On improving yourself, reading more and being in the moment
Hi there! I'm Haikal. You are receiving this email because you signed up to Sunday Shorts, a biweekly newsletter about effective learning.
Hey friends!
This issue is the 25th newsletter, a milestone for me! Thank you to everyone who signed up for reading my ideas and thoughts.
That being said, here are 3 Ideas I learned this Week, 2 Ideas from Me, and 1 Question for you.
3 Ideas I Learned This Week
Charlie Munger on the importance of blocking an hour every day to improving yourself
“In an interview he gave for his authorized biography Buffett told this story: Charlie, as a very young lawyer, was probably getting $20 an hour. He thought to himself, “Who’s my most valuable client?” And he decided it was himself. So he decided to sell himself an hour each day. He did it early in the morning, working on these construction projects and real estate deals. Everybody should do this, be the client, and then work for other people, too, and sell yourself an hour a day.”
Source: The Buffett Formula: Going to Bed Smarter Than When You Woke Up
Beethoven produced his best music when he was deaf
“Writing in 1801, at the age of 30, Ludwig van Beethoven complained about his diminishing hearing: “from a distance I do not hear the high notes of the instruments and the singers’ voices.”
As Arthur C. Brooks recounts in a 2019 op-ed, published in the Washington Post, Beethoven “raged” against his decline, insisting on performing, pounding pianos to ruin in a futile attempt to hear his own notes. By the age 45, he was completely deaf. He considered suicide, one friend reported, but was held back only by the force of “moral rectitude.”It’s here that Beethoven’s story veers toward legend. Cut off from the world of sound around him, working only with musical structures dancing through his imagination, at times holding a pencil in his mouth against his piano’s soundboard to feel the consonance of his chords, Beethoven produced the best music of his career, culminating in his incomparable Ninth Symphony, a composition so daringly new that it reinvented classical musical altogether.”
Derek Sivers on the lifestyle of the happiest people he knows
“People with a well-paying job ask my advice because they want to quit to become full-time artists.
But full-time artists ask my advice because they’re finding it impossible to make money.
(Let’s define “art” as anything you do for expression, even just blogging or whatever.)
For both of them, I prescribe the lifestyle of the happiest people I know:
Have a well-paying job. Seriously pursue your art for love, not money.”
2 Ideas From Me
Everyone knows we should read more books, but how can we read more books? In this article, I outline some ways we could use to read more. (I’ve completed 2 books this year by using this method)
How To Use Metacognition to Learn Better In Medical School
The best skill you can learn is learning how to learn. Start learning how to learn by practising metacognition, and from there, you can learn more things! (Meta or what)
1 Question for You
When faced with a problem, ask yourself: Can you really control it?
The most effective people focus on what they can control. They focus on being proactive instead of reactive.
If you’re thinking of the past, you get nostalgic. Thinking of the future leads to anxiety. By being in the moment and thinking of what you can control, you’ll be at peace.
Thanks for reading!
Haikal
P.S. If you found this helpful, could you give me a hand and share it?