Well, not 100%, but 99.999999999%.

Why?

Because 99.999999999% of people don’t know anything.

They are uneducated, with their vision and knowledge limited to their personal experiences, instead of universal principles (e.g. human psychology, neuroscience).

They tell you what work and what doesn’t from their personal experiences.

And the point is, what works for them may not work for you; and most of the time people just did things right intuitively and cannot teach you anything that could help replicate their success.

Not every successful person can be good teachers.

Let alone the unsuccessful ones.

So the rule of thumb is, only consider taking advice from that person if and only if they have gotten the results you want, in a way that you would like to replicate.

For example, if you want to get rich, you ask how rich people do it. And not all rich people, but those who did it in a way you desire, e.g. starting a business (vs investment).

BUT, as previously mentioned, they may not be able (yes, incapable of) teaching you how to replicate they success because they may not explicitly know what they’ve done right.

Yes of course they did the right thing to get the right result, but what they tell you (assuming that they weren’t lying or hiding anything and just want the best for you) may still be far from truth.

Why?

Because what’s in their perception maybe different from what’s in the reality.

Take studying as an example.

Straight A students may tell you their “secret” of studying is to wake up at 4 am to stidy, and take thorough notes after class.

So you started to wake up earlier and take more notes.

Yet your performance even declined and you feel easily irritated from the lack of sleep!

While these are exactly what they do at the surface, what they didn’t (or, incapable of) tell you, yet is what exactly you should be duplicating, is their mental processes.

Yes, the straight A student did wake up at 4 am, but did they tell you they sleep at 8 pm???

Did they tell you how they prioritise their quality of sleep, like getting all blue lights off a few hours before sleep and make sure their rooms are dark and cold???

(If you’re interested in getting higher quality sleep, read Mathew Walkers “why we sleep”, and you will also learn how do you schedule your day to optimise learning and memory consolidation. If you are spending 1/3 (or more!) of your life in sleep, you might as well learn how to do it so you make the most out of it, even when you’re asleep.

In fact, it is more important than when you’re awake, I would say. If your sleep isn’t good, nothing else you do in the day matters. Read the book to learn why!)

Ok, you take notes, tons and tons of notes, verbatim. Hack, you even copy the pictures in your books to your notes by hand!

Why aren’t you remembering anything afterwards??

Are your brain somewhat broken or anything??

Hm, this question is like you asking whether the oven is broken when you didn’t even plug in.

Sounds stupid?

Yet that’s what we do as humans (if you’re like the majority)- you got this incredible instrument (your brain- the oven) yet you didn’t know how to use it at all!

And instead of looking for the manual (learning how the brain works- learning how do you render the oven functional), you start doing stupid crap like blaming your innate intelligence and use your creativity to create a pile of excuses for “why you can’t learn”.

Congratulations! You just set yourself up for failure for the rest of your life.

Why?

Oh, if you can’t learn anything, what can you do?

You have no skills, no knowledge, not even the correct mindset to approach life?

You’re doomed.

All because of one single reason- you didn’t learn how to learn.

That’s the only reason why you can’t learn. Period.

Not some stupid genetics or environmental factors.

Everything on earth is possible. It’s all about “HOW TO”!

Stop questioning whether you can do XYZ, because you CAN!

Instead, start asking HOW TO!

How to successfully learn computer programming? How to successfully learn how to interact with other human beings? How to successfully learn how to play the guitar? How to successfully learn how to drive an aircraft?

HOW TO! ASK HOW TO!

Now, go pick up Carol Dwerk’s book Mindset and Peter Brown’s make it stick.

They are filled with real-life examples of the creation of extraordinary human beings, from ordinary naive infants, which all we’ve used to be (and most people currently still are, because they never attemtp to upgrade their brains with self-education!)!

You can learn into whoever you want to become!

It’s YOUR decision.

No one will be responsible for your dear life cuz that’s YOUR life.

Not mine, not others.

Yes- no one cares!

And that’s a GOOD thing- you have all the freedom you need to create yourself into whoever you want to become, ONLY according to YOUR expectations to yourself and your life, regardless of other people’s opinions!

And you know what? Stop caring what others expect you to be.

First of all, these people don’t care about you because all they express is what they want FROM you, instead of asking what do you want for yourself?

Second of all, even if you manage to fulfil their expectations or whatsoever, you think you have thee ability to make them happy?

Well, maybe for 2 seconds!

People can only be happy if they can their own fantasies– becoming the person they want to become.

You cannot make them happy because you are not them.

What? You don’t think people care about themselves more than anyone else?

Ok, show them a group picture that contains them.

Who did they focus on looking at?

Your face?? No! THEIRS!

