It isn't enough to think outside the box. Thinking is passive. Get used to acting outside the box.
Tim FerrissRead
Online I see people committing 'social media suicide' all the time by one of two ways. Firstly by responding to all criticism, meaning you're never going to find time to complete important milestones of your own, and by responding to things that don't warrant a response. This lends more credibility by driving traffic.
Interpretation
Engaging in unnecessary social media disputes can detract from personal progress.
Tim Ferriss highlights the negative impact of overly engaging with criticism on social media, suggesting that such distractions can hinder important personal achievements. He warns against giving attention to unworthy criticisms, which can ultimately lead to a cycle of negativity and derailment from one's goals.
In practice
During a presentation about workplace focus and productivity, one could use this quote to illustrate the dangers of distraction.
It isn't enough to think outside the box. Thinking is passive. Get used to acting outside the box.
The way we measure productivity is flawed. People checking their BlackBerry over dinner is not the measure of productivity.
It's just astonishing to me, but not surprising in some respects, how dependent we are on the somewhat meaningless and certainly ephemeral feedback that we get from strangers on the Internet. I think that's a dangerous dependence to develop.
I always point people to the article '1,000 True Fans' by Kevin Kelly. If you choose your thousand ideal customers or readers properly and find the single author blog that targets that audience, you never have to do any more marketing. You're done. That is a lesson that very few product developers and marketers have learned, and it's unfortunate.
By using money as the scapegoat and work as our all-consuming routine, we are able to conveniently disallow ourselves to do otherwise: 'John, I'd love to talk about the gaping void I feel in my life, the hopelessness that hits me like a punch in the eye every time I start my computer in the morning, but I have so much work to do! I've got at least three hours of unimportant email to reply to before calling prospects who said 'no' yesterday. Gotta run!
Being busy is a form of laziness - lazy thinking and indiscriminate action. Being busy is most often used as a guise for avoiding the few critically important but uncomfortable actions.
Don't be afraid to assert yourself, have confidence in your abilities and don't let the bastards get you down.
Before I sat down and became a writer, before I began to do it habitually and for my living, there was a decades-long stretch when I was terrified that it would suck, so I didn't write. I think that marks a lot of people, a real terror at being bad at something, and unfortunately, you are always bad before you can get a little better.
Excuses are the cradle ... that Satan rocks men off to sleep in.
Whoever you are, or whatever it is that you do, when you really want something, it's because that desire originated in the soul of the universe. It's your mission on earth.
Do you know why the Indian rain dances always worked? Because the Indians would keep dancing until it rained.
I'm drawn to failure. I feel like I'm contending with it constantly in my own life.
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