Rules can suck. They can be inhibiting. They can, in certain circumstances, liberate us, free us to live how we can, to become who we have the potential to become.
If you want to live a good, great, happy, successful life, try adopting these 4 rules.
Believe
Believe that you have the capacity, the potential, the ability to do what you want and become who you want to become.
That burning desire in your belly, that thing you dream about, even unconsciously and are a bit to afraid to voice it, to make it real, believe that you can make it happen.
Actually, believe that you were put here to do that thing, to become that man, to live that life.
“To feel ambition and to act upon it is to embrace the unique calling of our souls. Not to act upon that ambition is to turn our backs on ourselves and on the reason for our existence.”
If this quote from Steven Pressfield is true, and I believe it is, then your ambition is your soul telling you what you’re here to do.
It’s an intuition urging you to live a certain way and to pursue something, even if it’s an ideal, that will give meaning to this struggle that is living, to the uncertainty in living.
You need to believe in yourself, your abilities, in your mission.
It’s a choice, to believe or not to believe.
One has upside, the other (no belief) is filled with downside.
This belief will provide courage, which will allow you to take risks, which will allow you to aim higher, to experience more, to get more from life because you’ll give more to life.
Get better every day
This is the essential task.
Everything here will help with this task.
The task is to get better every day, in every way. To work harder every day, to learn more, to read more, to get smarter, tougher, to do what you must do, to be less lazy, less envious, less entitled.
To do this, define what you want to get rid of (those things that are holding you back, characteristics, habits, and so on).
…And work on getting rid of those things.
It’s easier to know what we ought not to do than what we ought to do.
Just like it’s clearer what we don’t want than what we do want.
No matter what’s going on in life, get better.
Rise daily with that mission in mind.
Never pity yourself
Never, ever ever ever ever ever, pity yourself.
Never look at where you are and feel bad about it. Never feel sorry for yourself or something you’ve done or where you are or who you are.
It just makes life worse. It makes the good impossible, magnifies the bad, it’s a lie, it’s not true, and it’s weak.
Guard your thoughts from this line of thinking. Be very careful about what you allow to take root in your mind.
Pity can consume potential and remove any possibility of happiness from your life. Never let it enter your brain, as a rule.
Enjoy life
Enjoy life. Seems too simple and cliche to really be an impactful call to action, but keep those two words in mind, and it can be.
We have this single life. This very limited existence, and within it we have millions of choices and decisions we can make. We can choose what to say and how to think and how to live. We can choose to enjoy this experience by doing things we love, but also by enjoying the struggle, finding pleasure in the pain, in the journey, in the worst of the worst shit thrown our way.
Much of the time this choice is simple a decision to enjoy life. Two words we say to ourselves that ends up changing how we look at what we’re going through, where we are, and what path we’re currently on. Much of what we currently do not enjoy can be enjoyed. Much of our inaction is because of laziness and fear, but if we’d live by those two simple words we’d end up doing more.
To enjoy life isn’t to be a smiling idiot who has no lows. But it does mean a shift in perspective that can dramatically change this fleeting experience for the better.
Be Legendary,
Chad Howse
