The Negotiations Situation

Imagine there are three research companies A, B, and C. Because they’re in such an important field, the government is giving them a grant, but it’s structured a bit strangely! The companies are presented with the being able to pick only one of the following options:

Company A+B = $600,000
Company A+C = $800,000
Company B+C = $1,000,000
Company A+B+C = $1,100,000

Pretend you are one of the companies, what is your strategy to maximize your returns?

A Company Value Analysis

Because the government grants contracts to each pair of companies, each company has a certain value in the government’s eyes:

Company A = $200,000
Company B = $400,000
Company C = $600,000

You can do a quick check to see that these add up to the totals for the contracts above!

Of course this means that any of the companies can work with any of the other companies and come to this theoretical value for the deal. For example, Company A can work with Company B or Company C to get their $200,000 fair share. Or, the three of them can work together and split the $100,000 difference somehow ($200k + $400k + $600k = $1.2 mil, which is $100k more than the $1.1 mil offered by the government!)

So what’s the deal that should result?

A Loop For The 50-50 People

This is an interesting situation that presents a loop to the 50-50 people, assuming that everyone is going for these theoretical company values. Company A can offer Company B $400,001 and only take $199,999 to try to get the deal. However, Company C can in turn offer Company A $200,001 while Company C takes $599,999. Knowing that offer though, Company B might offer Company C $600,001 while Company B takes $399,999. But then Company A can….

This situation just never made sense to me in college. Wouldn’t the loop just go on forever and ever?

As I asked this question, the results for the class came in and a variety of deals developed. Some with Company A taking $150,000 and Company B taking $450,000. Some with Company B taking $380,000 and Company C taking $620,000. Some with Company A taking $210,000 and Company B taking $390,000. It all seemed so random!

The part that just kept bugging me was, why would Company B choose to take $390,000 when Company C is probably offering him $400,001? Wouldn’t it make sense to switch over to Company C’s deal?

Think about the situation for a second… what would you do?

How The Solution Makes Sense In The Context Of Generosity

After an hour or so of talking with the professor and my classmates, the answer to the burning question of “What does Company B get in exchange for that $10,001 difference?” finally emerged. It is… the deal! That’s right – by taking $10,001 less, Company B was able to secure the deal!

For some people, they’d probably much prefer to be in the situation where Company B took $450,000 and Company A took $150,000. However, in the long run, it might actually be better to be taking the $390,000! By taking $390,000 as opposed to going for the $450,000, Company B significantly increases the chance of getting the deal! Besides, life is a series of such “free” pies that are created. That $10,001 can bring a lot more of those!

Even from the perspective of the deal at hand though, by getting a deal, Company B gets $390,000 extra. By losing the deal, it gets nothing. It only needs to increase its chance of getting the deal by 1/400 in order for that $10,001 “loss” to be justified! This is not to mention the goodwill Company B would get from Company A by giving that $10,001. If such a situation arises again in the future, Company A might just go straight to Company B and not even talk to Company C! That’s what generosity does for you!

However, do note that this tradeoff does level off at some point. For example, if Company B only took $10, either the other companies would pretty much accept immediately. In this case though, it’ll need a lot more deals to make up for the $399,990 it missed out on!

This is not to say that’s necessarily a bad choice, as maybe it knows that there’ll be a $10,000,000 grant next year that it’ll need the goodwill of the other company.

Either way though, the main take away is that less than $200k/$400k/$600k may be the optimal choice for each of the respective companies!

The Solution When Everyone’s Generous

There is that special option where all three companies get some money though. However, it requires that the three companies each give up something and not get their “full” amount. It is a perfect example of how everyone benefits if they are generous! If each of the company is slightly more generous than 50-50, then they’ll all feel great accepting that slight loss so that everyone can be happy!

In the end, if they all cooperate and give a little extra, they get a bigger pie to share. If they do not, then they’ll have to fight over a smaller pie and one of them gets nothing! Not a bad reward for cooperating right?

A Situation To Test Your Generosity

Imagine yourself in a business venture with a friend. It’s new, it’s innovative, and you’re just completely excited! As a result, the business does really well and makes you a ton of money! Now suppose your friend gives you a blank check and asks you to split that money any way you want. That’s right – you get to pick your share and his share!

In glee, your first thought is probably whether you should take all the money. After all, he asked you to do it! If he’s willing to give it, why not take it right? Hmmm… but maybe he would be pissed off and force you to give a fair share…

Maybe you can take a little more than 50%, an amount that he barely cares about and wouldn’t really argue over. Perhaps 52%? He’s not going to give you crap for taking an extra 2% right? And with that 2%, maybe you can buy an engagement ring for your girlfriend…

On the other hand, he is your friend, so maybe you should give him his fair share. Being what you feel is very generous, you graciously decide to make it 50-50. Whew… he gave you a chance to be greedy, but you resisted! Good job!