Everyone is self-obsessed. (Learn some psychology and human nature, please. It would like you FAR. Oh, you should go read Dale Carnegie’s how to win friends and influence people!)

Start living for YOU! This is YOUR life!

And when you start to live authentically (self-expressing- by pursuing your deepest desire), you WILL attract people who do the same and admire you.

But if you don’t, guess who’d you attract?

Yes, people like YOU!

But you don’t even like yourself cuz you are not living authentically! You are soulless, bored, and unfulfiled!

Then how could you ever be happy?

Stop searching on forums and start looking for books

Scrolling maybe enjoyable to you- you mindlessly consume to kill time.

But what will you get after investing all the time and energy?

Nothing! Literally nothing!

You became brain-fried and end up thinking like everyone else, because you are actively picking up their thoughts and mindset by reading their words.

That’s the infectiousness of mediocrity.

Before you listen or read anything, online or offline, ask yourself, “do I want to become this person?”

If the answer is no, RUN!

Why are you still there???

You are the 5 people you associate the most (-Jim Rohn), online or offline.

Who are you moulding yourself into?

Stop engaging such self-intoxicating behaviours!

Save yourself by removing anything that does not add value to your life, habits or people!

They don’t deserve your time and energy.

Divert them into learning into who you DESIRE to be!

You want to become an artist? A pilot? A lawyer? A medical doctor? A business person??

Do it!

Use self-learning as a means to do so- cuz open your eyes: which successful (I mean HIGHLY successful) person didn’t come from self-education but rely on formal (aka school) education?

NONE.

Those who rely on formal education became what I call “high-paying employees”- they don’t have a say, they have a boss, and they have orders to obey.

Every successful person work for themselves, not others.

You should do the same because you can (and if you want to- does anyone don’t want to?).

By replacing reading/listening to stupid things with SCIENCE-BASED (you want the truth, you want what actually works in real-life, or you should be reading fiction and spend the rest of your life in imagining instead of actually experience that imagination) books, you’re ahead of 99.9999999% of people.

Wow! It is that easy!

What to read

1- Human nature

Learn psychology- i.e. how we as humans think, reason, and make decisions.

e.g. why do you procrastinate?

If you cannot conquer yourself (make yourself obey your orders), you cannot do anything.

Success comes from what you do consistently, aka your habits; and the key to sustain your habits- NO, it’s not discipline- is emotion.

You have to feel good doing it to continue doing it (cuz you’re not stupid).

I recommand

• The free psychology course from coursera by Yale University
• Barbara’s Oakley’s a mind for numbers (It’s about really how your mind works, not numbers. Don’t judge the book by it’s title!)
• Barbara’s Oakley’s “learning how to learn” free course in coursera (I think the course is way better than her same-title book.)

You may be wondering why do I recommend “how to learn” stuff under human psychology. Well, it’s because you need to learn how to learn to learn psychology!

Plus, they help fix your mindset into that align with the truth, instead of from nowhere (mainly from stupid people, who made you take what is nonsense as the truth, ruining your life).

(For this “mindset align truth” thing, I recommend “principles” by Ray Dalio (the first few pages), and “7 habits of highly effective people” by Stephen Covey. You seriously should read them because the mismatch between your perception and the reality the root of 99% (or 100%) of your problems.)

2- How to learn

I recommend

• (the books and courses about learning mentioned above, especially especially especially “make it stick”.)

Are you excited???

If someone ever gives me such a book list and I don’t have to look at every corner to discover them, I would burst into tears.

But I know it could be overwhelming to those who (believe they) are short of time.

Well, just remember your goal was never to “finish them all”.

Because there are too many courses and books that could change your life and you will not be able to “complete em’ all!” by the time you die.

Don’t look at the gap (between the current and ideal version of you); focus on gains (the improvement you continuously made everyday- aka compare your current self with who you were yesterday).

(You should also read the free mini ebook “gaps and gains” by Dan Sullivan and Dr. Benjamin Hardy.

A quick note: I don’t recommend reading books summaries because you don’t know who is summarising it for you. And “no two persons ever read the same book” because you approach the same book with different mindsets and background and problems that you look forward to solve.

Read them yourself.

Buy ebooks and read them on your phone whenever you have time- at the bus stop, on the train, waiting for your meal, and even in the toilet!

You will be amazed how quick you could finish the book.

Oh, also read “the 4 levels of reading” by FS blog. That would help you read A LOT faster and absorb A LOT better.)

Ok, so just pick whichever recommendation you feel like starting.

Love watching videos? Coursera first. (If you really can’t choose: start with “learning how to learn”.)

Love reading? One of the books first. (If you really can’t choose: start with “mindset”.)

These recommendations should set you fairly well for life!

Yes, YOUR DREAM LIFE!

LET’S GO!!!!