Investing, betting and gambling

How often do you gamble?

How often do you make educated bets?

How much of your money do you invest?

How different are these three?

When we invest, we make a bet on future performance.

When we gamble, we make a bet on a future outcome.

So where does investing end and gambling begin?

All investments have risk, some more, some less.

Can you afford to take no risk?

Creativity & well-being

When are you most creative?

When are you least creative?

How important is your health?

How important is creativity to you?

When we feel bad, we are less innovative.

When our health is constantly an issue,

we lack energy and our mood is low.

This is not the most fertile ground.

Unless you are into depressive poetry.

So go and get that rest, so you can thrive.

Mistakes repeat

How often do you make the same mistake?

How often do you see others make them?

Can you learn from others’ mistakes?

Do people learn from your mistakes?

We tend to repeat mistakes,

they tend to build up in severity,

till we learn the lesson.

The same is true for others.

We are often incapable of learning from others’ mistakes.

And so are others in learning from yours.

Be understanding, be supportive, and learn together.

Not all steps are equal

How much do you progress?

How does yesterday compare to today?

How large are the steps you take?

How do they differ from day to day?

We can only take one step after the other.

With each step we progress,

With each step, we get closer to our goals.

Yet, not all steps are equal.

Some are more daunting than others.

Some are more important than others.

Step with confidence into the future.

Motivate the demotivated

How do you deal with the demotivated?

How much can you motivate someone?

How long do you wait for improvement?

How many attempts do you make?

Partners, friends, employees, relatives,

all people close to us,

all people that can be demotivated.

We can try to motivate, lead, and support.

But change needs to happen intrinsically.

At some point, we can motivate no longer.

Being disrespected

How often are you disrespected?

How often are you disrespectful?

How do you react to it?

Why are you being disrespected?

Why do you disrespect others?

We all get disrespected at some point.

How we react to it is important.

We might not realize it right away,

however, standing up for yourself is essential.

Sometimes you should walk away.

Communicating the complex

How well do you communicate complex topics?

How important is that skill for you?

How good is the other’s knowledge base?

How much do you need to dumb it down?

We all need to explain what we do to laymen.

The more specialized your knowledge,

the more you need to simplify it for others.

Analogies, simple vocabulary, and standard language

will deliver magic.

Specialist Knowledge

How many topics do you know well?

How deep is your knowledge?

How deep does it need to be?

Do you have specialist partners?

No matter what you do,

There is a huge amount to know.

Information, experience, laws, rules, etc.

If you are not a specialist, find one.

Knowledge is power and essential,

Using it correctly makes things happen.

Sharing is caring?

How much do you share?

When is the right momen to share?

What to share with whom?

What, how much, when with whom?

We want to connect to others.

We connect through sharing.

Vulnerability, emotions, experiences and so on.

The key is picking the right people,

at the right moment with the right depth.

Connection takes time, grace and skill.

Forgive your past self

How easily can you forgive yourself?

How many past decisions do you regret?

Which consequences did they have?

How do you feel about it now?

We need to learn to forgive our past selves.

There is no need to forgive your current self.

Yesterday you were a different person.

Many years ago even more so.

Today you can decide your tomorrow.

Outpacing the past is your recipe.

Rejection

How do you react to rejection?

Why do you react this way?

How can you leverage rejection?

How could you react differently?

Rejection can be difficult to take.

Some of us receive more than others.

Some of us can take it better others worse.

Our experiences in life directly affect this.

Rejection is feedback - so we can improve.

Rejection does not define you.

Will the rejection matter in five years?

Try something new

How often do you try new things?

Why do you try them?

Why don’t you try them?

How does it make you feel?

Trying new things is enriching.

How much is very individual.

For some, it is a big step.

Others do it easily.

Yet some, do it too often.

Truth or not?

How easily do you believe people?

How much of what you read is true?

How often do you tell the truth?

Why is anyone compelled to lie?

Most of what we are told is incorrect.

Some is altered on purpose.

Some is altered accidentally.

Greed, laziness, incompetence, distress etc.

Those are some reasons for it.

When it's important fact check everything.

Recognition… why oh why?

How much do you do for recognition?

How often do you receive resentment instead?

How does this differ when you do things for other reasons?

Why is recognition important to you?

Often we expect recognition in some form.

Rarely, will we receive the recognition.

We will often receive hatred, envy or resentment instead.

Recognition is rarely a good reason for anything.

Recognition is an external motivation.

Look for an internal reason, like joy in the task.

Friends in Flux

How much do you cherish friendship?

Does friendship or career come first?

How many friends have you lost so far?

Which of these do you truly miss in life?

People come and leave our lives constantly.

Some of them stay till the end.

Our lives are in constant flux and flow.

Not everyone is adequate for every situation.

Also, your friends go with the flow:

"Friends for a reason, friends for a season, and friends for a lifetime."

Hotel Room Anxiety

How much do you worry about your hotel room?

Do you worry with good reason?

What is it you worry about?

How much can you do in preparation?

All of us have had horrid hotel experiences.

For some of us, they ruin the next one.

We will enter the hotel with anxiety.

Anxiety so overbearing that the room is inadequate.

Which processes can you put in place to mitigate?

How can you lower your anxiety?

One day by One day

How often do you worry about yesterday?

How often do you worry about tomorrow?

How well have you planned today?

How focused are you on today?

You cannot change yesterday, it is over.

You cannot change tomorrow, it is yet to come.

You have full control over today.

Focus on today to change tomorrow.

Strive to be better today than yesterday.

The only competition is you against you.

Yesterday against today

Min and Max Pain

How large is your pain threshold?

How much pain do you need to get going?

How much does pain affect your patience?

How much does pain affect your quality?

Pain is fuel for our engine.

If there is not enough, we stay lazy.

If there is too much we drown.

Patience is pain endurance.

Quality is pain utilization.

What was your last obligation?

How did you feel about it?

Why did you feel that way?

Was there anything useful about it?

We are presented with countless obligations.

Many are put upon us by others.

Most, we do not want to do.

However, some are useful to us.

Obligations can force us to do them.

Which of your obligations lead to positive consequences?

Be brave

What was your last brave action?

When is a brave action appropriate?

When should you choose the safe option?

Do you take enough brave actions?

Most of us do not take enough brave actions.

We over-think and under-act.

To progress you need to move.

Many instances require courage of you.

To be brave is not easy, yet essential.

However, knowing when to go safe is crucial.