Now, what if I told you that it might be better if you only took 40%?

Say WHAT??? Take less than 50%? Maybe you think I made a typo.

No really, take 40%. You’ll most likely make more money.

Yes, make more money.

The Nature Of Wealth

It doesn’t seem to make any sense on the surface. Let’s say the business made a million dollars. 60% of it is $600,000. 40% of it is $400,000. $600,000 is greater than $400,000. So how are you making more money by taking $400,000? Like, what?

Before going into the reasoning for that, let’s take a look at the nature of wealth in general.

Let’s assume Person A has some corn, and Person B has some apples. Person A got sick of eating his corn and wants some apples and Person B is in the same situation with apples and wants some corn. A field of apples is worth $1000 to Person B but $2000 to Person A. A field of corn is worth $1000 to Person A and $2000 to Person B. Therefore, Person B gives Person A some apples and Person A gives Person B some corn. They both become happier (see Do You Get Money?).

Before trading, Person A has a field of corn worth $1000 to him and Person B has a field of apples worth $1000 to him. Total wealth: $2000.

After trading, Person B has a field of corn worth $2000 and Person A has a field of apples worth $2000. Total wealth: $4000.

By trading, $2000 of wealth is created out of thin air.

This is also what happens when two people work together. One person brings a certain skill set, and another person brings a different skill set. Together, they accomplish things that neither of them could have alone. As a result, while Person A alone can make say $1000 and Person B alone can make $1000, together they might be able to make $3000 having expended the same amount of effort (see How To Get Your Partner To Do More Work).

So the real question here is how to divide up that extra $1000 of value created through both people. So 50-50 right? Doesn’t that sound really fair? Well, here’s why taking $400 might be better than taking $500.

How Being More Generous Makes You More Money

Assume for a moment that you are now the partner of the person and he took 60-100% of the money. How would you feel about it? Wouldn’t it feel kind of like he screwed you over? Wouldn’t you want to look for someone else who can maybe be happy with 50-50? Or god forbid give you a little more? How would you react the next time this person wants to work with you?

By taking more than your fair share of the money, you make other people annoyed. They despise you. They think you’re petty. They want to get as far away from you as possible. Sure, you got your extra 10-20% this time, but who’d ever want to work with you again?

Now, let’s say he picked 50-50, which is probably what most of the world runs on. “Not bad!” you think, “that’ only fair!” If you find a good deal again though, you’ll probably shop around see who’ll do the most work for their 50% cut. Hey, plenty of 50-50 people out there right?

Now, what if your partner offered you 60% of the money? Boy would you be eager to jump on board and start working hard! After all, you’re getting a bigger part of the pie! Would there be any question of who you’d want to work with?

Think about this for a second… how many 50-50, or even say 55-45 people, are there? Doesn’t that describe most of the world?

And who would they want to work with? Other 50-50 people, or you, a hard working 40-60 person? If word got out that you’re a generous person who’ll give other people more than their fair share, you can expect all those people to come knocking at your door!

With so many more offers to chose from, isn’t it more likely that you’ll find a better opportunity? 40% of a $1 million dollar opportunity is certainly much more than 60% of a $100,000 opportunity! Oh, so is 40% of 100 different $100,000 opportunities!

What you trade off as a smaller portion of a deal is greatly made up by more deals and better deals.

In this way, not only are you wealthier in money, you’ll also be much wealthier in friends!

The more I think about this concept, the more important and astounding it is to me. So many events in my life that didn’t make any sense now suddenly does. It resonates with me strongly both emotionally and logically!

To better understand this concept and spread it to other people, I will write an article once a day for the next 30 days to demonstrate this idea in action!

Getting What You Want

In How To Win Someone’s Heart, we looked at ways to secure the loyalty and trust of our fellow human beings. In this article, we’ll see how this concept applies more generally and from a more logical perspective.

Okay! We’ll get right down to it. Let’s say you’re walking around and there’s this person with something you want. Maybe it’s the $100 bill in his pocket, or maybe you want to have sex with her, or maybe you want him to vote for you. So how do you go about getting that person to give you what you want?

Well, let’s take a look at your options. You can either use force or not use force.

Option 1: Force The Other Person To Give You What You Want

In the case of the $100 bill, you would run up to the guy and rob him. In the case of the girl, you would rape her. In the case of the voting, maybe you would put a gun to the guy’s back and shoot him if he doesn’t vote for you. This is probably the most direct and the quickest way to get the object of your desire. And actually, it does work. You’ve gotten exactly what you want from this person. So what’s the problem?

