16 Powerful Concepts On Work, Time, Money, Happiness, And, Life
I think everyone should know these…
This single article has a lot of lessons/concepts that I’ve learned via reading non-fiction books, listening to podcasts, watching interviews, and some from my own experiences.
I hope these are gonna give you some profound wisdom and make you a better person.
1. Input-Based vs Output-Based Jobs
When applying for a job or even for a freelance project, what we generally apply for is based on what we want to work on. The roles can be a graphic designer(like me), developer, product manager, etc.
But what we quite often miss is the “how” part. How should we work? Always value jobs that are based on the outputs that you are gonna provide to the company or the client.
Let’s say you are a designer and you need to create a design that your company has asked you to do by EOD. Now, it can take 1 hour, 2 hours, or 5 hours, but that depends on the individual.
Here your job is to give them the output. Nobody cares (and Nobody shouldn’t) how long it took for you to complete. That’s a good sign as long as you are working on projects that you love and deadlines that you are ok with.
Now let’s consider this. What if the employer asks you to work on the design for 4 hours? That means you have to stay at the office for that 4 hours. And it doesn’t make any sense. You can get it done in 3 hours. Why should you stay for 4 hours?
Which is the reason why charging by the hour doesn’t make any sense. You are getting punished (with less pay) for doing the work fast (in 3 hours rather than 4 hours).
Find a job where the employer doesn’t care about what you do all the time, as long as you are giving outputs as per the deadline. If you are already in that job, you are lucky. Find a gig (if you are a freelancer) that doesn’t pay you per hour.
2. Leverage — Retire With Wealth
Code and Media are the new forms of leverage.
Naval Ravikant
A developer wrote a code for an app and she took 10 hours a day for 30 days. And now a woodcutter cut piles of wood for the same amount of time every day for 30 days. The former published an app after 30 days and is getting paid more and more every month as time passes by because the app is getting more and more downloads. And the latter is only putting the same amount of time only to earn the same amount of money.
Now, why is that? Both have 24 hours a day. But the key thing is the developer has leverage (code leverage — the app works even while she sleeps) whereas the woodcutter doesn’t have something that works for him. He is the one who has to work or he has to employ a bunch of people that work for him (labor leverage) and make profits from them. But, the other people can work only 10 hours a day where the code works 24/7 every day.
The same applies to media. Writing an article takes a day maybe. But that same article, if it has some timeless content, will still make money for the writer even after 10 years.
Leverage is so powerful. What is something that you, me, Bill Gates, and, Elon Musk have in common? Time. We all have 24 hours in a day. But what we do with that time is what defines how much wealth we are creating.
Wealth is money coming from assets that you own even while you sleep.
Naval Ravikant
Bill Gates has software working for him while he sleeps. Elon Musk has geniuses that are writing code and building products that work even while he sleeps. So, what do you have that is working for you even while you sleep?
The tri factor of life: Time, Money and Happiness.
Spend time to earn money and be happy only to spend money to save time to be happy.
— sujith.eth (@sujith_god) October 19, 2021
Wealth gives us freedom. It enables us to retire.
The ability to do what you want, when you want, with who you want, for as long as you want, is priceless. It is the highest dividend money pays.
Morgan Housel, (Book: The Psychology Of Money)
3. Eliminate Boring Transactions — Wealth Creation
This concept is taken from one of Kunal Shah’s interviews.
Time and Money are the two currencies that we spend (or waste).
We make transactions in both time and money. We spend 300 Rs. on petrol and we spend 2 hours watching a movie on Netflix. But spending money (Netflix subscription) and time (Watching movies & TV shows) for Netflix is exciting whereas spending time and money to fuel the car isn’t.
So, that’s a boring transaction we make in both time and money. But at the same time, we get excited to plan a trip (spend money) & go on a trip (spend money and time). So, that’s an interesting transaction.
Now, what if you could create a business that can reduce/remove the boring transactions in people’s lives? Or at least make it easier or interesting?
So, what if you developed a car that doesn’t need you to fuel your car? Now, this is an extreme example, but the point I am trying to make here is this is really a clever mental model that answers at least to some extent to questions like “What business should I build”, “How to find better startup ideas”, etc.
