings have the spark of the same divine spiritual energy; therefore, to hurt another being is to hurt oneself.

Everything is connected.

The realization of your soul (Ātman) with Brahman (the universal soul), and the soul of everyone, everything and all eternity, is considered the pinnacle of the human experience: Nirvana (liberation from the cycle of suffering through life, death, reincarnation, and rebirth). This oneness unifies all living beings.

Humans and the stuff that makes up the galaxy share 97% of the same kinds of atoms; the building blocks of life: carbon, hydrogen, nitrogen, oxygen, phosphorus, and sulfur. The similarities continue into living things: genetic similarities between us and bananas are close to 50%, and between us and fruit flies, 60%.

Humans are also genetically 99.9% similar to all other humans. 0.1% is all that differentiates us.

We’re way more connected than we may think.

Despite the philosophy and science behind our similarities, economically, it seems that most people are motivated by misguided self-interest.

The Tragedy of the Commons

The tragedy of the commons is a theory originating from British economist William Forster Lloyd. In this situation, if there is a shared resource that is unregulated and free, individual users, acting independently according to their own self-interest, will behave contrary to the common good of all users by depleting the resource through their collective action for their own gain. Lloyd wrote about the hypothetical effects of livestock grazing on common land, ending up with all the land being laid barren, but today it can refer to anything such as the oceans, atmosphere, or even an office refrigerator. There are no real incentives for behavior that’s good for the collective, nor punishments for behavior that harms the collective.

We also see this in the classic game theory example of the prisoner’s dilemma:

Two members of a criminal gang are arrested and imprisoned. Each prisoner is in solitary confinement with no means of communicating with the other. The prosecutors lack sufficient evidence to convict the pair on the principal charge, but they have enough to convict both on a lesser charge. Simultaneously, the prosecutors offer each prisoner a bargain. Each prisoner is given the opportunity either to betray the other by testifying that the other committed the crime, or to cooperate with the other by remaining silent.

These are the possible outcomes:

• If A and B each betray the other, each of them serves two years in prison

• If A betrays B but B remains silent, A will be set free and B will serve three years in prison (and vice versa)

• If A and B both remain silent, both of them will serve only one year in prison (on the lesser charge).

It is in both criminals’ collective best interest to say nothing, but theory suggests that since betraying a partner offers a greater reward than cooperating with them, all purely rational self-interested prisoners will betray each other, meaning the only possible outcome for two purely rational prisoners is for them to betray each other.

This kind of thinking will get us nowhere.

Anecdote: College

The rite of passage nowadays. Spend your time, away from the bustle of society, to indulge in developing a passion for learning, so that in four years you graduate a thoughtful and productive member of society.

It's what I worked so hard to get to. I was fortunate to go to a well-funded high school. However, the area I lived in was where all the trouble was. It was the only spot in town where the cops came, where police questioned me when I went to pick up my brothers from school, and where drugged-up randos banged on our condo's door in the middle of the night.

I threw myself into school; AP courses, chess club, gymnastics, track, drama, international club, the like. I was in school at 5:30am and would often only get home at 8:30pm. And I'd have to bike 4 miles back and forth with all my textbooks, sometimes in the freezing cold.

I was going to go to a good college and make something of myself.

And I squandered it all. In school, I was told that political science and foreign policy was not where I should go—there was no money in politics, I was told. So instead of continuing with ROTC and studying Arabic, I had to turn to a 'realistic' career. If you're Indian, you have 3 options: you're either a doctor, an engineer, or a failure.

So I threw myself into pre-med and health & wellness. Personal trainer, clinical research, bodybuilding, EMT, volunteer work with populations with disabilities.

While I'm grateful that I have a foundation in health, it wasn't what I wanted to work on necessarily. As such, I found easy distractions.

My school was rated a top party school—I'd like to think I was part of that ranking. I did anything and everything.

