Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers

By: Timothy Ferriss
Date Read: 2017-03-16
Rating: ★★★★★

Read This First—How to Use This Book

In this book, you’ll naturally look for common habits and recommendations, and you should. Here are a few patterns, some odder than others: More than 80% of the interviewees have some form of daily mindfulness or meditation practice A surprising number of males (not females) over 45 never eat breakfast, or eat only the scantiest of fare (e.g., Laird Hamilton, page 92; Malcolm Gladwell, page 572; General Stanley McChrystal, page 435) Many use the ChiliPad device for cooling at bedtime Rave reviews of the books Sapiens, Poor Charlie’s Almanack, Influence, and Man’s Search for Meaning, among others The habit of listening to single songs on repeat for focus (page 507) Nearly everyone has done some form of “spec” work (completing projects on their own time and dime, then submitting them to prospective buyers) The belief that “failure is not durable” (see Robert Rodriguez, page 628) or variants thereof Almost every guest has been able to take obvious “weaknesses” and turn them into huge competitive advantages (see Arnold Schwarzenegger, page 176)

Christopher Sommer

When in doubt, work on the deficiencies you’re most embarrassed by.

“Flexibility” can be passive, whereas “mobility” requires that you can demonstrate strength throughout the entire range of motion, including the end ranges.

Dominic D’Agostino

Cancer as a Metabolic Disease by Thomas Seyfried: required reading for all of Dom’s students Tripping Over the Truth by Travis Christofferson: Dom has gifted this to seven or eight people over the last year The Language of God: A Scientist Presents Evidence for Belief by Francis Collins

Joe De Sena

“Breathe, motherfucker! ”

Deconstructing Sports and Skills with Questions

“The quality of your questions determines the quality of your life.”

Who is good at SPORT despite being poorly built for it? Who’s good at this who shouldn’t be? Who are the most controversial or unorthodox athletes or trainers in SPORT? Why? What do you think of them? Who are the most impressive lesser-known teachers? What makes you different? Who trained you or influenced you? Have you trained others to do this? Have they replicated your results? What are the biggest mistakes and myths you see in SPORT training? What are the biggest wastes of time? What are your favorite instructional books or resources on the subject? If people had to teach themselves, what would you suggest they use? If you were to train me for 12 weeks for a FILL IN BLANK competition and had a million dollars on the line, what would the training look like? What if I trained for 8 weeks?

Peter Attia

Rule #1: Avoid “white” starchy carbohydrates (or those that can be white). This means all bread, pasta, rice, potatoes, and grains (yes, including quinoa). If you have to ask, don’t eat it.

Rule #2: Eat the same few meals over and over again, especially for breakfast and lunch. Good news: You already do this. You’re just picking new default meals. If you want to keep it simple, split your plate into thirds: protein, veggies, and beans/ legumes.

Rule #3: Don’t drink calories. Exception: 1 to 2 glasses of dry red wine per night is allowed, although this can cause some peri-/ post-menopausal women to plateau.

Rule #4: Don’t eat fruit. (Fructose → glycerol phosphate → more body fat, more or less.) Avocado and tomatoes are allowed.

Rule #5: Whenever possible, measure your progress in body fat percentage, NOT total pounds. The scale can deceive and derail you. For instance, it’s common to gain muscle while simultaneously losing fat on the SCD. That’s exactly what you want, but the scale number won’t move, and you will get frustrated. In place of the scale, I use DEXA scans, a BodyMetrix home ultrasound device, or calipers with a gym professional (I recommend the Jackson-Pollock 7-point method). And then:

Rule #6: Take one day off per week and go nuts. I choose and recommend Saturday. This is “cheat day,” which a lot of readers also call “Faturday.” For biochemical and psychological reasons, it’s important not to hold back. Some readers keep a “to-eat” list during the week, which reminds them that they’re only giving up vices for 6 days at a time. Comprehensive step-by-step details, including Q& As and troubleshooting, can be found in The 4-Hour Body, but the preceding outline is often enough to lose 20 pounds in a month, and drop 2 clothing sizes.