Here is an example I can think of:
Nobody gets excited about a movie ticket. We get excited about watching a movie. Hence, we have Bookmyshow, so that we don’t have to stand in a line at the theatre. And then we have Netflix which makes watching movies possible any time, anywhere instead of going to a theatre.
Here is another profound insight Kunal Shah mentioned in his podcast with Raj Shamani:
“Can there be 4000 winners for throwing Javelin in the Olympics? Definitely Not.
Can there be 5000 millionaires in the month of July 2021? Probably, Yes. That’s where the difference comes. Some businesses by design do not have the space for more people to exist.”
There are unlimited ways to create wealth.
4. Parkinson’s Law + Pareto’s Law = Being Productive
Parkinson’s Law states that work expands so as to fill the time available for its completion. How long it takes me to complete a task will mostly depend on when should you finish it and how much time you have until then.
So if you have 5 hrs, you’ll complete the work in 5 hrs. If you have 2, you’ll complete in 2.
To avoid dragging over & working those many hours to fill the time, I don’t start the work until I feel it’s getting late.
So, it’s the fear of missing out on the deadline that gets me triggered. And I have noticed that in those situations my abilities (mental and physical) get better and even get the work done fast.
The lesson here is to have tight deadlines. But in the end, it’s about getting better at judging how much it will take for you to get a task done.
When you have a deadline it’s like a storm ahead of you or having a truck around the corner. It’s menacing and it’s approaching, so you focus heavily on the task.
Eldar Shafir
So, Parkinson’s law talks about how we should do the work. But, what about the “What should we work on?” part? That’s when Pareto’s Law comes.
It states that 80% of outcomes (output) come from 20% of the causes (inputs).
Now the goal here is to find out that 20% inputs and do it more and more. If I know that weight lifting is gonna build muscle and not cardio, why would I even consider cardio? So, knowing what’s important and impactful is pretty important.
The Book “One Thing” takes us to the extreme version of this law. If interested, read here.
5. Flow State — Being Present And Happy
A flow state is a mental state in which you are totally absorbed by and deeply focused on the work. Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi, a Hungarian-American psychologist is the one who recognized and came up with the psychological concept of flow.
The best moments in our lives are not the passive, receptive, relaxing times… the best moments usually occur if a person’s body or mind is stretched to its limits in a voluntary effort to accomplish something difficult and worthwhile.
Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi
To get into the flow state, you need to work on something that is exciting and challenging. You get excited about a project if you are naturally curious about it or already good at it. And you take it as a challenge if it is difficult but still achievable. If it is too easy or too hard, you won’t even get started on it.
So, somewhere between these lines, there is a flow state waiting for you. Just find it.
Oh! I forgot to say. Multi-tasking is a myth. Don’t even think of achieving a flow state when you are watching youtube videos on your PC browser, and responding to emails on your phone, and doing the work on the laptop at the same time.
Focus is what most of us lack and one of the reasons why we don’t get to the flow state. Read a short story on “focus” here:
All 3 broke off their conversation, turned and simultaneously said FOCUS.
— sujith.eth (@sujith_god) August 3, 2021
6. Can Money Buy Happiness & Solve All Our Problems?
We sometimes assume that we have everything except money or we can get everything we want if we have money. That’s not true.
Can money buy happiness? Yes. Give me a million dollars and I’d be the happiest man on earth. But that only solves my money problems, probably. Can I fix my relationship issues with that money? Can that million dollars guarantee that I am gonna live longer?
Money can’t solve all of your problems but it can solve all of your money problems.
– Naval Ravikant
And here is another quote from the book Happy Money, written by Ken Honda:
A salary of $1 million a month in no way guarantees financial freedom. Our toys just get more and more expensive.
– Ken Honda
So, yes money can make us happy and solve many of our problems. But not all. And if not used with the right mindset we might even end up buying more problems.
Just imagine a rich person affording a fancy gym membership vs going for liposuction (buying health problems with money). And just imagine a rich person spending money on buying a Lamborghini vs investing in a cocaine business to make more money.
