Principles

Life moves based on the decisions you make. The quality of your decisions is based on the principles you hold. Your principles shape shape how you view the world, and thus your reality.

A good life is easy to obtain. You just need a good set of principles. Once you have your principles it's as simple as applying them to all your decisions.

Principles are malleable and can change. But should not change often. To be a principled person is to chart your path through the world with confidence, not certainty.

Principled people can come of as stubborn or rigid. This is beacase the observer doesn't have their own principles, or their principles don't align.

Your principles should be as unique as you want to be.

Principles for navigating reality

1.1 Learn to deal with change early

Change is the only constant in life. Most change is out of your control. What's in your control is your response to it. It's ok to not want things to change. But resisting it won't help you.

1.2 Reshape your world through invention

We have a moral obligation to invent new Technologies. Technology shapes our reality. Inventing new Technologies makes us different than every other life form. Always strive to invent more, not less.

1.3 Know that we know less than we think

All science changes over enough time. What we believe to be true now will likely be wrong in the future. We get things wrong because we ask the wrong questions. Be open to new ideas, and know that you don't know it all.

1.4 Copy the things you like

Memetic desire explains how humans behave. We're copy machines, everything we do is copied. Know what you are copying and why. Be cool with it. If you're not happy with who you are, you're copying the wrong people.

1.5 Model the world as 500 people, not 8 billion

99% of the time you need to rationalize something, it's a more accurate heuristic. Nothing applies to all 8 billion people.

1.6 There are thousands of ways to live

No one way is right. Learn and try many different ways before you pick. Pick the way that feels right to yourself.

1.7 Become a time billionaire

Retirement with money is a bad goal, a stupid optimization. 31 years equals a billion seconds. Optimize the healthiest 31 years of your life, not the worst.

1.8 Value experiences over things

You live your life with your brain. Fill it with magic memories. Revisit them. Tell tales, sing songs, make videos. Never forget them.

1.9 Practice essentialism and minimalism

It's not about having nothing. It's about removing the excess. Until we go without things, we fail to realize how unnecessary many of them are.

1.10 Say hell yes or say no

If it's a maybe, it's a no. Make decisions quick. Almost every decision can be reversed. Reversing a decision is a question of how much pain you can endure.

Principles for doing great work

2.1 Work like a lion, not a cow

9-5 work resembles a cow grazing nice and slow. Lions wait, they chill for long periods. When a Lion finds something to eat it sprints, kills, eats, and rests with verious intent.

2.2 Everything is a project, or a system.

There are no goals. Treat everything as a project. It starts and ends. It improves a larger system. Goals are just dreams, projects are how things happen. Projects that don't help a system, are hobbies.

2.3 Action first, study second, organize third

Long to-do lists are procrastination in disguise. Take action, gain forward motion, then reflect, then recalibrate. Nothing causes more anxiety than lack of action.

2.4 Find work that is positive sum

The more people who win, the better. Zero sum games are obvious, people loose. And they loose big.

2.5 Play to win

If you're going to do anything, play to win.

2.6 Dare mighty things

Far better to dare mighty things and win glorious triumphs, even checkered by failure, than to rank with those who neither enjoy nor suffer much because they live in a gray twilight that knows not victory or defeat - Theodore Roosevelt.

2.7 Perfect a small number of things

You can't have everything you want. Pick a few things and make them great.

2.8 Only do work that improves your life

There are many ways work can improve your life. If your work doesn't improve your life, stop. The work you do defines you.

2.9 Choose the simplest solution

When presented with competing solutions, the one built from the fewest elements is usually best. Sometimes a big problem has a small solution. People hate hearing that because their big problem feels like it deserves a big solution.

2.10 Engineer your own serendipity

Build systems (habits) that put you where luck is most likely to strike. You can't engineer luck. You can increase your surface area for luck to strike.

Principles for dealing with people

3.1 Accept correction without being offended

If you can't be corrected without taking offense, you'll never truly grow. Mistakes shape us. Not success.

3.2 Treat people as they treat you

Demand respect. Only give it when it's deserved.

3.3 How you walk through the fire matters

It's less about what you do and more about how you do it.

3.4 Celebrate other people's success

Do not punish people for winning. Be excited for them. Learn from them.

3.5 Have an ethos and wear it on your sleeve

Have a code. Live by that code. Walk straight through hell with a smile.

3.6 You become the 10 people you spend the most time with

Choose your friends, coworkers, and teachers wisely. This includes what you read, watch, and listen to. Time together is what shapes who you become.

3.7 When people show you who they are, believe them

Second chances can be earned, but not freely given. Most people are exactly who they show you they are.

3.8 Control where you put your attention

The paradox of life is that everything is a disaster and yet everything is fine. The difference is where you focus your time and energy. Whatever has your attention owns you.

3.9 Do epic shit

Life can be extremely boring. Fill your days with the epic things. People will be more attracted to you.

3.10 Find ambitious people

Most people are starved of ambition. Ambition is rare. Seek ambitious people to be around. Ambitious people are more positive and better friends. There is such thing as too much ambition.

Princples for a healthy body, mind, and soul

4.1 Hard choices, easy life

Easy choices, hard life. Most people will choose to live with long term chronic pain, than deal with short term accute pain. Cultivate a high pain tollerance.

4.2 Civilize the mind, make savage the body, beautify the soul

It will take a lifetime. Start young and the rewards compound.

4.3 Master your thoughts

The worst prison lives between your two ears. Master your thoughts, master your reality. Let them run free, and you'll be in prison forever.

4.4 Control your attention to control your destiny

Control your attention to shape your thoughts. Your thoughts shape your actions. Your actions shape your habits. Your habits shape your character. Your character shapes your destiny. - Lao Tzu.

4.5 Comfort is the most addicting drug

Life exists on the edges. The edge of being scared and the edge of comfort. Get comfortable being uncomfortable. Too much comfort sedates the mind.

4.6 Never compare yourself to others

Get inspiration from others, not jealousy or anger. Only compare against the person you were yesterday. Get 1% better every day.

4.7 Pain is inevitable, suffering is optional

Pain is what the universe does to you. Suffering is what you do to yourself. Don't seek pain, but don't fear it. Better a hard truth than a comfortable lie.

4.8 Cure envy with gratitude

Master envy and you master happiness. The world is driven by envy, not greed.

4.9 Never act on a partial feeling

Mindless actions are stupid ones. Mindless experiences are forgettable ones. Process your feelings before you act.

4.10 Eat for nutrition, not taste

Food is our fuel. Taste is a pleasure. Fuel your body like you want it to run. Bad fuel, bad performance. It's that simple.

* I originally wrote this in 2021. I periodically update my principles. I only update them if I don't believe them to be true, or the world changes and I need to adapt.