The 3-2-1 Newsletter: 3 ideas from me, 2 quotes from others, 1 question to ponder.
3-2-1: On creating meaning, the remarkable odds of your existence, and life instructions
February 27, 2020 | by James Clear
3 IDEAS FROM ME
I.
“Aim to be great in 10 years.
Build health habits today that lead to a great body in 10 years.
Build social habits today that lead to great relationships in 10 years.
Build learning habits today that lead to great knowledge in 10 years.
Long-term thinking is a secret weapon.”
II.
“If you…
1) develop a bias for moving fast
2) consistently ask, “What’s the real goal here and is there a better way to accomplish it?”
… you can accomplish a lot in one life.”
III.
“You can create a lot of meaning in your own life by helping someone else do something that is meaningful to them.”
2 QUOTES FROM OTHERS
I.
The author and generally hilarious human,?Bill Bryson,?on the remarkable odds of your existence:
“Not one of your pertinent ancestors was squashed, devoured, drowned, starved, stranded, stuck fast, untimely wounded, or otherwise deflected from its life’s quest of delivering a tiny charge of genetic material to the right partner at the right moment in order to perpetuate the only possible sequence of hereditary combinations that could result — eventually, astoundingly, and all too briefly — in you.
Bonus quote:
Bryson’s description reminds me of a comment by the astrophysicist?Carl Sagan?on the rarity of life in the universe:
“Extinction is the rule. Survival is the exception.”
Sources:?A Short History of Nearly Everything?and?The Varieties of Scientific Experience: A Personal View of the Search for God??
II.
The poet and Pulitzer Prize winner?Mary Oliver?with some suggestions for your one precious life:
“Instructions for living a life: Pay attention. Be astonished. Tell about it.”
Source:?Red Bird
1 QUESTION FOR YOU
What would 10-year-old me say? What would 80-year-old me say?
Until next week,
James Clear
Author of the million-copy bestseller,?Atomic Habits
Creator of?The Habits Academy?and the?Habit Journal
P.S.?Not in this grocery store.
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