 The 3 Powerful Words That Can Change Your Life Socrates was an Athenian philosopher. In fact, he was considered the greatest philosopher to ever live. But if you were opportune to meet Socrates today and asked him for an advice that can change your life, what advice do you think Socrates may give you? In this video, we'll be sharing with you what's probably the best advice Socrates can ever give you and it's in three simple words. If you're new here, consider subscribing so you won't miss other interesting videos like this. Now take a moment to look around you and see a few people who succeed and millions others who don't. What do you think separate these two groups? Maybe many things but one important reason why most people don't succeed in life is because they really don't know who they are. They are strengths and weaknesses. They are talents, potentials and inabilities. That's why Socrates gave an important advice which is know thyself. In my opinion, the three most important words in English are know yourself. Know yourself first. Before you decide on what to do with your life, which carrier to pursue, who to marry or anything at all, the very first thing you ought to do is to know yourself. But why is this important? Let me tell you a personal story. As a young boy of about 16, I confronted myself with the question about who I am. I really wanted to know what my strengths and weaknesses are. I wanted to know what kind of life I should live as an adult, what career path I should pursue, who I should marry and all of that. Because there is no simple answer to this question, it took me more than two years to really get all of the answers I needed. I had to read books, spend time alone accessing myself and thinking through what I love and hate. The end result of that exercise is that as an adult, I really never have problems saying no to a lot of things. I never have problems saying no to many things because I know myself and I know what I can do that will make me happy. Not just the career path, even when I wanted to get married. Because I know who I am, I simply know who can fit my life. In short, I can tell you that if any exercise can drastically change your life, that's know yourself first. Today we have a world where people's decisions are being influenced by social proof, trends and societal norms. While this seems to make our life easier, it eventually leads us to everlasting sadness. Like for instance, if you are a brilliant student in most countries, your parents want you to become a doctor, lawyer or an engineer. That's the standard of the society and most of us fall for that. So many people dreamed all their life to work in a bank because the society says the bankers are rich, only to discover that they are never happy doing so. The solution to this problem is know yourself first. Every society has the definition of the good woman or the man to marry. If you don't know yourself, you'll fall victim because you are a unique individual. Know yourself first. Our society has the definition of success and that's usually like becoming a millionaire. Unfortunately, nobody is happy because it has a million dollars in the bank. People are happy because they are doing what's in agreement with their inner values. Like for instance, if you know that stealing is a bad thing, stealing a million dollars will not necessarily make you happy because you get that money by doing something which is against your internal value. If you are a personal values family for another example, though the society believes that anyone who makes above $100,000 per year should be happy, you'll be a miserable person even if you make $200,000 but never have time for your family. If you love a serene lifestyle and hate public attention, even though everyone thinks riding a Ferrari is cute, buying one may make you miserable because of the unwanted attention you get as a result. By now, you can see that it's very important to know who you are but let me emphasize this, you are a unique individual who is completely different from everyone in the world. For you to become truly happy and successful, you have to say no to most things everyone thinks is normal. Instead, you have to make decisions based on your deep understanding of who you are. Now, how can you know for certain who you are? 1. Stop thinking that the society's norms are made for you Every society has many unwritten norms and customs. If you grew up in the US, you may think it's normal to buy things you cannot afford since you can always use your credit card. If you grew up in India, you may think it's normal for women to pay dowry to marry men. Every society has some very silly customs which everyone blindly follows. However, if you truly want to live a happy life, you have to sit back and separate yourself from the societal pressures. Without this, you may never have the opportunity to know that you are a unique human being who should think and make decisions based on what works for him, not based on what everyone thinks is right. 2. Spend a lot of time alone Ours is a very noisy world. We are the busiest generation ever in the history of the world. Our attention span was once in minutes. Now it's in seconds. We rush through everything and even while we have nothing to do, the internet gives us more than enough. We can connect with people via social media and spend as much hours as we wish. We spend time with our works, our friends and our phones but we've got no time to spend with ourselves. You think about that. The reason why you know your friends or spouse is because you spend a lot of time with them. How then can you know yourself if you don't spend time with yourself? Cultivate the habit of staying alone without any distraction from your phone or the TV. Just meditate about your past. Think about the time in the past when you feel so happy. Think about things you were doing at that time. Think about some very important decisions in your life like career and marriage decisions and think about things that influence you to take those decisions the way you did. To know yourself, you have to spend time with yourself. 3. Write down three things you do with extreme ease even though your friends find them difficult to do. I love writing and I never knew how important writing will be in my career. Today, I've made more money from writing than anyone in my family can ever believe but I also know so many people who cannot write a thousand words with ease. What are those things you do with extreme ease? How can you monetize them? If you don't know any answer to these two questions, kindly ask people you think you may know because you may discover that your life's career is simply a hobby of yours. 4. Answer this question, if there is no money, what career path would you follow? One of the worst mistakes people make is to follow a career path that promises much money. If you do this, you'll wake up one day with a lot of money and zero fulfillment. If you have all the money in the world, what job would you do? As for me, if I suddenly become richer than Bill Gates, I'll still love to do business, write and teach business because I just love those games. What would you do if you need no money? That may be what you should do now because that's an indication to what makes you happy. 5. Pause and question common assumptions The society says that I'll be happy if I'm famous, is that true? The society says that I'll be rich if I graduate from school as one of the best students, is that true? The society says that I'll be fine and happy if I work for big companies like Apple and Google, is that true? Based on who I am and what I know about myself, are all these assumptions true? Make it your habit to pause and question common assumptions. This will make you to know the difference between the food that's truly right for you and the food that the society wants to feed you. 6. Read a few books about temperament Many years ago, I borrowed a book from one of my friends. It's titled Why You Act the Way You Do by Tim Laa Yee. I advise you should read this great book. Reading this book changed my life. I got to know my temperament and those of others I met. This way, I don't just know who I am, I become more tolerant and understanding about other people because I can know people's temperament within a few hours of working with them. Knowing your temperament will reveal many of your strengths and weaknesses to you, what to focus your energy on and what to avoid completely. 7. Read other good books People who are more decisive are usually people who are confident. People who are confident are usually people who read because knowing what others don't know makes us have the confidence we need to do what we ought to do whether they approve it or not. Somehow, we tend to believe that we are better than those we know more than so we can easily do anything they don't approve. Expand your knowledge and you will have confidence to know yourself. A spoon can never do a good job of writing. A bird can never do a good job of swimming. A horse can never do a good job of climbing the tree. Living under the sun is unique and so are you. You can never function very well in life until you know yourself, so I advise that you should know yourself first. 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