Pavel Tsatsouline

Two Warmups: Halos and Cossack Squats

3 High-Yield Exercises—Pavel’s “Simple & Sinister” Kettlebell Program One-arm swing Turkish get-up (TGU) Goblet squat

Among effective midsection exercises are ‘power breathing,’ hollow rocks, Janda sit-ups, hanging leg raises, and ‘hard-style planks.’ To do the last, hold a plank for 10 seconds under max contraction, not for several minutes. Hold it like you’re about to be kicked and breathe ‘behind the shield’ of your tensed midsection. For a challenge, consider putting your feet on the wall, a few inches from the floor.”

“Grease the Groove” for Strength Endurance and Strength “To increase your pull-up numbers, start doing half the reps you’re capable of (e.g., sets of 4 if your personal best is 8) in repeated sets throughout the day. Simply accumulate reps with at least 15 minutes between sets, and adjust the daily volume to always feel fresh.” Using GTG for several months, Pavel’s father-in-law went from 10 to 20 strict pull-ups at age 64—and he could not do that many when he was a young Marine. The minimum of 15 minutes’ rest is necessary for creatine phosphate hypercompensation. “Whereas most strength-endurance programs work by training one to tolerate more lactic acid, GTG instead trains one to produce less acid. It increases the quantity and quality of mitochondria in fast-twitch muscle fibers and makes them more aerobic.” If you are “greasing the groove” for a maximal strength movement, do not exceed 5 reps per set. In this case, the method works through a different mechanism (for the nerds: synaptic facilitation and myelination). Let’s say you’re working up to a single perfect rep of a one-armed push-up. In your progression, you might do one-armed push-ups with feet on the floor and hands on the edge of a table or counter. If 6 reps is your max, you would do GTG sets of no more than 2 to 3 reps.

Paul Levesque (Triple H)

“I’d never heard it said that way, but it stuck with me. So much so that I’ve said it to my kid now: ‘Is that a dream, or a goal? Because a dream is something you fantasize about that will probably never happen. A goal is something you set a plan for, work toward, and achieve. I always looked at my stuff that way. The people who were successful models to me were people who had structured goals and then put a plan in place to get to those things.

Whitney Cummings (page 477) told me something similar, on big standup specials: “My work isn’t done tonight. My work was done 3 months ago, and I just have to show up.”

This led me to ask myself, usually during my quarterly 80/ 20 reviews of stress points, etc., “What am I continuing to do myself that I’m not good at?” Improve it, eliminate it, or delegate it.

Jane McGonigal

“‘ Any useful statement about the future should at first seem ridiculous’ by Jim Dator. Also, ‘When it comes to the future, it’s far more important to be imaginative than to be right’ by Alvin Toffler. Both are famous futurists. These quotes remind me that world-changing ideas will seem absurd to most people, and that the most useful work I can be doing is to push the envelope of what is considered possible. If what I’m doing sounds reasonable to most people, then I’m not working in a space that is creative and innovative enough!”

5 Morning Rituals that Help Me Win the Day

I am grateful for…

  3. What would make today great?
  6. Daily affirmations. I am…

To be filled in at night: 3 amazing things that happened today . . .

  3. (This is similar to Peter Diamandis’s “three wins” practice; see page 373.)

How could I have made today better?

Three Tips from a Google Pioneer

Gone. At the end of a thought, notice that the thought is over. Gone. At the end of an experience of emotion—joy, anger, sadness, or anything else—notice it is over. Gone.

In many of my public talks, I guide a very simple 10-second exercise. I tell the audience members to each identify two human beings in the room and just think, “I wish for this person to be happy, and I wish for that person to be happy.” That is it. I remind them to not do or say anything, just think—this is an entirely thinking exercise. The entire exercise is just 10 seconds’ worth of thinking.

Coach Sommer—The Single Decision

Strength improvements [for a movement like this] take a minimum of 6 weeks. Any perceived improvements prior to that are simply the result of improved synaptic facilitation. In plain English, the central nervous system simply became more efficient at that particular movement with practice. This is, however, not to be confused with actual strength gains.

The secret is to show up, do the work, and go home. A blue collar work ethic married to indomitable will.

Chris Sacca

“Weirdness is why we adore our friends….Weirdness is what bonds us to our colleagues. Weirdness is what sets us apart, gets us hired. Be your unapologetically weird self. In fact, being weird may even find you the ultimate happiness.”

Marc Andreessen

“Life can be much broader, once you discover one simple fact, and that is that everything around you that you call ‘life’ was made up by people that were no smarter than you. And you can change it, you can influence it, you can build your own things that other people can use. Once you learn that, you’ll never be the same again.”

