𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗰𝗿𝘆 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗱𝗶𝗲,📔

𝘄𝗵𝗼 𝘄𝗶𝗹𝗹 𝗰𝗿𝘆 𝘄𝗵𝗲𝗻 𝘆𝗼𝘂 𝗱𝗶𝗲,📔 Preface I honor you for picking up this book. In doing so, you have made the decision to live more deliberately, more joyfully and completely. You have decided to live your life by choice rather than by chance, by design rather than by default. And for this, I applaud you. Since writing the two previous books in The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari series, I have received countless letters from readers who saw their lives change through the wisdom they discovered. The comments of these men and women inspired and moved me. Many of the notes I received also encouraged me to distill all that I have learned about the art of living into a series of life lessons. And so, I set about compiling the best I have to give into a book that I truly believe will help transform your life. The words on the following pages are heartfelt and written in the high hope that you will not only connect with the wisdom I respectfully offer but act on it to create lasting improvements in every life area. Through my own trials, I have found that it is not enough to know what to do—we must act on that knowledge in order to have the lives we want. And so as you turn the pages of this third book in The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari series, I hope you will discover a wealth of wisdom that will enrich the quality of your professional, personal and spiritual life. Please do write to me, send me an e-mail or visit with me at one of my seminars to share how you have integrated the lessons in this book into the way you live. I will do my very best to respond to your letters with a personal note. I wish you deep peace, great prosperity and many happy days spent engaged in a worthy purpose. 1. Discover Your Calling When I was growing up, my father said something to me I will never forget, “Son, when you were born, you cried while the world rejoiced. Live your life in such a way that when you die the world cries while you rejoice.” We live in an age when we have forgotten what life is all about. We can easily put a person on the Moon, but we have trouble walking across the street to meet a new neighbor. We can fire a missile across the world with pinpoint accuracy, but we have trouble keeping a date with our children to go to the library. We have e-mail, fax machines and digital phones so that we can stay connected and yet we live in a time where human beings have never been less connected. We have lost touch with our humanity. We have lost touch with our purpose. We have lost sight of the things that matter the most. And so, as you start this book, I respectfully ask you, Who will cry when you die? How many lives will you touch while you have the privilege to walk this planet? What impact will your life have on the generations that follow you? And what legacy will you leave behind after you have taken your last breath? One of the lessons I have learned in my own life is that if you don’t act on life, life has a habit of acting on you. The days slip into weeks, the weeks slip into months and the months slip into years. Pretty soon it’s all over and you are left with nothing more than a heart filled with regret over a life half lived. George Bernard Shaw was asked on his deathbed, “What would you do if you could live your life over again?” He reflected, then replied with a deep sigh: “I’d like to be the person I could have been but never was.” I’ve written this book so that this will never happen to you. As a professional speaker, I spend much of my work life delivering keynote addresses at conferences across North America, flying from city to city, sharing my insights on leadership in business and in life with many different people. Though they all come from diverse walks of life, their questions invariably center on the same things these days: How can I find greater meaning in my life? How can I make a lasting contribution through my work? and How can I simplify so that I can enjoy the journey of life before it is too late? My answer always begins the same way: Find your calling. I believe we all have special talents that are just waiting to be engaged in a worthy pursuit. We are all here for some unique purpose, some noble objective that will allow us to manifest our highest human potential while we, at the same time, add value to the lives around us. Finding your calling doesn’t mean you must leave the job you now have. It simply means you need to bring more of yourself into your work and focus on the things you do best. It means you have to stop waiting for other people to make the changes you desire and, as Mahatma Gandhi noted: “Be the change that you wish to see most in your world.” And once you do, your life will change.

2. Every Day, Be Kind to a Stranger On his deathbed, Aldous Huxley reflected on his entire life’s learning and then summed it up in seven simple words: “Let us be kinder to one another.”All too often, we believe that in order to live a truly fulfilling life we must achieve some great act or grand feat that will put us on the front covers of magazines and newspapers. Nothing could be further from the truth. A meaningful life is made up of a series of daily acts of decency and kindness, which, ironically, add up to something truly great over the course of a lifetime. Everyone who enters your life has a lesson to teach and a story to tell. Every person you pass during the moments that make up your days represents an opportunity to show a little more of the compassion and courtesy that define your humanity. Why not start being more of the person you truly are during your days and doing what you can to enrich the world around you? In my mind, if you make even one person smile during your day or brighten the mood of even one stranger, your day has been a worthwhile one. Kindness, quite simply, is the rent we must pay for the space we occupy on this planet. Become more creative in the ways you show compassion to strangers. Paying the toll for the person in the car behind you, offering your seat on the subway to someone in need and being the first to say hello are great places to start. Recently, I received a letter from a reader of The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari who lives in Washington State. In it she wrote: “I have a practice of tithing to people who have helped me along my spiritual path. Please accept the enclosed check of $100 with my blessing and gratitude.” I quickly responded to her generous act by sending one of my audiotape programs in return so she received value for the gift she sent me. Her gesture was a great lesson in the importance of giving sincerely and from the heart.