Drugs, sex, parties. Looking back, I'm not sure how I made it out. I was so immature at the time, I thought the only way to cover my fragile ego was to display excessive machismo. Starting fights, doing aggressive dares, and taking everything personally. I wanted to be 'cool', so badly.

Looking back, I'm glad that part of my life is over. Now when people want to party, I don't feel like I'm missing out on anything, because I went so hard in undergrad.

I definitely got lost, and I think a lot of people get lost in college. I was unbelievably selfish. It was all about me.

If I could do it all over again, I’d work on my dreams day one of college. And stop trying so hard to fit in. 4 years of unstructured life with no responsibilities. Wouldn’t waste time trying to find a job—would spend all of it trying to create the job.

Today, my fulfillment is in making it all about others.

~ Collective altruism ~

“Ask not what your country can do for you, but what you can do for your country.”  —  John F. Kennedy, presidential inauguration.

December 7, 1941: A Day That Will Live in Infamy.

The Imperial Empire of Japan had just destroyed the American Navy base in a surprise attack at Pearl Harbor, Honolulu. The next day, President Franklin D. Roosevelt formally entered America into the greatest war in history.

The United States had a herculean task — quickly raise, train and outfit a strong military force to join the Allies on two distant and very different fronts, Europe and the Pacific. Meeting these challenges would entail significant government spending, turning existing manufacturing into wartime production, building vast new factories, and dramatically reducing many facets of American life. Contributions from all Americans would be required to build up Roosevelt’s 'Arsenal of Democracy'.

The war production effort brought immense changes to America. The need for labor and deployment of men to war opened up novel opportunities for women, teenagers, the elderly, and minorities on the 'Home Front'.

Ration stamps were given to families that were used to buy their allowance of meat, sugar, fat, butter, vegetables and fruit, petrol, tires, clothes, and oil. The U.S. War Information Office issued posters that encouraged Americans to “go with less — so they’re going to have plenty” ('they' referred to the U.S. troops).

In the meantime, individuals and groups carried out drives for scrap metal and rubber which could be utilized to manufacture arms. Civilians were urged to grow their own vegetables and fruits to cope with rationing. By 1945, 20 million “victory gardens,” were planted and maintained by ordinary citizens, produced over 1 billion tons of food (about 40 percent of all vegetables consumed in the U.S.).

Americans volunteered to defend the nation by training in first aid, aircraft spotting, bomb removal, and fire fighting. By mid-1942 over 10 million Americans were civil defense volunteers.

Hollywood, radio, baseball, all contributed in their own ways to the war effort. The entire country had to work together to win.

We can learn a lot from this. Pandemics, global warming, preventing WWIII. Unsolvable problems. The slew of challenges that we face and will face require a collective mindset to tackle them. We may be surprised at how fragile we are alone, but together we can drive real change.

"Le mot impossible n'est pas français." (The world 'impossible' is not French.) — Napoleon Bonaparte

~ Self-actualization~

Anecdote: Sadness

20 stories down. Standing at the edge of the tallest apartment complex in my University, I felt dizzy looking down. It would be all over in a matter of seconds.

I felt like I had nothing when I graduated college. My friends had gone onto amazing careers, I had broken up with my girlfriend, and I had completely gone unhinged health-wise: experimenting with hard drugs, ceasing exercise, and entertaining deeply negative thoughts.

My heart was broken in twenty different pieces.

It's not any surprise why I had such depressive thoughts and thought about self-harm often. This pattern would repeat through intense experiences through my next few years.

Some days I was so depressed, I would sit in the basement and cry. Just stare into nothing and have tears drip down as I bombasted myself for being such a waste of talent, with no direction, and nothing to show for my efforts. Other days, I’d just sit and stare at my computer screen, shocked that after everything that I had done, all the books I read, all the people I learned from, all the time I had invested in impressive projects, I had absolutely nothing.

Such is the roller coaster of life. When it hits, it hits hard.