Derek Sivers

“What if you asked, ‘When you think of the word “successful,” who’s the third person that comes to mind? Why are they actually more successful than the first person that came to mind?’

This is genius. Ricardo Semler, CEO and majority owner of the Brazil-based Semco Partners, practices asking “Why?” three times. This is true when questioning his own motives, or when tackling big projects. The rationale is identical to Derek’s.

“Every time people contact me, they say, ‘Look, I know you must be incredibly busy . . .’ and I always think, ‘No, I’m not.’ Because I’m in control of my time. I’m on top of it. ‘Busy,’ to me, seems to imply ‘out of control.’ Like, ‘Oh my God, I’m so busy. I don’t have any time for this shit!’

Lack of time is lack of priorities. If I’m “busy,” it is because I’ve made choices that put me in that position, so I’ve forbidden myself to reply to “How are you?” with “Busy.” I have no right to complain. Instead, if I’m too busy, it’s a cue to reexamine my systems and rules.

When you make a business, you’re making a little world where you control the laws. It doesn’t matter how things are done everywhere else. In your little world, you can make it like it should be.

Alexis Ohanian

A Damn-Giving Assignment of Less Than 15 Minutes Improve a notification email from your business (e.g., subscription confirmation, order confirmation, whatever): “Invest that little bit of time to make it a little bit more human or—depending on your brand—a little funnier, a little more different, or a little more whatever. It’ll be worth it, and that’s my challenge.”

Alexis has many approaches, of course, but I liked this example of what Cal Fussman (page 495) might call “letting the silence do the work”: “I really think a lot can be conveyed with a raised eyebrow.”

“Productivity” Tricks for the Neurotic, Manic-Depressive, and Crazy (Like Me)

“The moment that you feel that, just possibly, you’re walking down the street naked, exposing too much of your heart and your mind and what exists on the inside, showing too much of yourself. That’s the moment you may be starting to get it right.” —Neil Gaiman, University of the Arts commencement speech

Tony Robbins

“It’s a belief: Life is always happening for us, not to us. It’s our job to find out where the benefit is. If we do, life is magnificent.”

“Losers react, leaders anticipate.”

Jim Rohn famously said, “If you let your learning lead to knowledge, you become a fool. If you let your learning lead to action, you become wealthy.”

Following something like the above, Tony does 9 to 10 minutes of what some might consider meditation. To him, however, the objective is very different: It’s about cueing and prompting enabling emotions for the rest of the day. His 9 to 10 minutes are broken into thirds. Here is an abbreviated synopsis: The first 3 minutes: “Feeling totally grateful for three things. I make sure that one of them is very, very simple: the wind on my face, the reflection of the clouds that I just saw. But I don’t just think gratitude. I let gratitude fill my soul, because when you’re grateful, we all know there’s no anger. It’s impossible to be angry and grateful simultaneously. When you’re grateful, there is no fear. You can’t be fearful and grateful simultaneously.” The second 3 minutes: “Total focus on feeling the presence of God, if you will, however you want to language that for yourself. But this inner presence coming in, and feeling it heal everything in my body, in my mind, my emotions, my relationships, my finances. I see it as solving anything that needs to be solved. I experience the strengthening of my gratitude, of my conviction, of my passion. . . .” The last 3 minutes: “Focusing on three things that I’m going to make happen, my ‘three to thrive.’…See it as though it’s already been done, feel the emotions, etc….

What My Morning Journal Looks Like

“Once we get those muddy, maddening, confusing thoughts [nebulous worries, jitters, and preoccupations] on the page, we face our day with clearer eyes.”

Peter Thiel

So if you’re planning to do something with your life, if you have a 10-year plan of how to get there, you should ask: Why can’t you do this in 6 months?

There is something very odd about a society where the most talented people all get tracked toward the same elite colleges, where they end up studying the same small number of subjects and going into the same small number of careers.

Seth Godin

‘First, Ten,’ and it is a simple theory of marketing that says: tell ten people, show ten people, share it with ten people; ten people who already trust you and already like you. If they don’t tell anybody else, it’s not that good and you should start over. If they do tell other people, you’re on your way.”

“Deep down, I am certain that people are plastic in the positive sense: flexible and able to grow. I think almost everything is made, not born, and that makes people uncomfortable because it puts them on the hook, but I truly believe it.”

