TOP 10 LESSONS LEARNED FROM THE BOOK “THE ART OF THE GOOD LIFE”

1. Peak-end Rule:

You remember the high point and the end point of your holiday, but the rest is forgotten.

Remind to make them as sweet as possible.

2. Plans are nothing. Planning is everything.

A good life is not a stable state or condition.

The good life is only achieved through constant readjustment.

3. Inflexibility as a Stratagem

When it comes to important issues, flexibility isn’t an advantage – it’s a trap.

Use radical inflexibility to reach long-term goals that would be unrealizable if their behavior were more flexible.

4. Reality Doesn’t Care About Your Feelings

Accepting reality is easy when you like what you see, but you’ve got to accept it even when you don’t – especially when you don’t.

5. Counter-productivity

A basic rule of the good life is as follows: if it doesn’t genuinely contribute something, you can do without it.

Next time, try switching on your brain instead of reaching for the nearest gadget.

6. Do Nothing Wrong and the Right Thing Will Happen

So do your best to systematically eliminate the downside in your life – then you’ll have a real chance of achieving a good life.

There are old pilots and there are bold pilots, but there are no bold old pilots.

7. Why You Didn’t Earn Your Successes

Your success are fundamentally based on things over which you have no control whatsoever.

Stay humble. Remind yourself daily that everything you are, everything you have and can do, is the result of blind chance.

8. Don’t make your emotions your compass.

Because our emotions are so unreliable, a good rule of thumb is to take them less seriously – especially the negative ones.

9. THE Authenticity Trap

Restrict authenticity to keeping your promises and acting according to your principles.

The rest is nobody else’s business.

10. THE 5 Second No

Once Seneca said: “All those who summon you to themselves, turn you away from your own self.”

So give the five-second no a trial run. If you cannot say ‘Yes’ to something in five seconds, the answer is ‘No’.