Just because you have all the money with you doesn’t mean you can or you will enjoy it. You might end up in never-ending status games (also called “Keeping up with the Joneses”) or even jail. But since it’s a choice, you can be happy too.
7. Happiness Is A Choice + Abundance Mindset
Happiness is a choice, not a result. Nothing will make you happy until you choose to be happy. No person will make you happy unless you decide to be happy. Your happiness will not come to you. It can only come from you.
If you decide to be happy right now, you can be happy. Even without a million dollars. If you are not then there is no guarantee that you’ll be happy once you get the money. The reason why we have a lot of worries is that we think with the scarcity mindset.
“A close relative of mine got admission from a top university, and so I can’t get it. A friend of mine made money in the stock market and so I probably can’t make it.”
What we need to understand is that if somebody is making money, that doesn’t mean they took a part of our pie. The pie never gets divided by all the people on the earth. It just gets bigger. So he/she made her pie bigger. We fail to see that.
Think abundant. The world is full of opportunities. There is a lot of money in the world. Once you understand this, you’ll a bit peaceful. And start with gratitude for what you already have. You’ll be more than happy.
Acknowledging the good that you already have in your life is the foundation for all abundance.
Eckhart Tolle
8. Living A Regret Free Life
The book, “The Top 5 Regrets Of The Dying”, written by Bronnie Ware, mentions that these are the most common regrets that the old and dying will have when they were in their last days:
- I wish I’d had the courage to live a life true to myself, not the life others expected of me.
- I wish I hadn’t worked so hard.
- I wish I’d had the courage to express my feelings.
- I wish I had stayed in touch with my friends.
- I wish that I had let myself be happier.
I was pretty surprised that not one regret has to do with money, status, and, fame which are the most common things that we look for in life. So, what’s the formula for a regret-free life? Just “Be in the present”.
We spend so much time making plans for the future, often depending on things coming at a later date to assure our happiness or assuming we have all of the time in the world, when all ever have is our life today.
– Bronnie Ware
9. Enjoying Being Alone + Embracing Boredom
People often mistake “Being Alone” with “Loneliness”. No, they are quite opposite. Being alone is basically “The Art Of Doing Nothing”. It’s not the same as “Being Lazy” or “Procrastinating”.
Naval talked about why “Being Alone is a Superpower” in Joe Rogan’s podcast and he mentioned a quote from Blaise Pascal which inspired me a lot:
All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.
Blaise Pascal
After hearing this quote, I thought: I was never alone. Yes, I don’t stay with people most of the time in a day, but I still have my mobile where I check my Twitter feed. I still have a laptop with me where I watch movies. I still have books around me that I read.
Basically, I was always doing something to avoid boredom. The reason why we don’t embrace boredom is when we literally do nothing, our mind is bombarded with a lot of problems that need to be solved. “Should I change my job?”, “Am I dating the right person?”, “Are my parents really toxic?”, etc.
Instead of solving these problems, we aim for distraction: social media, games, movies, porn, alcohol, etc.
Yes, it’s better to scroll on Instagram and watch some cool videos than to think about the job that we hate about everything, except the money part. But better only for the short term.
As we continue to do this, more and more problems get stacked up in our minds.
Now you know why human beings are getting more and more depressed.
Once you allow boredom that’s when you really question yourself and have the time to think: “Am I really doing what I want to do?”, “Am I copying somebody else desires?”, “Should I learn that skill?”, etc.
Once all the problems that stacked up in our minds are solved (at least mentally), then we become free. Like, really free, like a child.
Do you know? Many people prefer to undergo electric shocks than sit alone.
10. Motivation & Competition
When we were young and just getting started to walk, families, relatives, and everyone encourages us to walk. If we fell, they come to console us and then encourage us again to walk.
So we learned to walk because some people cheered for us. And we take that as motivation and that’s how we learned to walk and that’s how we are so good at it. Moreover, there is no comparison there. No parent compares her child’s walking speed with someone’s child.
But when we go to school comparison and competition starts. And the same happens with the job.
And now you tell someone that you are gonna start a business or change your career you are most likely to hear “Nope! You are not gonna make it”.