James Altucher

“What if you just can’t come up with 10 ideas? Here’s the magic trick: If you can’t come up with 10 ideas, come up with 20 ideas….You are putting too much pressure on yourself. Perfectionism is the ENEMY of the idea muscle…it’s your brain trying to protect you from harm, from coming up with an idea that is embarrassing and stupid and could cause you to suffer pain. The way you shut this off is by forcing the brain to come up with bad ideas.

In his words, but condensed for space, here are some examples of the types of lists James makes: 10 old ideas I can make new 10 ridiculous things I would invent (e.g., the smart toilet) 10 books I can write (The Choose Yourself Guide to an Alternative Education, etc). 10 business ideas for Google/ Amazon/ Twitter/ etc. 10 people I can send ideas to 10 podcast ideas or videos I can shoot (e.g., Lunch with James, a video podcast where I just have lunch with people over Skype and we chat) 10 industries where I can remove the middleman 10 things I disagree with that everyone else assumes is religion (college, home ownership, voting, doctors, etc.) 10 ways to take old posts of mine and make books out of them 10 people I want to be friends with (then figure out the first step to contact them) 10 things I learned yesterday 10 things I can do differently today 10 ways I can save time 10 things I learned from X, where X is someone I’ve recently spoken with or read a book by or about. I’ve written posts on this about the Beatles, Mick Jagger, Steve Jobs, Charles Bukowski, the Dalai Lama, Superman, Freakonomics, etc. 10 things I’m interested in getting better at (and then 10 ways I can get better at each one) 10 things I was interested in as a kid that might be fun to explore now (Like, maybe I can write that “Son of Dr. Strange” comic I’ve always been planning. And now I need 10 plot ideas.) 10 ways I might try to solve a problem I have This has saved me with the IRS countless times. Unfortunately, the Department of Motor Vehicles is impervious to my superpowers.

How to Create a Real-World MBA

“Losers have goals. Winners have systems.”

The Law of Category

What’s the name of the third person to fly the Atlantic Ocean solo? If you didn’t know that Bert Hinkler was the second person to fly the Atlantic, you might figure you had no chance at all to know the name of the third person. But you do. It’s Amelia Earhart. Now, is Amelia known as the third person to fly the Atlantic Ocean solo, or as the first woman to do so?

Chase Jarvis

Little note: If someone ever says ‘yes’ that quickly, you didn’t ask for enough.”

From Time Enough for Love: “A human being should be able to change a diaper, plan an invasion, butcher a hog, conn a ship, design a building, write a sonnet, balance accounts, build a wall, set a bone, comfort the dying, take orders, give orders, cooperate, act alone, solve equations, analyze a new problem, pitch manure, program a computer, cook a tasty meal, fight efficiently, die gallantly. Specialization is for insects.”

1,000 True Fans—Revisited

True fans are not only the direct source of your income, but also your chief marketing force for the ordinary fans.

Alex Blumberg

Prompts to Elicit Stories (Most Interviewers Are Weak at This)

  • “Tell me about a time when . . .”
  • “Tell me about the day or moment or time when . . .”
  • “Tell me the story of…how you came to major in X, how you met so-and-so, etc.”
  • “Tell me about the day you realized… ”
  • “What were the steps that got you to…?”
  • “Describe the conversation when…

Chris Young

As a related aside, one of my favorite business-related PDFs floating around the Internet is “Valve: Handbook for New Employees” from Gabe’s company. As Chris put it: “It’s the only HR document you will ever knowingly want to read.”

Hold the standard. Ask for help. Fix it. Do whatever’s necessary. But don’t cheat.”

Daymond John

“My parents always taught me that my day job would never make me rich. It’d be my homework.”

The Canvas Strategy

Let’s flip it around so it doesn’t seem so demeaning: It’s not about kissing ass. It’s not about making someone look good. It’s about providing the support so that others can be good. The better wording for the advice is this: Find canvases for other people to paint on. Be an anteambulo. Clear the path for the people above you and you will eventually create a path for yourself.

That’s what the canvas strategy is about—helping yourself by helping others. Making a concerted effort to trade your short-term gratification for a longer-term payoff. Whereas everyone else wants to get credit and be “respected,” you can forget credit. You can forget it so hard that you’re glad when others get it instead of you—that was your aim, after all. Let the others take their credit on credit, while you defer and earn interest on the principal.

