Do you ever sit in a room alone and think? I can probably guess your bank balance by how you answer that question...Great people think deeply. And they do it often. In a routine...

[Here is a picture from this week where Megan and Elsie held a "which book to buy" contest at Barnes and Noble]

[And the winner is.. They decided "How To Win Friends and Influence People" by Dale Carnegie was the best book for the day]
 

Solving All Your Problems...

For today's Book-Of-The-Day, I was reading Pensees by Blaise Pascal, the famous mathematician.

He says, “All of humanity's problems stem from man's inability to sit quietly in a room alone.”

Ponder that for a few minutes.

I don't care if you make $1,000 a year or $1 million - that's powerful.

What if Pascal is right and that is truly the solution to the problems of civilization and the problems of your life?

How simple would that make life?

Sometimes the answer is right under your nose.

To me life is only about 2 things:

1. Planning

2. Executing

Some people are good at executing but on the wrong plan. That is the worst.

Joel Salatin used to tell me, "There is nothing worse than realizing you are good at the wrong thing."

That is most of the modern world. They have a skill in some job they hate.

Most people live out a life of quiet desperation while daily building skill in some job they loathe. You don't ever want to be that person.

You are better to sell everything, be homeless, get a motorcycle and drive across South America like Che Guevara in Motorcycle Diaries (amazing movie to watch by the way)...

 

Something Free For You...
 

The Link: >>Click Here To Visit My iTunes Podcast Show

Some people are good at planning but not at executing. That is more rare but still happens. Planning is harder than executing. Controlling the mind is a beast. It's difficult.

That's why I asked you - how many hours do you sit alone in a room quietly with no distractions, no iPhone, no Facebook and think deeply

 

Think Like Bobby Fisher...
 

I call this "Chess-like thinking." Thinking things through thoroughly. Planning for the best case. Planning for the worst case.

What happens if you can't pay your bills? What happens if the economy tanks? What happens if your close friend betrays you? What happens if you make a profit?

Going three or four moves deep...

Like Lao Tzu says, "Prepare for what is difficult when it is easy." You don't want to be making a plan after something happens. Jim Rohn used to say, "Prepare for tomorrow, today."

Let me add, when I say sit alone and think I'm not talking about "searching for the truth within." Most of you know I don't really believe in that philosophy and have spoken on it extensively here on my new podcast, "The Grand Theory Of Everything."

You should be sitting alone thinking, pondering, recombining the thoughts, knowledge and experience you are gaining from reading about and mentoring under the world's greatest minds.

It's a balance. You must both take in new ideas and then use deep thought to process it all into your daily activity.

Like Dale Carnegie says in How to Win Friends and Influence People, “Only knowledge that is used sticks in your mind.”

Think. Think. Think. Figure out how to apply it.

The world is moved forward by thinkers. Not consumers. Not morons. Not selfish entitled brats.

Thinkers.

The Thinking Chair...
 

Start practically. Devote 10 minutes a day to sitting in a chair (I have a library with one chair in it I use) and just thinking.

[Here is a photo of the lonely, single chair in my library]

Make sure you don't have any electronics in the room. Start with 10 minutes and work up to 60 minutes. Let me know how it works for you?

Quote Of The Day: “Reading furnishes the mind only with materials of knowledge; it is thinking that makes what we read ours.” ― John Locke