People around you, sometimes even your loved ones will no longer motivate you. Sometimes they do that because they want the best for you. Whatever the reason might be, there comes a time when you are the one who can motivate you.
Follow people that are doing something that you are already doing and take advice. You don’t have to talk to them. Read, listen and watch all of their content. You’ll get an idea of how they think. And move along, without expecting anything in return.
Nobody asked me to read books. But I read because I want to. Nobody asked me to write this article. But I wrote and now you are reading it.
So, just do it. Do it because you really want to do not because someone else is doing it or someone told you so. And aim to beat your own high scores. After all, Life is a single-player game.
If you recognize competition as a destrictive force instead of a sign of value, you’re already more sane than most.
Peter Theil, Zero To One Book
11. Compound Effect & Domino Effect
Money can be earned linearly. But not wealth. Wealth is created by those who understand the power of compounding. This is why “the rich always get richer”. Because they have more money to compound.
Compound interest is the eighth wonder of the word. He who understands it… earns it. He who doesn’t…pays it.
Albert Einstein
Compound interest goes well with the concept of leverage and time. Knowledge compounds over time. Skills compound over time. It’s just a matter of consistency.
Success doesn’t come from doing extraordinarily difficult things. It’s doing simple things consistently.
Darren Hardy (Quote from the book The Compound Effect)
When planning for something big, we need to find that one domino, that when it falls makes the other dominos fall and eventually make it big. Doing 10 pushups for a day is easy. But imagine what would happen if you do it for 5 years. You will no longer just do 10 pushups a day after a month. And you can only imagine how your body can transform in 5 years.
You might be thinking, “If it’s that easy, anyone can do it”.
Nope! What’s easy to do is also easy to not do it. Not me, Jim Rohn said that. 10 pushups are very easy for me. But I was never that consistent. At least not long enough to see some change.
So, finally find that domino. Do it long enough and that one domino will fall and affect all the other dominos, which is what the compound interest is all about. Big gets better. But before that, we need to do some small things consistently.
12. Habits, Willpower, and, Discipline
Have you ever heard of the quote, “Motivation gets you going, but discipline keeps you growing”? Yes, discipline is what we need to get ahead.
You can build discipline through habits or willpower. But willpower is limited. Let’s say you are trying to cut sugars. But when you see all the sugary foods that are lying around in your home, you control yourself using willpower. So yes, you will be not eating those foods, but that doesn’t work. Will it? How many times have you tried to control yourself but ended up eating those?
Willpower is like fuel. And every day you’ll start with 100% fuel. But as you resist more and more things in a day it gets to zero.
Now, instead of controlling yourself with willpower just imagine hiding all those foods & keeping them away from you. Make the products of bad habits (alcohol, processed foods, toxic people) impossible to reach and products of good habits easy to reach. (Lesson from the book: Atomic Habits).
Decide where to live, what to eat, whom to talk to, etc., and then build habits around those, instead of trying to control yourself with willpower by staying in a bad environment.
I have never seen someone consistently stick to positive habits in a negative environment.
James Clear (Atomic Habits book)
13. Envy, Social Dilemma, & Rat Race: Biggest Traps Of Life
Nobody wants to get locked up, although ‘locked up’ is a matter of perspective. There can be people who are out who are in prison mentally and emotionally and worse off than those who are behind bars.
Wesley Snipes
Envy
Envy Is A Juice That Is Not Worth The Squeeze!
Envy is a peace destroyer.
Basically, when we envy someone, we only envy one particular thing from those people. Fame, money, social following, relationship, etc. But we don’t consider their struggles and we don’t consider swapping everything.
I’d like to have the money that Warren Buffet has ($100 Billion) parallelly keeping my age (24) — there is no point in teleporting my 20s to 90s for the sake of money. I don’t want to live at his place. And I don’t want to spend 5 hours a day reading. This is just another sci-fi get rich quick scheme.
Now question yourselves:
“Am I ready to swap my entire life (kids, parents, job,…) with the person I am jealous of?” If the answer is “No” then you are not worthy to envy someone.
Envy is an illusion.
The part of the person that we envy doesn’t exist without the rest of that person.