Peter Diamandis

“A problem is a terrible thing to waste.”

One of the books he recommends for cultivating dealmaking ability is actually a children’s book and a 10-minute read: Stone Soup. “It’s a children’s story that is the best MBA degree you can read. Between the concept of supercredibility and Stone Soup, you have a great foundation.

How to Say “No” When It Matters Most

Those of you who often over-commit or feel too scattered may appreciate a new philosophy I’m trying: If I’m not saying “HELL YEAH!” about something, then I say no. Meaning: When deciding whether to commit to something, if I feel anything less than “Wow! That would be amazing! Absolutely! Hell yeah!”—then my answer is no. When you say no to most things, you leave room in your life to really throw yourself completely into that rare thing that makes you say, “HELL YEAH!” We’re all busy. We’ve all taken on too much. Saying yes to less is the way out.

One of my favorite time-management essays is “Maker’s Schedule, Manager’s Schedule” by Paul Graham of Y Combinator fame. Give it a read.

Life favors the specific ask and punishes the vague wish.

BJ Miller

“When you are struggling with just about anything, look up. Just ponder the night sky for a minute and realize that we’re all on the same planet at the same time. As far as we can tell, we’re the only planet with life like ours on it anywhere nearby. Then you start looking at the stars, and you realize that the light hitting your eye is ancient, [some of the] stars that you’re seeing, they no longer exist by the time that the light gets to you. Just mulling the bare-naked facts of the cosmos is enough to thrill me, awe me, freak me out, and kind of put all my neurotic anxieties in their proper place. A lot of people—when you’re standing at the edge of your horizon, at death’s door, you can be much more in tune with the cosmos.”

If you’re open to reading a “dark” book to help put things in perspective, If This Is a Man and The Truce (often combined into one volume) by Primo Levi are two of my favorites.

“I’m up and getting after it by 4:45. I like to have that psychological win over the enemy. For me, when I wake up in the morning—and I don’t know why—I’m thinking about the enemy and what they’re doing. I know I’m not on active duty anymore, but it’s still in my head: that there’s a guy in a cave somewhere, he’s rocking back and forth, and he’s got a machine gun in one hand and a grenade in the other. He’s waiting for me, and we’re going to meet. When I wake up in the morning, I’m thinking to myself: What can I do to be ready for that moment, which is coming? That propels me out of bed.”

“I would never have guessed this. First of all, the sensation, just holding that snowball. But also the implied, inherent perspective that it helped me have. That everything changes. Snow becomes water. It’s beautiful because it changes. Things are fleeting. It felt so beautiful to be part of this weird world in that moment. I felt part of the world again, rather than removed from it. It was potent.”

Maria Popova

“Guilt is interesting because guilt is the flip side of prestige, and they’re both horrible reasons to do things.”

“All those artists and writers who bemoan how hard the work is, and oh, how tedious the creative process, and oh, what a tortured genius they are. Don’t buy into it….As if difficulty and struggle and torture somehow confer seriousness upon your chosen work. Doing great work simply because you love it, sounds, in our culture, somehow flimsy, and that’s a failing of our culture, not of the choice of work that artists make.”

“Thoreau writes, ‘The really efficient laborer will be found not to crowd his day with work, but will saunter to his task surrounded by a wide halo of ease and leisure. There will be a wide margin for relaxation to his day. He is only earnest to secure the kernels of time, and does not exaggerate the value of the husk.’ Think of what a beautiful metaphor this is for not mistaking the husk—the outer accoutrements of productivity like busyness, or a full calendar, or a clever auto-responder—not mistaking those for the kernel, the core and substance of the actual work produced. And he then says, ‘Those who work much, do not work hard.’ I love that.”

You discover your ‘dream’ (or sense of purpose) in the very act of walking the path, which is guided by equal parts choice and chance.”

“You can’t blame your boss for not giving you the support you need. Plenty of people will say, ‘It’s my boss’s fault.’ No, it’s actually your fault because you haven’t educated him, you haven’t influenced him, you haven’t explained to him in a manner he understands why you need this support that you need. That’s extreme ownership. Own it all.”

The Dickens Process—What Are Your Beliefs Costing You?