Well, the problem is that you are also getting something you don’t want along with it! The guy you took the $100 bill from would probably want to kick your ass if he ever saw you again. The girl you raped would probably have you arrested and put behind bars for good. The guy who you forced to vote for you would probably kill you if he ever got a chance. That’s what happens when you take something from someone – they lose it and aren’t happy about that loss!

Beyond these problems, what are the chances of that person giving you what you want again? Do you think that guy would walk around with $100 bills sticking out of his pocket again? He probably doesn’t carry around more than $5 anymore! And that girl you raped – she probably got a big bad boyfriend named Bubba who’ll smash your head in. And that guy you put a gun to – he’s probably a black belt in some sort of martial art now and can probably take your gun and shoot you before you can say “vote for me!”

Forcing it does get you want you want, but at a very high price! It might be worth it if you are in a really desperate situation. Maybe you’re starving and need that $100 bill to buy your family food, or you are the last man on earth and that girl won’t have sex with you.

Just be aware of the price you are paying if you pick this option – it’s a one time thing, the other person will hate you and oppose you at any opportunity in the future. Whatever it is, it’d better be pretty damn important!

Is there a better way?

Option 2: Give The Other Person What They Want

Now, let’s say you are the guy with the $100 bill. A guy walks up to you and gives you a big diamond and he says, “I would really appreciate it if you could give me that $100 bill!” Wouldn’t you be much more likely to give it to him gladly? And the next time you have a $100 bill, wouldn’t you go around looking for him to see what he has to offer you?

That’s what happens when you give other people what they want! They’ll come back time and time again looking for that thing, and giving you more of what you want!

Of course, if you’re mean to them and laugh at them or something, then you’ll also be offering something they don’t want. As a result, they might go find someone else to get their needs fulfilled. For example, if you have an expensive jewelry store and you look down on a guy who comes in without a suit, that guy will probably go to another jewelry store even if you are offering better prices! Or if you give your spouse money and make them feeling like they owes you something, then they will probably go out to make their own money so that they can get away from you!

However, if you not only give it to them but you do it cheerfully, is there any reason why they would go to anyone else? When you become an indispensible source that fulfills other people’s needs, they will do whatever they can to keep you happy!

And therein likes the way to get what you want – Give other people what they want, make yourself indispensable to them, do it cheerfully, and they’ll come back again and again with what you want!

As I thought about this, I am reminded of something my girlfriend had said a while back: “When you only want something, you can live without it. When you absolutely need something, you begin to change yourself to make it work.” And I realized – that is exactly what’s so wonderful about sex!

Every day, we are reminded of this need as we get turned on by various stimuli. And it is a need. We are biologically programmed to want it. We need it to create babies. We need it to get a real sense of closeness. Anyone who hasn’t experienced it before they die would probably have at least a strong curiosity as to what it would’ve been like! In fact, the human race need to have sex in order to survive!

So why did nature build this innate need into us? Wouldn’t it be easier to propagate the race if we could just reproduce on our own? Why do we have to go through this hassle just to survive?

As I sought an answer to this question, my mind drifted to memories of myself a few years ago. I was nearing the end of college, working hard in hopes of finding a good job. Most of my time was spent in a computer lab plugging away on various projects. I loved my work and the people I was doing it for. However, when things didn’t go my way and I got angry, I simply stopped talking to the people causing the anger – permanently. My position required no real need for other people, so this worked just fine. There was no real desire to consider their feelings or what they wanted.

Fast forward a year when my desire for sex and reproduction took over. I wanted to date people and get to know them better. All of a sudden, getting angry and complaining didn’t get me what I want anymore. “Hey!” I suddenly realized, “People don’t like to talk to people who get angry and complain to them all the time!” Then slowly, I started on the path of learning about human relations.

And that is exactly what sex does! It drives you to start understanding the perspectives of other people. Because there is something you want badly that somebody else has, you are forced to listen to what they want! You are obligated to try to understand their perspective. You have to give other people an incentive to give you want you want, and you can only do that by learning about what they want!

If we were all asexual beings, there would be no need for other people. There would be no driving force for people to cooperate and work together! We can just go about our day never understanding the ways we can help each other. It is no wonder that Napolean Hill claims sex to be the most important emotion! As we learn about the opposite sex, we learn more about people in general. We learn that people are different, and then learn to appreciate those differences. We learn that two people together can be greater than the sum of their parts!

Because of this, we can see why Hill would think sex is a much more important emotion than love. Sure, love allows you contribute positively to society, but only sex gives you the desire to learn about the other person. It makes you learn about what you should be giving, and forces you to adapt to fill that role. With only love, you might give things a shot, but at the end of the day, you don’t have to give everything you have to make it work. And giving everything you have is precisely what tends to make human relationships work well!