All that matters is that when you look into the abyss, you can look back, and climb out. You matter to this world.

For most of human history, resources were limited by geography. You had what you grew up with and the economic output of nations didn’t change much year to year. This is why wars and colonialism occurred — to gain something valuable you didn’t have access to. Once the Industrial Revolution kicked off, productivity and innovation in all sectors skyrocketed, including in human thought, actualized during the Enlightenment. People could finally have more things, at the same time as other people, and their time was freed up to focus on more than simple day-to-day survival. Economic progress gave many the opportunity to tackle novel and challenging problems.

Despite all of our progress, half the world lives with under $6 daily. The more we actually help the less fortunate to gain access to robust healthcare, better education, and basic human rights, the more these people have a chance of helping us all out. Think about what great innovators are actually out there, today.

How? It comes down to Abraham Maslow’s hierarchy of needs. An American psychologist studying the possibilities of human potential, Maslow theorized that all humans have basic needs for survival, and only once those are satisfied can they progress into higher levels of needs. If you’re on the run in a civil war-torn country, you’re likely not to care about finding the opportunity to research the cure for cancer, you’re just concerned about staying alive.

From the base of the pyramid upwards, the expanded set of needs are:

1. Biological and physiological needs — air, food, drink, shelter, warmth, sex, sleep.

2. Safety needs — protection from the elements, security, order, law, stability, freedom from fear.

3. Love and belongingness needs — friendship, intimacy, trust, and acceptance, receiving and giving affection and love. Affiliating, being part of a group (family, friends, work).

4. Esteem needs — which Maslow classified into two categories: (i) esteem for oneself (dignity, achievement, mastery, independence) and (ii) the desire for reputation or respect from others (status, prestige).

5. Cognitive needs — knowledge and understanding, curiosity, exploration, need for meaning and predictability.

6. Aesthetic needs — appreciation and search for beauty, balance, form.

7. Self-actualization needs — realizing personal potential, self-fulfillment, seeking personal growth and peak experiences. A desire “to become everything one is capable of becoming”(Maslow, 1987, p. 64).

8. Transcendence needs — A person is motivated by values that transcend beyond the personal self (e.g., mystical experiences and certain experiences with nature, aesthetic experiences, sexual experiences, service to others, the pursuit of science, religious faith).

The level of needs is flexible based on external circumstances or individual differences — humans can fluctuate throughout levels due to different life experiences. The need to grow does not stem from a lack of something, but rather from a desire to grow as a person. Once these growth needs have been reasonably satisfied, one may be able to reach the highest level called self-actualization, a state in which one actualizes their potential, experiences the connected world for all that it is, and continues becoming.

“The specific form that these needs will take will of course vary greatly from person to person. In one individual it may take the form of the desire to be an ideal mother, in another it may be expressed athletically, and in still another it may be expressed in painting pictures or in inventions” — Maslow on self-actualization.

Maslow hypothesized that only 2% of our population would fully reach this state. Out of the people he believed fit this mold, such as Henry David Thoreau (American transcendentalist philosopher) and Abraham Lincoln, he noted a few trends.

Characteristics of self-actualizers:

1. They perceive reality efficiently and can tolerate uncertainty.

2. Accept themselves and others for what they are.

3. Spontaneous in thought and action.

4. Problem-centered (not self-centered).

5. Unusual sense of humor.

6. Able to look at life objectively.

7. Highly creative.

8. Resistant to enculturation, but not purposely unconventional.

9. Concerned for the welfare of humanity.

10. Capable of deep appreciation of basic life-experience.

11. Establish deep satisfying interpersonal relationships with a few people.

12. Peak experiences.

13. Need for privacy.

14. Democratic attitudes.

15. Strong moral/ethical standards.

Behaviors leading to self-actualization:

1. Experiencing life like a child, with full absorption and concentration.

2. Trying new things instead of sticking to safe paths.

3. Listening to your own feelings in evaluating experiences instead of the voice of tradition, authority or the majority.