If we aren’t willing to trade places with them completely — their life, their body, their thoughts — then there is nothing to be envious about.
— Naval (@naval) May 3, 2020
Social Dilemma
If you have watched the film Social Dilemma, you would know what I am talking about. I think everyone should understand how social media works and the kind of effects it has on us mentally. Chasing after likes and engagement is another trap that is adding more depression to our lives.
The dilemma exists in real social life too. People around you will decide what you should study and which career is best for you. And sometimes we get lost in this trap of “Trying to impress people around us”. It’s the same. Only this time you are trapped with real people, unlike the follower count on social media.
Rat Race
We work hard to make money and as we make more and more money, we spend more. Why? Wearing a Rolex gives me status. Buying an iPhone makes us look cool. That’s called the “Rat Race”. Running in a circle with no endpoint, until we die.
Advertising has us chasing cars and clothes, working jobs we hate so we can buy s**t we don’t need
Tyler Durden, Fight Club Movie
The way to get out of the rat race is to aim for wealth (not money) and by choosing our desires, precisely.
Can you do something without telling anybody? Are you willing to learn something and at the same time not tell anybody about it? Question yourself and if the answer is “Yes”, then the desire is real. You want that for yourself.
Finding desires that you really want for yourself is very hard. But that’s how we escape the rat race.
14. There Shouldn’t Be Such Thing As “One Career” or “One Skill”
Most of us believe in the concept of “Choosing a better career” or “Finding that one career”. But it doesn’t have to be that way. Even if we want to stick to one career that makes us happy, and helps us financially, we should try a lot to find that one thing.
And in that process, you may end up loving a lot of things. You are good at design, but writing makes you happy currently. Should you switch your design career to writing? Probably yes.
The point is to try something that is fun and makes you happy. The goal is to “Not regret once you get old”.
Here is a paragraph from the book “Do Epic Shit” by Ankur Warikoo:
“Six months back perhaps you were trying your hand at music, along with your day job. You used to like it back then; however, you were more driven by lyrics. So now you’ve become a songwriter for small bands, keeping your day job.
The world may call it a chase. So be it.
It is still way better than slogging at doing something you hate. Just because everyone else does the same.
Better to be lost for something worthwhile. Instead of getting lost in everything worthless.**“
A great philosophy for a career is “Find things that are fun to do”.
And moreover, every skill you acquire improves the odds of success. Scott Adams, famously known for his Dilbert comics described his skill-set like this in his book:
“I have poor art skills, mediocre business skills, good but not great writing talent, and early knowledge of the internet. And I have a good but not great sense of humour. I’m like one big mediocre soup. None of my skills are valued world-class, but when my mediocre skills are combined, they become a powerful market force”.
Unique skill comes from learning multiple things that you are curious about and then combining those skills.
Get exposed to as many things as you can when you have the time (If not, make time). That’s the key.
15. Physical Health is everything
What if you have all the money that you need. What would you do? You’d do whatever you want to do, right? But what if your body doesn’t allow you to? Your body is not allowing you to travel. Your body is not allowing you to eat the food that you love.
Just imagine how miserable would that life be. That’s why physical health is so important.
Confucius has a great saying on this: “A health man wants a thousand things, a sick man only wants one”.
When you don’t have great physical health, you don’t have any good mental health too. The mental worries only compound over time if physical health gets worse.
If you don’t have good health, you have nothing. It’s that simple. So, just take care of your body.
16. Regret is more painful than failure
Sometimes trying is hard. Trying to switch a career needs a lot of mental hassle. Trying to solve a relationship problem requires a lot of work. But the point is while trying may lead us to failure, not trying will lead us to regret.
Failure is a temporary feeling. Regret is an everlasting feeling. If you have a desire to do something, create something, or change something, you should do it anyway.
Failure is painful until you succeed or change the direction. But regret is painful, forever. It haunts.
In the book “The Top 5 Regrets Of The Dying”, the author mentioned this as the top regret of the people who were in the last stages of their life: “I wish I had the courage to live the life I truly want”.
Do it now, you’ll fail or succeed. Do it never, you’ll regret it.