3. Maintain Your Perspective One day, according to an old story, a man with a serious illness was wheeled into a hospital room where another patient was resting on a bed next to the window. As the two became friends, the one next to the window would look out of it and then spend the next few hours delighting his bedridden companion with vivid descriptions of the world outside. Some days he would describe the beauty of the trees in the park across from the hospital and how the leaves danced in the wind. On other days, he would entertain his friend with step-by-step replays of the things people were doing as they walked by the hospital. However, as time went on, the bedridden man grew frustrated at his inability to observe the wonders his friend described. Eventually he grew to dislike him and then to hate him intensely. One night, during a particularly bad coughing fit, the patient next to the window stopped breathing. Rather than pressing the button for help, the other man chose to do nothing. The next morning the patient who had given his friend so much happiness by recounting the sights outside the window was pronounced dead and wheeled out of the hospital room. The other man quickly asked that his bed be placed next to the window, a request that was complied with by the attending nurse. But as he looked out the window, he discovered something that made him shake: the window faced a stark brick wall. His former roommate had conjured up the incredible sights that he described in his imagination as a loving gesture to make the world of his friend a little bit better during a difficult time. He had acted out of selfless love. This story never fails to create a shift in my own perspective when I think about it. To live happier, more fulfilling lives, when we encounter a difficult circumstance, we must keep shifting our perspective and continually ask ourselves, “Is there a wiser, more enlightened way of looking at this seemingly negative situation?” Stephen Hawking, one of the greatest physicists ever, is reported to have said that we live on a minor planet of a very average star located within the outer limits of one of a hundred thousand million galaxies. How’s that for a shift in perspective? Given this information, are your troubles really that big? Are the problems you have experienced or the challenges you might currently be facing really as serious as you have made them out to be? We walk this planet for such a short time. In the overall scheme of things, our lives are mere blips on the canvas of eternity. So have the wisdom to enjoy the journey and savor the process.

4. Practice Tough Love The golden thread of a highly successful and meaningful life is self-discipline. Discipline allows you to do all those things you know in your heart you should do but never feel like doing. Without self-discipline, you will not set clear goals, manage your time effectively, treat people well, persist through the tough times, care for your health or think positive thoughts. I call the habit of self-discipline “Tough Love” because getting tough with yourself is actually a very loving gesture. By being stricter with yourself, you will begin to live life more deliberately, on your own terms rather than simply reacting to life the way a leaf floating in a stream drifts according to the flow of the current on a particular day. As I teach in one of my seminars, the tougher you are on yourself, the easier life will be on you. The quality of your life ultimately is shaped by the quality of your choices and decisions, ones that range from the career you choose to pursue to the books you read, the time that you wake up every morning and the thoughts you think during the hours of your days. When you consistently flex your willpower by making those choices that you know are the right ones (rather than the easy ones), you take back control of your life. Effective, fulfilled people do not spend their time doing what is most convenient and comfortable. They have the courage to listen to their hearts and to do the wise thing. This habit is what makes them great. “The successful person has the habit of doing the things failures don’t like to do,” remarked essayist and thinker E. M. Gray. “They don’t like doing them either, necessarily. But their disliking is subordinated to the strength of their purpose.” The nineteenth-century English writer Thomas Henry Huxley arrived at a similar conclusion, noting: “Perhaps the most valuable result of all education is the ability to make yourself do the thing you have to do, when it ought to be done, whether you like it or not.” And Aristotle made this point of wisdom in yet another way: “Whatever we learn to do, we learn by actually doing it: men come to be builders, for instance, by building, and harp players, by playing the harp. In the same way, by doing just acts we come to be just; by doing self-controlled acts, we come to be self-controlled; and by doing brave acts, we come to be brave.”

