What I Did Wrong and What I Did Right
I’ve messed up a lot in life. In my twenties I worked twelve hours a day six days a week in the gym. Weekends were wasted drinking like a frat boy and chasing girls in loud bars till all hours of the night. I was the poster child for extreme…
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How to Deal With Disappointment
One of the most common things I see in people who write to me is something we all share: disappointment in ourselves. We all feel this, because we constantly fail to live up to our standards: We aren’t as disciplined as we’d like. We don’t stick to habits we’re trying…
READ MORE5 ways to become a morning person (or at least fake it)
There are plenty of compelling reasons for being an early riser. A number of studies have proven that morning people are happier and more productive than their moonlighting counterparts. Still, Night Owl Network reports that of the 85% of people who follow an early-bird schedule on a daily basis, only…
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The Most Important Hour of Your Life
An executive called me up a few months ago in existential pain. He had spent the last several years pursuing a career path he now admitted was not right for him. He had overstayed his time building a software company when he really wanted to be teaching and writing. An…
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Mozart and Beethoven’s Secret Weapon
Poor Mozart. His frantic life, heavy with social and work burdens (teaching lessons and giving concerts), left him only a few hours each day for composition. Fortunately he had a secret weapon on his side, something available to all of us. Most of us fail to use it, let alone acknowledge it even…
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#1 Secret of Churchill & Productivity
If you read a lot or are someone who gets a lot done, people will assume two things. One, that you’re a speed reader. Two, that you never sleep. In my experience, neither of those assumptions are true. Or at least, they don’t need to be. There’s no trick to reading a…
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How to Get Your Life Back
In yesterday’s essay I shared with you some of the strategies I used to complete a 4 year college degree in just 3 semesters. Today I’m going to show you my strategies to recover wasted time and get your life back. Let’s begin… Triage ruthlessly Get rid of everything that wastes your time. Use the…
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How One Entrepreneur Finished a 4 Year College Degree In 3 Semesters
When going to college many years ago, I decided to challenge myself and see if I could graduate in only three semesters, taking the same classes that people would normally take over a four-year period. This article explains in detail all the time management techniques I used to successfully pull…
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What You’re Saying When You’re Late for an Appointment
I was eight minutes late for my lunch with SL. He stood up to greet me, smiling, and gave me a present—a book he had just published. A few minutes into our conversation—we share many common interests as well as overlapping business methodologies—he asked me, “So… what do you think…
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How to Save Two Hours a Day
Ernest Hemingway was known to awaken between 5:30 and 6 o’clock in the morning, without fail, no matter how much he drank the night before. Perhaps old Hem was immune to hangovers. He also knew he had to do the first things first. In a 1958 interview with the The Paris Review, Hemingway said,…
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A Quick-Start Guide to Avoiding Information Overload
Admit it: you’ve been there. You’re researching and learning and finding information, but you feel as if you’re digging yourself into a hole. There are conflicting opinions and conclusionless debates, and you don’t know what advice to take or what to believe. The worst part is that you genuinely want…
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Success Secrets of America’s Creepiest Man
My relationship with the creepiest man in America began in 1988. At the time he wasn’t going by his real name. On that day, he went by Richard. It was a cloudy Saturday afternoon in April. My uncle was having a garage sale across from the old church where I…
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