Bettering ourselves leads to bettering others and — if we play that ripple effect all the way out its infinite potential and multiply it by every willing soul — to bettering the world. If you don't want to become better yourself, do it for them. If your goal in life is to be useful to others, you can start by figuring out how to be useful to yourself.

Our reactions are often more instinctual than intentional, especially when a situation or a person is doing their best to bring out our worst.

Studies show that we need about five compliments to balance out every negative remark made toward us. That's because we remember negative events more intesely than positive ones. Introducing a gratitude practice — a simple process of regularly taking stock of what you're grateful for — is a good way to counteract your negativity bias by fostering an awareness of the positive things in your life.

If you're not happy with your life, then ask yourself, what tiny thing could i do tomorrow that would make my life a little bit better?

...Just because these thoughts are real does not make them true. Even at the very bottom, you have a choice.

You can engage your curiosity be asking yourself questions to spark your imagination: What do i want to do? Why do i want to do it? What small thing i can do right now to get started? Keeping your questions small helps the resulting Tasks remain manageable. The harder the Task, the more effort it will require and the more likely you'll be to put it off. Make the Task as effortless as possible.

Not all things we're into are meant to be our occupation. That in itself is a valuable lesson to learn, especially when you're young. It's important to figure out what role the things that interest you play in your life. Not every hobby or curiosity is a calling, but some are.

If happiness is the result of our actions, then we need to stop asking ourselves how to be happy. Rather, we should be asking ourselves how to be.

Convenience, however, often comes at the expense of understanding.

During Migration, we transfer content from one place in our Bullet Journal to another by rewriting it. This may seem like a lot of effort, but it serves a critical purpose: It weeds out distractions. Because it takes a little bit more time to rewrite things by hand, there's a built-in incentive to pause and consider each candidate. If an entry isn't worth the few seconds of effort required to rewrite it, then it's probably not that important.

Productivity is about getting more done by working on fewer things.

We need to reduce the number of decisions we burden ourselves with so we can focus on what matters.

Each decision, until it's been made and acted on, is simply a thought.