4. Avoiding playing games and being honest.

5. Being prepared to be unpopular if your views do not coincide with those of the majority.

6. Taking responsibility and working hard;

7. Trying to identify your defenses and having the courage to give them up.

If we help more people with their needs, so that they can self-actualize, they will have the capacity and freedom to help others and contribute to the global human effort.

“I am, somehow, less interested in the weight and convolutions of Einstein’s brain than in the near certainty that people of equal talent have lived and died in cotton fields and sweatshops.” — Stephen Jay Gould, American paleontologist and evolutionary biologist.

~Egoistic altruism~

Anecdote: Privilege

Startups are supposed to be glamorous.

When I was running my company through an accelerator in Las Vegas, it was anything but.

My salary was around $240 monthly, I slept on the same mattress as my cofounder in a studio apartment with no AC and bugs, and we'd have to push the shopping cart back a mile from the grocery store in the blistering Nevada heat because we couldn't afford a taxi.

We'd fall asleep on our laptops after working all day. Monday - Sunday. This was my life for several months.

We were quite dumb at the time because we thought this was fun. We saw it as a privilege, to wake up every day and choose what we want to work on. And every weekend, we'd reward ourselves with some fancy LaCroix, since we only could afford water during the week.

Privilege always bites me. We are so lucky. When I spent a year traveling around the world, I lost count of the kids I saw begging for food.

Kuwait. India. Germany. Singapore. Malaysia. South Korea. Canada. Mexico.

Elephant sanctuaries, Buddhist monasteries, tiger preserves, Arabian desert, mountain hot springs.

Poverty. Hunger. Disease.

Getting away from the 9-5 at America was one of the most mind-opening experiences I had. I didn't speak English, I lived life at a different pace, and fully appreciated the life I had come from.

We are all dealt different cards in life. I never forget how incredibly privileged I am. And that always spurs me to be grateful, and to give back whenever I can.

People who have their basic needs taken care of are one step further on the path to discovering their talents in science, entrepreneurship, and thought. This both increases the demand for ideas and the rate of idea generation. How much more useful could a human be to all of us if instead of languishing in a slum, they could actually learn skills on the internet and contribute to the global economy?

We can all agree that all of us have basic inalienable rights, but we need to ensure that humans are capable of actually reaching that level of well-being. The basic capabilities to establish according to Professors Martha Nussbaum and Amartya Sen include:

1. Life: Being able to live a normal lifespan; not dying prematurely.

2. Health: Being able to have good health, nourishment, and shelter.

3. Bodily integrity: Being able to move freely from place to place; to be secure against violent assault, having opportunities for sexual satisfaction and for choice in reproduction.

4. Senses, imagination, and thought: Being able to use the senses, to imagine, think, and reason—and to do these things in a "truly human" way, cultivated by education. Producing works and events like religious, literary, and musical with true freedom of expression. Being able to have pleasurable experiences and to avoid non-beneficial pain.

5. Emotions: Being able to have attachments to things and people outside ourselves; to love those who love and care for us, to grieve at their absence; to experience longing, gratitude, and justified anger. Not having one's emotional development stunted by fear and anxiety.

6. Practical Reason: Being able to form a conception of ethics and to engage in critical reflection about life planning.

7. Affiliation: Being able to socialize with others, to recognize and show concern for other humans, and empathize. Having the social bases of self-respect and non-humiliation; being able to be treated as a dignified being equal to that of others. Non-discrimination on the basis of race, sex, sexual orientation, ethnicity, caste, religion, national origin and species.

8. Species: Being able to live with concern for and in relation to animals, plants, and nature.

9. Play: Being able to laugh, play, and enjoy recreation.

10. Control over one's environment: Being able to participate effectively in political choices that govern one's life. Being able to hold property; having the right to seek employment on an equal basis with others; having the freedom from unwarranted search and seizure.

