Quotes to Live By

Here is the list of quotes I try to read every morning when I wake up, and live throughout the day.

Life’s battles don’t always go to the stronger or faster man, but sooner or later the man who wins is the one who thinks he can. – Bruce Lee

Strength, intelligence, charisma; these are but a few of the traits that help a person go quite far in this world. But they all fade in the face of some challenge or another. Those with strength may lose their resolve in the face of a persistent adversary. Those with intelligence must occasionally bow to the rare devilishly tricky puzzle. Those with charisma may encounter deaf ears and cognitive dissonance. Is there one ring to rule them all? Clean, simple, sheer force of will. The one currency in this world that will retain value no matter how much inflation and debt crush international financial markets. Believe in yourself, try hard, and be ready to pick yourself back up. Because… why not!?

The basic difference between an ordinary man and a warrior is that an ordinary man takes everything as a blessing or as a curse, while a warrior takes everything as a challenge. – Don Juan

There are two types of events in this world. Those you can influence, and those you cannot. Psychologists like to call the first your “sphere of influence.” There’s not much pondering to be done here. Events are in your control. Start influencing. Carpe diem.

The wise man asks himself for the reason of his mistakes. The fool asks others. -Chinese proverb

You may associate with the smartest, strongest, richest people in the world. But ask yourself this- why are they your friends/colleagues/investors/employees? Because you are unique, you think different, and you bring something to the table something that other people don’t have. You are the only one who can truly and honestly evaluate your performance. Peer into your soul early and often. Work to get a better understanding of who you are, and why you do the things you do, and you will surely be well prepared for anything life can dump on your head. You have nothing to fear from peering into your soul if you like who you are. And if you don’t like who you are, even a tiny little piece, what to stop you from crafting a new “you”?

By trying often, the monkey learns to jump from the tree. – Cambodian proverb

We all know the sports fan who is capable of offering timeless wisdom of the ages… from the comfort of their recliner. Or the armchair entrepreneur. Or the consultant who “analyzes” an opportunity away. Get out there and do! How else can one expect to learn?

You may sense a theme here. Something along the lines of “attacking life” might be an accurate depiction. What lead to this thought pattern? Life’s short. There are so many amazing, interesting, fun things to do, that to NOT be excited every morning I jump out of bed would just be a tragic loss.

So instead, I read these quotes, throw on my armor, grab my sword, and venture out into the world to see what adventures await

The Nature of Time I

Have you ever taken a step back from your life, and really taken stock of how you spend your time every day? Without going too far out on a limb, I’d be willing to guess it looks a little something like this:

But wait a second. What about that coder down the street, who somehow manages to have his light on all night, every night?

I apologize. That coder isn’t hardcore enough

Or perhaps the contractor who embraces the flexibility of their schedule as much as possible?

Certainly there are many more schedules.

All of these folks spent the same amount of time on the same basic tasks (work, sleep, and other stuff), they just happened to distribute their time differently. Can you imagine spending a day in each of these distributions? Which one seems most natural to you? Which make you cringe in your chair? Personally, the idea of having my workday broken up into 30 minute chunks sends shivers up my spine. I like to reach a state of flow with my work, but that’s a conversation for another day. Take a moment to reflect on how you would ideally distribute your activites throughout the day…

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Of course there’s no right answer. Different people gravitate towards different natural states. And of course, the above is a mere sampling of different possible ways to hack up your day. Consider folks not constrained by having to spend 1/3 of their time working, sleeping, and recreating:

The student who lives and dies by the motto “if you wait until the last minute, it only takes one minute.”

Don’t forget the rare soul who has successfully embraced a polyphasic sleep schedule.

Maybe the hardcore coder above STILL wasn’t hardcore enough for you.

You get the idea

In a moment, we’re going to layer a great deal of complexity on top of this relatively simplistic model. But let’s take a second to pause and reflect. Most people fall into the first bucket, with a standard 9-5 job, a standard sleep schedule from 12-8, and a quiver of evening activities to fill in the hole. How do people choose when to do different activities?

Draconian enforcement of working hours aside, I suspect a lot of the reason has to do with people aligning their schedules to others. After all, humans are social creatures. So for most people, matching one’s time distribution to other folks (work or play) is darn important. Perhaps more important than one’s natural sleep cycle. Perhaps synching one’s schedule with the rest of humanity leads to incredibly inefficient uses of time. Anyone who’s ever sat in rush hour (you know who you are) knows what I’m talking about. Not to mention baseball game traffic… eeesh.

Ultimately, the question I’d like to explore: How can I spend my time efficiently, doing the things I want to do?

Where we’re headed: Spending time to increase efficiency of doing other things… Considering the week as one long block of time… The utility of spending time on different activities… The utility of spending time on different activities, at different times… Introvert/extrovert tendencies, and impact on perception of time… Perception of time based on the flexibility of your schedule…

Macintosh Productivity

I love watching other people use computers. I’m forever amazed by command line ninjas who zip around with an army of scripts and hotkeys at their command, transforming their machine into a finely tuned productivity tool. Other times I watch people spend 15 clicks on a task that would otherwise take 2.

Some of the tools and tricks I use to make computing as painless as possible:

Quicksilver

This simple, unassuming application is the main reason I won’t consider running anything other than the Mac OS. What does it do? Anything (ANYTHING) I want to do is now a few keystrokes away. The power of the command line with the It was astonishing how quickly Quicksilver became an integral part of… well, everything.

Level 1- Learn the Basics.
Application launcher- Launch any app, any time, anywhere, using a handful (less than 4) of keystrokes.
Level 2- Triggers. Bind common tasks to hotkey combinations or function keys, greatly speeding otherwise repetitive tasks.
Level 3- Beyond… The world can be your oyster.

Mail Act-On

Inbox Zero is a powerful way of life. Mail-Act On makes it manageable. Control-a sends an email to the “action required” folder. Control-s sends an email to “storage”. The delete key deletes. 0 emails in my inbox. Simple. Peaceful.

DevonThink

Anything I find remotely interesting or useful gets dumped into here. And never forgotten. An advanced AI / recommendation engine ensures that research is only a few keystrokes away.

Adium

GoogleTalk, MSN Messenger, Yahoo Messenger, AIM. One application. No fuss. ‘Nuf said.

Itunes

A playlist of radio stations keeps the new tunes rolling in.

Bonus

http://opensourcemac.org/- A great resource, for all your software needs.

On deck- Tools I use in real life to stay sane, and web pages I find useful.