Limiting Yourself: The Key to Your Success. Is it really possible to be more successful by limiting yourself?
Yes. But limits are supposed to be evil and dirty; the enemies to our inner free spirit. Right? Well what I’ve realized is that sometimes limits are actually the key to your success. The Difference There are unconsciously ingrained self-limitations. Unconsciously habituated limitations are the kind that just happen to you. So that type of limiting conditioning really sucks. And it’s no wonder that we become so loathing to the sight or mention of limits. But it turns out there is actually such a thing as positive limits. That’s what I first thought. I’ve always been a kind of nonconformist. Well, what they never really tell you is that some of those limits you place on yourself can be positive.
When you think of a “life without limits” you have a tendency to think that you can do anything. But this is just part of it. Because some limits are actually beneficial. Here’s the hidden irony: A few of the positive limits I’ve implemented. Could You Walk Away From $8 Million in Easy Money? One of my favorite stories comes from Zappos CEO, Tony Hsieh.
Tony sold his first company to Microsoft shortly after graduating from college. One of the conditions was that he stay for another 12 months. In exchange, he would walk away an extra $8 million richer. The work conditions weren’t strenuous, as Tony himself recounts , “I just had to do the bare minimum amount of work so that I wouldn’t get fired.” It’s Not About You. But, especially this year, one is conscious of the many ways in which this year’s graduating class has been ill served by their elders.
They enter a bad job market, the hangover from decades of excessive borrowing. They inherit a ruinous federal debt. More important, their lives have been perversely structured. This year’s graduates are members of the most supervised generation in American history. Through their childhoods and teenage years, they have been monitored, tutored, coached and honed to an unprecedented degree. Yet upon graduation they will enter a world that is unprecedentedly wide open and unstructured. No one would design a system of extreme supervision to prepare people for a decade of extreme openness. Worst of all, they are sent off into this world with the whole baby-boomer theology ringing in their ears. But, of course, this mantra misleads on nearly every front. College grads are often sent out into the world amid rapturous talk of limitless possibilities. Get Organized. How to Organize Your Files.
Written by Jason Eisner in 2000, for new Computer Science Ph.D. students at the University of Rochester. by Jason Eisner Here are some suggestions about how to organize your work during your research career.
Workstyles vary, and you will develop your own organizing system over time. But these are techniques that I personally have found to be helpful. Be careful, though - what really matters is the work itself, so don't spend all your time getting more organized than necessary! Keeping Track of Information Online Although paper has its uses, electronic files have at least four advantages over paper: easy to edit, readable from anywhere with a computer, harder to lose, and searchable.
Partly for this reason, you may spend much of your workday editing files in Emacs. Put it in a special file. As for general directory organization, do it any way you like. You will probably organize your more personal files into subdirectories under ~/proj, ~/teach, ~/mail, etc. Version Control Administrivia. Want to Improve Your Grades…Improve Your Study Skills! Yes, it really is that simple.
If you want to improve your grades, you need to improve those study skills. Choose a specific place to study and get the materials you'll need to use while you study. Pencils, pens, paper, computer, etc. along with your textbooks and class notes. Perhaps you can study with music so you'll want to add a radio and if you're easily distracted get a simple kitchen timer also.
Are Your Dreams Impairing Your Happiness? Posted in Balanced Lifestyle, Balanced Mind and Soul | November 27, 2011 | 15 Comments By Anastasiya Goers What would a life be without a dream?
– A very boring existence, that’s what. We all have dreams that help us move from one point in life to the other one. In winter we dream about warm summer days and a well-deserved vacation. While growing up we dream about who we want to be, how many kids we want to have, sometimes even who we want to marry. Once we establish our families we start dreaming about seeing our kids grow up. After long years of work we dream about retirement and the wonderful peaceful place that we will move to.
Our dreams keep us going in life, get us through tough periods and give us hope and goals to work for. “How, in the world, can they ruin my happiness?” I knew a guy once who had trouble finding a girlfriend. Another girl that I knew had a dream of building an amazing career and starting a family at the same time.
Procrastination.