We take these things for granted. Look at your own day-to-day. You have the opportunity to pursue education, watch stimulating content on Netflix, and socialize with people who have diverse perspectives. Your worries are very different than most of the world.

The 8 richest people in the world own more wealth than the bottom 50% of the world combined.

There are billions of people struggling with basic human needs — small changes in their lives could result in immense impact. For example, diseases like malaria, diarrhea, and tuberculosis kill millions annually. They’re all but eradicated in the Western world.

The marginal cost of saving another life in the American healthcare system is enormous. This paper estimates that the marginal cost to save a life in the US in 2000 from health spending is from $0.8m — $13m depending on age. 2% inflation since the year 2000 should raise that by 40%, but the costs have likely risen by more than that — the rate of increase from 1980–2000 was about 5%, which would mean the cost is 130% higher as of 2017.

Contrast that with spending a few dollars on basic vaccination, contraception, and pills that could alter the lives of millions of people in developing nations. Not only are more people impacted, but the scope of the impact is tremendous, and the cost to help is low. The more disenfranchised you are, the more that little changes make a big difference in your world.

Making the world a better place is actually in your best interest because statistically, some of these freed brains will build things and solve problems that help all of us. This, in a nutshell, is egoistic altruism, the concept that the more people are well-off, the better off you are. Our lives today are made better by the inventions of others: the internet, antibiotics, light bulbs.

Inevitably some of these people will end up doing bad things. All humans have the potential for greatness, both evil and benign.

John Locke & Thomas Hobbes

The Enlightenment philosophers John Locke & Thomas Hobbes, are the classic two sides of the coin in regards to the actual state of human nature. Locke believed that the natural state of humankind is characterized by reason and tolerance — all people are equal and independent, and everyone had a natural right to defend his life, health, liberty, or possessions. Hobbes instead saw the natural state of mankind as a state of war against each other, as humans are selfish and brutish. According to him, all human beings want the same things. Given this state of desire is prescribed by greed, humans are in competition to satisfy their needs. Competition for profit, fear for security, and pride in regard to reputation all fuel this state of permanent conflict.

Locke’s thought influenced the U.S. Constitution — wherein citizens voluntarily give the government some of their power through a ‘social contract’ to protect their ‘natural rights’ of life, liberty, and property, from those that violate the law. The Constitution isn’t your right to do whatever you want; individual desires don’t supersede society’s needs as a whole.

Whichever philosopher is right — more empathy and kindness will support those who need understanding and guide them to a better path. If we can help more people self-actualize, the benefits to all of us will be unbelievable.

It takes a village to raise a kid. That kid could end up saving us all. Once our basic needs are taken care of, there is no greater satisfaction in life than giving back and helping others. Seriously. Giving back and being kind improves our health, makes us feel genuinely good, and spurs ripple effects of kindness in our communities.

Now, more than ever in history, you, the individual, can shape the course of the world by chasing big dreams that have big impacts.

“Just when the caterpillar thought 'I am incapable of moving', it became a butterfly.” — Chuang Tzu, Taoist philosopher.

"Well-behaved women seldom make history." — Dr. Laurel Thatcher Ulrich, Pulitzer-Prize winning historian.

Anecdote: Generations

Over 100 years ago, my grandfather settled 100 acres of land in rural India. It was essentially jungle—he carried a shotgun to ward against leopards preying on his sheep or elephants in the heat of musth, the mating season. He toiled the soil, built his own home, and raised his own crops.

His son, my father, was fortunate to receive a college education and move to America to try his hand at business.

And here I am writing their story.

It blows my mind that in just three generations there has been so much change. Smartphones would have been alien to my grandfather. And living off the land as he did is impossible to me.

It's such a crazy culmination of occurrences that led me to exist. That led me to here.

It's impossible to predict what the future looks like—but if we do care about our species, our legacy, and our children, it's important to take steps to protect that future.