5. Keep a Journal Maintaining a daily journal is one of the best personal growth initiatives you will ever take. Writing down your daily experiences along with the lessons you have drawn from them will make you wiser with each passing day. You will develop self-awareness and make fewer mistakes. And keeping a journal will help clarify your intentions so that you remain focused on the things that truly count. Writing in a journal offers you the opportunity to have regular one-on-one conversations with yourself. It forces you to do some deep thinking in a world where deep thinking is a thing of the past. It will also make you a clearer thinker and help you live in a more intentional and enlightened way. In addition, it provides a central place where you can record your insights on important issues, note key success strategies that have worked for you and commit to all those things you know are important to achieve for a high-quality professional, personal and spiritual life. And your personal journal gives you a private place to flex your imagination and define your dreams. A journal is not a diary. A diary is a place where you record events while a journal is a place where you analyze and evaluate them. Keeping a journal encourages you to consider what you do, why you do it and what you have learned from all you have done. And writing in a journal promotes personal growth and wisdom by giving you a forum to study, and then leverage, your past for greater success in your future. Medical researchers have even found that writing in a private journal for as little time as 15 minutes a day can improve health, functioning of your immune system and your overall attitude. Remember, if your life is worth thinking about, it is worth writing about.

6. Develop an Honesty Philosophy We live in a world of broken promises. We live in a time when people treat their words lightly. We tell a friend we will call her next week for lunch knowing full well we do not have the time to do so. We promise a co-worker we will bring in that new book we love so much knowing full well that we never lend out our books. And we promise ourselves this will be the year we will get back into shape, simplify our lives and have more fun without any real intention of making the deep life changes necessary to achieve these goals. Saying things we don’t really mean becomes a habit when we practice it long enough. The real problem is that when you don’t keep your word, you lose credibility. When you lose credibility, you break the bonds of trust. And breaking the bonds of trust ultimately leads to a string of broken relationships. To develop an honesty philosophy, begin to monitor how many small untruths you tell over the course of a week. Go on what I call a “truth fast” for the next seven days and vow to be completely honest in all your dealings with others—and with yourself. Every time you fail to do the right thing, you fuel the habit of doing the wrong thing. Every time you do not tell the truth, you feed the habit of being untruthful. When you promise someone you will do something, do it. Be a person of your word rather than being “all talk and no action.” As Mother Teresa said, “there should be less talk; a preaching point is not a meeting point. What do you do then? Take a broom and clean someone’s house. That says enough.”

7. Honor Your Past Every second you dwell on the past you steal from your future. Every minute you spend focusing on your problems you take away from finding your solutions. And thinking about all those things that you wish never happened to you is actually blocking all the things you want to happen from entering into your life. Given the timeless truth that holds that you become what you think about all day long, it makes no sense to worry about past events or mistakes unless you want to experience them for a second time. Instead, use the lessons you have learned from your past to rise to a whole new level of awareness and enlightenment. Life’s greatest setbacks reveal life’s biggest opportunities. As the ancient thinker Euripides noted, “There is in the worst of fortune the best chances for a happy change.” If you have suffered more than your fair share of difficulties in life, perhaps you are being prepared to serve some greater purpose that will require you to be equipped with the wisdom you have acquired through your trials. Use these life lessons to fuel your future growth. Remember, happy people have often experienced as much adversity as those who are unhappy. What sets them apart is that they have the good sense to manage their memories in a way that enriches their lives. And understand that if you have failed more than others, there is a very good chance you are living more completely than others. Those who take more chances and dare to be more and do more than others will naturally experience more failures. But personally, I would rather have the bravery to try something and then fail than never to have tried it at all. I would much prefer spending the rest of my days expanding my human frontiers and trying to make the seemingly impossible probable than live a life of comfort, security and mediocrity. That’s the essence of true life success. As Herodotus noted so sagely, “It is better by noble boldness to run the risk of being subject to half of the evils we anticipate than to remain in cowardly listlessness for fear of what may happen.” Or as Booker T. Washington said, “I have learned that success is to be measured not so much by the position that one has reached in life as by the obstacles he has overcome while trying to succeed.”

