In most ordinary moments, the situation thinks for you. This happens because of a lack of clear thinking.
Shane Parrish is the founder of Farnam Street and the ‘wisdom-seeker’ behind The Knowledge Project Podcast. He says that his book, Clear Thinking, started with a simple question:
“Why do the world’s most successful individuals have an uncanny ability to be in the right place at the right time?”
The answer to this is positioning. These successful individuals are rarely backed into a corner by circumstances.
It’s commonly believed that your life is shaped by the major decisions you make. Clear Thinking highlights that it’s actually the accumulation of small, everyday choices that have a big impact on your future.
The book says, “Every ordinary moment is an opportunity to make the future easier or harder. It all depends on whether you’re thinking clearly.”
According to Shane, the main obstacles to clear thinking are emotion, ego, social bias, and inertia.
Key Insights:
1. Your Position Determines Your Future
Putting yourself in a good position means being well-prepared. Bettering your position allows you to think clearly and master your circumstances.
2. You Can Turn Desired Behaviour into Default Behaviour
Rules circumvent your behaviour – when you learn how to use them to your advantage, rules can produce life-changing results. When you want to do more of what you want and less of what you don’t, you can’t rely on willpower alone. It’s your chosen environment that’s going to help nudge you toward better decision-making.
3. If You Do What Everyone Else Does, You’ll Get the Same Results Everyone Else Gets
Play the long game. If you want a different outcome, you have to do things differently. You also have to be patient and do the hard things repeatedly in order to make tomorrow easier.
4. Outcome Over Ego
Focus on the outcome instead of how you feel. That’s it. Don’t rearrange the world to prove you’re right.
5. While It May Not Be Your Fault, It Is Your Responsibility
Commanding your life means having self-accountability, i.e., taking responsibility for your abilities, your inabilities, and your actions. Your honest judgements of yourself is important; recognise when you need to do better – there’s always something that you can do to achieve progress.
When it comes to clear thinking, the question you have to ask yourself is, what does it mean to lead a quality life? Time is finite and so you need to narrow things down to 2-3 priorities, according to Shane.
In most areas of your life where you experience difficulties, it’s usually because you’re inconsistent with your behaviours. By mastering the best of what other people have already figured out, you can turn their hindsight into your foresight.
In addition, you need to be pro-failure. Reflection is where learning happens, but you need to consciously process reflection. To do this, you need to ask yourself 3 questions: What did you do, what was the outcome, and what would you do differently next time?
Everyone has an inner monologue. Shane’s advice is to recognise that negative loop and say ‘not this time’. In an anecdote about using negative reviews to create positive fuel, Shane shares an example of this. In 2018, the New York Times wrote a profile on him. One comment read, “I’m confident that Mr. Parrish is experiencing his 15 minutes of fame.” Shane kept a reminder of this comment which served as his fuel, motivating him to persevere. Less than 3 months after Clear Thinking was published, it earned multiple bestseller badges.
Paving the way to clear thinking means you need to be aware of the decisions that are within your control to make that are going to put you in a better position.
Next steps…
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