There is much to fix with the world. But it is our world. And one day, it will be their world.

“I was sad because I had no shoes, until I met a man with no feet” — Asian proverb.

Framing your life and choosing your career are luxury privileges that most people will never get to experience. If you live in a developed nation, have an education, and aren’t starving for your next meal or looking for a spot to sleep, you’ve hit the human jackpot.

Some people might tell you that this is a lot of effort to change things and you could die tomorrow. They’re absolutely right — we’re here only for a short period of time.

Don’t wait. Make it count. Do something.

“Our only limitations are those we set up in our own minds.” — Napoleon Hill, American author

"I am the sum total of everything that went before me, of all I have been seen done, of everything done-to-me" — Salman Rushdie, Midnight's Children

This manuscript has drawn tremendously from thoughts shared by the following extremely intelligent people:

• How to have a meaningful career with a large social impact

• The Breakout List

• Farnam Street

• GatesNotes

• Huberman Lab

• Nobel

• What to Work On

• Almanack of Naval Ravikant

• Anthology of Balaji

• Essays of Paul Graham

• Pmarchive - Guide to Personal Productivity

• How to Pick a Career (That Actually Fits You) - Wait But Why

• Young Money

~Personal workflow~

Regardless of where you work, and how that organization measures progress and productivity, you should have your own rules. These are some things that've worked for me:

1. Workspace

Have a dedicated space for work with an ergonomic chair. Maintain an empty desk without clutter. Similarly, have places for designated activities: gym for working out, library for studying, etc. Train your brain to associate places with different behaviors.

2. Flow.

Figure out your optimal workflow. Understand how to flow between different states. Humans cannot multitask.

I theme my days as much as possible. Some days I stick to meetings and calls. Other days I dive deep into strategic thought. I'd rather be good at one thing one day, rather than okay at many things. When creativity strikes me, I don't ignore it; I give in to it and lose myself. There is no way to box this into a 9-5.

Do not disturb mode.

Fun fact: In the 1930s, John Keynes, an American economist, predicted that the rise of machines would reduce our work week to 15 hours.

3. Prioritize.

Most stuff doesn’t matter. Avoid calls and meetings in the morning, and instead set your priorities for what you need to get done to call the week a success. Create goals on Monday and see if you achieve them Friday. We get caught up in so many microdecisions through the week, progress is hard to measure.

In order, delete, delegate, defer, decide. Decision fatigue is real, so save your energy for the big choices. Focus on bottlenecks. A few things matter, greatly. Your success will be determined by figuring out what those are.

4. Timebox.

Do one thing at a time. Utilize Pomodoro. Timebox your work.

Set hard deadlines. Batch tasks that are similar together and get stuff done.

5. People can wait, focus on yourself first.

Learn to write good concise emails, have clear agendas for meetings, and take notes during with clear follow-ups. Your colleagues will find that invaluable.

6. Outsource what you can’t get to. This doesn’t mean get a secretary. Understand the difference.

7. Know how to Google things.

8. Minimum Viable Product.

Perfection is unattainable. Get something out as fast and as lean as possible, get feedback, and reiterate. A 6/10 done is better than a 10/10 dream.

9. Question.

Kaizen is a Japanese business practice that strives for continuous improvement of all functions in a company, with the goal of eliminating waste and redundancies.

Parkinson's law is the adage that "work expands to fill the time available for its completion".

Never be afraid to ask why you're doing things. Why is perhaps the most important question in work.

10. Learn.

The most important component in work is learning. If you're not learning, you're not growing, and you will become obsolete.

~Roadmap your life~

1. Vision

   I like to work backwards. Think about where you want to be in a year. In six months? Tomorrow? Who do you want to be and what do you want to do?

2. Write your eulogy.

   Nothing is a better motivator than knowing you’ll die one day.