8. Start Your Day Well The way you begin your day determines the way you will live your day. I call the first thirty minutes after you wake up “The Platinum 30” since they are truly the most valuable moments of your day and have a profound influence on the quality of every minute that follows. If you have the wisdom and self-discipline to ensure that, during this key period, you think only the purest of thoughts and take only the finest of actions, you will notice that your days will consistently unfold in the most marvelous ways. Recently, I took my two young children to see the thrilling IMAX movie Everest. Aside from the breathtaking imagery and the powerful acts of heroism portrayed, there was one point that stayed with me: in order for the mountain- climbers to scale the summit, it was essential for them to have a good base camp. It was impossible for them to get to the top without that camp at the bottom that offered them a sanctuary for rest, renewal and replenishing. Once they reached Camp Two, they then returned to the base for a few weeks to recharge their batteries. On reaching Camp Three, they hastily retreated to base camp to prepare for the trek to Camp Four. And on reaching Camp Four, they again went back down the mountain to base camp before making their final push for the summit. In the same way, I think that every one of us, in order to reach our personal summits and master the daily challenges of our own lives, needs to revisit our base camps during “The Platinum 30.” We need to go to a place where we can reconnect to our life’s mission, renew our selves and refocus on the things that matter most. In my own life, I have developed a very effective morning ritual that consistently gets my day off to a joyful and peace-filled start. After waking, I head down to my “personal sanctuary,” a little space I have created for myself where I can practice my renewal activities without being disturbed. I then spend about fifteen minutes in silent contemplation, focusing on all the good things in my life and envisioning the day that I expect is about to unfold. Next I pick up a book from the wisdom literature, one rich with those timeless truths of successful living that are so easy to forget in these fast-paced times we live in. Examples include Meditations by the Roman philosopher Marcus Aurelius, The Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and Walden by Henry David Thoreau. The lessons in these works center me on the things that truly count and help launch my day on the right footing. And the wisdom I read during that precious early morning period infuses and enlightens every remaining minute of my day. So start your day well. You will never be the same. 9. Learn to Say No Gracefully It is easy to say yes to every request on your time when the priorities of your life are unclear. When your days are not guided by a rich and inspiring vision for your future, a clear image of an end result that will help you act more intentionally, it is not hard for the agendas of those around you to dictate your actions. As I wrote in Leadership Wisdom from The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari, “if your priorities don’t get scheduled into your planner, other people’s priorities will get put into your planner.” The solution is to be clear about your life’s highest objectives and then to learn to say no with grace. The Chinese sage Chuang-tzu told the story of a man who forged swords for a maharaja. Even at the age of ninety, his work was carried out with exceptional precision and ability. No matter how rushed he was, he never made even the slightest slip. One day, the maharaja asked the old man, “Is this a natural talent or is there some special technique that you use to create your remarkable results?” “It is concentration on the essentials,” replied the sword- crafter. “I took to forging swords when I was twenty-one years old. I did not care about anything else. If it was not a sword, I did not look at it or pay any attention to it. Forging swords became my passion and my purpose. I took all the energy that I did not give in other directions and put it in the direction of my art. This is the secret to my mastery.” The most effective people concentrate on their “areas of excellence,” that is, on the things they do best and on those high-impact activities that will advance their lifework. In being so consumed by the important things, they find it easy to say no to the less-than-worthy distractions that clamor for their attention. Michael Jordan, the best basketball player in the game’s history, did not negotiate his contracts, design his uniforms and prepare his travel schedules. He focused his time and energies on what he did best: playing basketball, and delegated everything else to his handlers. Jazz great Louis Armstrong did not spend his time selling tickets to his shows and setting up chairs for the audience. He concentrated on his point of brilliance: playing the trumpet. Learning to say no to the non-essentials will give you more time to devote to the things that have the power to truly improve the way you live and help you leave the legacy you know in your heart you are destined to leave.

10. Take a Weekly Sabbatical In ancient days, the seventh day of the week was known as the Sabbath. Reserved for some of life’s most important, yet commonly neglected pursuits, including spending time with one’s family and hours in deep reflection and self- renewal, it provided a chance for hard-working people to renew their batteries and spend a day living life more fully. However, as the pace of life quickened and more activities began to compete for people’s attention, this wonderful tradition was lost along with the tremendous personal benefits that flowed from it. Stress itself is not a bad thing. It can often help us perform at our best, expand beyond our limits and achieve things that would otherwise astonish us. Just ask any elite athlete. The real problem lies in the fact that in this age of global anxiety we do not get enough relief from stress. So to revitalize yourself and nourish the deepest part of you, plan for a weekly period of peace—a weekly sabbatical—to get back to the simpler pleasures of life, pleasures that you may have given up as your days grew busier and your life more complex. Bringing this simple ritual into your weeks will help you reduce stress, connect with your more creative side and feel far happier in every role of your life. Your weekly sabbatical does not have to last a full day. All you need are a few hours alone, perhaps on a quiet Sunday morning, when you can spend some time doing the things you love to do the most. Ideas include spending time in your favorite bookstore, watching the sun rise, taking a solitary walk along a beach and writing in your journal. Organizing your life so that you get to do more of the things you love to do is one of the first steps to life improvement. Who cares if others don’t understand what you are trying to accomplish by making the weekly sabbatical an essential part of your life. Do it for yourself, you are worth it. In the words of Thoreau, “If a man does not keep pace with his companions, perhaps it is because he hears a different drummer. Let him step to the music which he hears, however measured or far away.”