| I realized several years ago that there is a difference between what's new and what's important. There is almost nothing new, that's also important. So don't bother about what's new. Instead, look for the things that withstood the time. It's a choice to be distracted with what's new. Some tips: * Replace your smartphone with an old fashion Nokia. If something is really important, people will call you. All the other messages are not important. * Don't read the news. Especially not online news. News is what it's named after: it's new, but rarely important. Terminate your membership on any journal that you have. * If something is free, it's probably mend to distract you. Always think twice when something is "given" to you for free. You're not the customer of Gmail, Youtube, or Google! You're not the customer of commercial tv broadcasters! You're not the customer of free news sites! The customers are the advertisers. If you want something, it's often better when you have to pay for it. * Use a text based web browser (I like elinks). If a webpage cannot be showed correctly, it's probably not interesting to look at. * Don't read books younger than 10 years old. The older the book the better. They stood the wheel of time. There are many books written to do one thing, and one thing only, make a lot of profit. Especially books on self improvement, if they would work, you would never buy a self improvement book again. Which means no profits anymore. * Similar for technology, new technology doesn't mean that it's better. Try to only use technology that stood the wheel of time. E.g. I recently start replacing paper books with ebooks. I think that E-readers are around long enough now to be something that's worthwhile to start using. * Don't care about current stocks and funds trends too much. Current trends are new, but not per definition important. If you put a fixed amount of money into a retirement fund every month, you'll likely have enough when you're 65 to retire. * Don't care about the current house prices and projections too much. If you're going to live in your house for the next 50 years, the current house price nor the projected house price doesn't matter at all. As long as you don't have to sell your house, the house price has zero effect on your life. Good luck! |
- News: Yes, I have stopped reading online news.
- Free: I totally agree with this advice. I have stopped looking for freebies. I only use paid products as much as possible(even for gmail, youtube etc.). Only freebies are taken in when I am trying something new.
- Books: I have an affinity towards self help books which I am planning to cut down. I have to start looking for the solution inward as compared to outward.
- Technology: Yes and No - my job involves catching up to latest technology and implementing technology which came into market 10 years ago. I guess 10 years could be a good batch size.
- Text based browser: My niece of 5 year old is more knowledgable as compared to me when I was 5 years old. It is not that he is genetically smart or better than me. The mediums via which he is learning video, audio, pictures etc. as compared to text make him understand things faster and better. Now, whenever I have to understand a new concept I always go through video tutorial, podcast or a blog with flowcharts and diagrams. I am able to connect the dots faster.
- Stocks and house prices: This is one part where I still don't have a clarity on. I feel manipulated by the bigger forces of the market.