3. Braindump

   List out everything that you want to do. Then eliminate it to 1-3 things. Focus on that.

4. Timeline

   Set a timeline to achieve these things. Now cut that in half.

5. Rinse and repeat

~Things to avoid~

“It is not that we have a short time to live, but that we waste a lot of it. Life is long enough, and a sufficiently generous amount has been given to us for the highest achievements if it were all well invested. But when it is wasted in heedless luxury and spent on no good activity, we are forced at last by death’s final constraint to realize that it has passed away before we knew it was passing. So it is: we are not given a short life but we make it short, and we are not ill-supplied but wasteful of it… Life is long if you know how to use it.”  —  Seneca the Younger, Roman philosopher

I am still learning about all the right things to do, but I've learned a bit about the things that I'm trying to limit.

Note: This is just what I'm doing — there are millions of people that do the following and are healthier, happier, and more successful than me. I haven't eliminated everything; rather, I'm trying to be more mindful about the following.

• Alcohol.

  It blows my mind how socially unacceptable it is to not drink. Responsible drinking may offer some benefits, but over the long-term, drinking can lead to pancreatitis, cancers, liver disease, a damaged nervous system, brain damage, psychiatric disorders, aging, sexual dysfunction, excessive fat gain, disrupted sleep, and fractured relationships.

• Bad sleep habits.

  Our society doesn't value sleep. It glamorizes the grind, the hustle, and lauds those that don't sleep.

  Yet lack of sleep directly contributes to memory issues, mood changes, likelihood of accidents, cognitive function, weakened immunity, fat gain, sexual dysfunction, and diabetes.

• Being afraid to stand up for your values and beliefs.

“The ultimate measure of a (wo)man is not where (s)he stands in moments of comfort and convenience, but where (s)he stands at times of challenge and controversy.”  —  Martin Luther King, Jr.

• Busyness.

  Do not confuse being busy as being productive. Activity does not necessarily = progress. Too many people say that they don’t have time to exercise, meditate, or think about goals. Please. You make time for what matters.

• Comparing yourself to others. Compete against yourself.

• Doing things to “fit in”. Be yourself, unapologetically.

• Not treating every day like it’s your last.

• Paralysis by analysis.

• Phones.

  Phones are physically changing our posture, impacting our brain chemistry, and transforming our social behavior. They're ruining the ability to focus, productivity, mental health, and sleep. Being connected 24/7 is stressful — we’re never off work, truly.

  I was in for a surprise when I checked my phone usage statistics. It was depressing to see how many times I unlocked my phone and how much screentime I accrued daily.

  So now when I'm engaged in deep work, I leave my phone in another room. I don't want to get sucked into a loop of fresh notifications. Speaking of notifications, most are turned off on my phone.

  Try a smartphone vacation. Try going one day over the weekend without checking your phone. Seriously, when have you ever gotten an earth-shattering notification?

  With the tap of a button we can have food delivered, be transported, find love, be entertained. But the same button can also isolate us, disengage us, and remove us from the world.

  I've finally understood the meaning of the word 'cell' phone  — we're prisoners inside them. Notifications can wait while we live.

  Hopefully somedays, you don't even know where your phone is — and you don't care.

• Porn

• Relationships for the wrong reasons.

  If you’re more in love with the idea of getting in a relationship, rather than a relationship, don’t get in a relationship.

• Saying yes to everything.

• Smoking.

• Soda.

• Sugar.

• Television watched mindlessly.

• Unmotivated friends who don’t push you or are jealous about your success. You’re the average of the 5 people you spend most of your time with. Surround yourself with people who bring you up, and learn how to navigate through different levels of communication. It’s one of the best ways to better yourself and learn. Don’t be afraid to have people around you that challenge and criticize you to make you better, and don’t be afraid to not hang out with people who aren’t aligned with you. Don’t let someone who gave up on their dreams make you abandon yours.

"The future depends on what you do today." — Mahatma Gandhi