17 Raw Lessons About Human Nature

You don't get to choose what you believe

1. The rewards you get in terms of self-esteem and self-story of what you think of yourself will be correlated to the size of the commitment you keep when no one is watching.
2. The greatest consequence in life is not keeping commitments to yourself, and it compounds when beliefs come from.

Why self-respect is so important

1. Mark Manson: The person you have to spend the most time in your life is yourself. Try not to lose their respect. And, self-respect and self-esteem largely come from having faith in your own words.
2. The commitment we keep to ourselves and what we do when no one is watching is the most persuasive evidence that governs everything we then do every day thereafter.

Context is worth more than the skills

• Your skill is worthless, but your context is valuable.
• Maybe your skill set currently exists in a lucrative and unlucrative market; all you need to do is find the market where it's in the lowest supply and yield the greatest return for those who need it.

How to Avoid the Trap of Mono-Thinking

• You can gauge someone's ignorance by the number of phenomena they explain with the same answer, those who blame many different issues on just one cause are recycling explanations because their demands for answers outstrip the supply.
  • If I know one of your views and from it I can accurately predict everything else that you can believe, then you're not a serious thinker.

Fame Changes Everyone Around You

• Fame doesn't change you, it just changes everybody around you.
• Instincts that may sometimes lead you wrong but they're the only thing that's ever led you right.
• When you're building products or businesses, don't create for someone you haven't met. Create for your best friends because there will be lots more people like you and your best friend, and you know your best friend best.