In A Christmas Carol, Scrooge is visited by the Ghosts of Christmas Past, Present, and Future. In the Dickens Process, you’re forced to examine limiting beliefs—say, your top two or three handicapping beliefs—across each tense. Tony guides you through each in depth, and I recall answering and visualizing variations of: What has each belief cost you in the past, and what has it cost people you’ve loved in the past? What have you lost because of this belief? See it, hear it, feel it. What is each costing you and people you care about in the present? See it, hear it, feel it. What will each cost you and people you care about 1, 3, 5, and 10 years from now? See it, hear it, feel it.

Sam Harris

landscape that was worth exploring….“The sense of being a self riding around in your head—this feeling that everyone calls ‘I’—is an illusion that can be disconfirmed in a variety of ways….It’s vulnerable to inquiry, and that inquiry can take many forms.

My Favorite Thought Exercise: Fear-Setting

What we fear doing most is usually what we most need to do. As I have heard said, a person’s success in life can usually be measured by the number of uncomfortable conversations he or she is willing to have. Resolve to do one thing every day that you fear. I got into this habit by attempting to contact celebrities and famous businesspeople for advice.

Kevin Kelly

In a world of distraction, single-tasking is a superpower.

Write to Get Ideas, Not to Express Them “What I discovered, which is what many writers discover, is that I write in order to think. I’d say, ‘I think I have an idea,’ but when I begin to write it, I realize, ‘I have no idea,’ and I don’t actually know what I think until I try and write it….That was the revelation.”

One of his tools for coming up with unbelievable (yet ultimately accurate) predictions is making a list of what everyone thinks is true or will be true, and asking “What if that weren’t true?” for each, brainstorming the ramifications.

‘What’s the worst that can happen? Well, the worst that can happen is that I’d have a backpack and a sleeping bag, and I’d be eating oatmeal. And I’d be fine.’”

Is This What I So Feared?

“Our life is frittered away by detail….Simplify, simplify….A man is rich in proportion to the number of things which he can afford to let alone.” —Henry David Thoreau, Walden

Whitney Cummings

‘Comedians become comedians so they can control why people laugh at them.’

“the way you do anything is the way you do everything.”

Alain de Botton

“Wasn’t it Bill Clinton who said that when dealing with anyone who’s upset, he always asks, ‘Has this person slept? Have they eaten? Is somebody else bugging them?’ He goes through this simple checklist….When we’re handling babies and the baby is kicking and crying, we almost never once say, ‘That baby’s out to get me’ or ‘She’s got evil intentions.’”

Lazy: A Manifesto

I recently learned a neologism that, like political correctness, man cave, and content-provider, I instantly recognized as heralding an ugly new turn in the culture: planshopping. That is, deferring committing to any one plan for an evening until you know what all your options are, and then picking the one that’s most likely to be fun/ advance your career/ have the most girls at it—in other words, treating people like menu options or products in a catalog.

Amanda Palmer

Honor those who seek the truth, beware of those who’ve found it’ (adapted from Voltaire).

All of the value in life, including in relationships, comes from compound interest.

“In any situation in life, you only have three options. You always have three options. You can change it, you can accept it, or you can leave it.

“Desire is a contract you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want.”

Anger is a hot coal that you hold in your hand while waiting to throw it at someone else (Buddhist saying).

All the real benefits in life come from compound interest.

Praise specifically, criticize generally (Warren Buffett).

Glenn Beck

“Question with boldness even the existence of a God; because, if there be one, he must more approve of the homage of reason, than that of blindfolded fear.”—Thomas Jefferson

Josh Waitzkin

Whereas most competitors are secretive about their competition prep, Marcelo routinely records and uploads his sparring sessions, his exact training for major events. Josh explains the rationale: “Marcelo was visually showing these competitors what he was about to use against them at 2 weeks, 3 weeks, 4 weeks (away from competition), and his attitude about this was just completely unique: ‘If you’re studying my game, you’re entering my game, and I’ll be better at it than you.’”

He can turn it off so deeply, and man, when he goes in the ring, you can’t turn it on with any more intensity than he can. His ability to turn it off is directly aligned with how intensely he can turn it on, so I train people to do this, to have stress and recovery undulation throughout their day.

Testing the “Impossible”: 17 Questions that Changed My Life

Another way I often approach this is to look at my to-do list and ask: “Which one of these, if done, would render all the rest either easier or completely irrelevant?”

“Good”

When things are going bad, don’t get all bummed out, don’t get startled, don’t get frustrated. No. Just look at the issue and say: “Good.”

Recommendations Throughout the Book