It’s a very amazing system that nature has created! We need sex to reproduce and survive as a species. Sex forces us to start considering other people’s perspectives. Those who are unable to do that are people who will be unable to find a mate! It’s almost like a rite of passage that says, “Only people who understand other people past a sufficient level has the right to continue existing (through their children)”.

In effect, sex is nature’s way of saying, “Work together! Or Die!”

One general theme emerges if you spend enough time looking for the meaning of life and looking through personal development literature – your thoughts create your reality. Before you click the back button on your browser and dismiss this as a bunch of mumbo jumbo, this actually can have a lot of scientific basis in reality! You’re probably skeptical, and I don’t blame you. After all, thinking about a thing doesn’t make it happen, right? Imagining a million dollars isn’t going to get you a million dollars, right? Thinking about getting your orange peeled certainly doesn’t seem to make it peel itself… It probably seems unrealistic to anyone with an ounce of common sense!

But wait! When you turn on your radio and television, pictures and sounds seem to come out of nowhere. Doesn’t that sound pretty unrealistic too? And yet there they are! There’s certainly nothing connecting the TV or radio to anything else. You just turn it on, and hey, there’s light and sound. There certainly seems to be “things” appearing out of nowhere!

“Yeah, but it’s powered by electricity and there’s liquid crystals or cathode ray tubes projecting photons,” you say, “There’s all sorts of electrons bombarding the screen, releasing energy to create the images we see. On the other side, somebody used some electricity (or other form of energy) to power their transmitter, caused some electromagnetic waves, and your receiver on your TV/radio gets those signals and converts them.” In short, in goes some energy, some waves happen, and out comes some matter really far away!

Hmmmm, so then, what happens when you think? Your thoughts are waves too! Since we don’t completely understand how our brain works, isn’t it possible that part of the brain is a transmitter that runs on the energy from our body, and sends out waves of thought? After all, we don’t really know how thought works either! Maybe depending on the receiver at the other end, those waves are somehow converted into matter, and if thought results in actual physical matter being created, then does that not qualify as thought creating reality?

In physics, there is a theory that says all matter vibrates and has a wave component. If that is true, then everything is connected. If our brains are sending out wave after wave of thought, who can say exactly what effect they’re having? After all, EM radiation doesn’t go away in space! Once it’s sent out, it keeps going light years away and centuries later! Who’s to say thought waves don’t operate the same way?

In this light, “thought creates reality” is not nearly as far away or as implausible as it would appear! After all, people thought that it was impossible for radios to work the way it does now. All it would take for this theory to be true is for someone to discover a way to measure thought waves emanating from other people!

This would also make things like telepathy very plausible. If you are sending out thought waves, then it would make perfect sense for someone “tuned” to you to be able to receive them. It would also make things like seeing dead people, ghosts, etc. completely within the realm of reason as well! Maybe those things just send thoughts in ways only certain people can perceive. There are definitely articles that say ghosts exist and seeing them is just a matter of you wanting to. You wanting to – you tuning your perceptions to receive “ghost frequencies”.

Following this train of thought, if people are transmitters of thought to other people, then perhaps people are receivers of thought as well. After all, we get ideas seemingly out of nowhere sometimes when we are seeking creative solutions. Maybe they’re someone else’s thoughts that you just tune into when you ask that question. Who knows?

This would mean that all of our thoughts are connected somehow and there is a collective consciousness. In a way, this is like the Borg from Star Trek. We have our own thoughts, but we can tune into the collective consciousness and broadcast ideas to each other.

If you keep sending wave after wave of “cure cancer” into the collective consciousness, would it not seem more and more likely that someone will come up with a solution for it? Or maybe there are other types of receivers of your thought who gets that thought and acts on it. We know so little about how the universe works, but we do know that energy, waves, and matter aren’t as disconnected as we think they are! e = mc^2, right?

Another interesting idea is that since each little bit of matter contains a lot of energy, it takes a lot of sustained thought in order to turn energy into its physical form. This is consistent with ideas in books like Think And Grow Rich, where persistence is deemed to be very important. It also is congruent with the general motivational advice that you should “keep at it” and “keep going after your goals”. Maybe it just takes a while for your thoughts to manifest into reality.

With so many unknowns, who can really say? Evidence certainly seems to point to thought creating reality as being more likely than not likely!!

Growing up, I remember watching a show on the Discovery channel that talked about different species of human beings, one of which is the Neanderthal. They had the incredible to focus on doing one task at a time, producing far greater amounts than their smarter, but “lazier” cousins. It occurred to me that in terms of production, even if you are only half as fast as someone else, you can still produce more if you work three times as long! In the end, people judge you by how much you produced, not how much you were capable of producing.

Fast forward a few years, to where I was taking 7-8 of Cornell’s most challenging courses per semester, and getting all As in them. Was I smarter than my peers? I really doubt it. My success was due mostly to this concept of focusing on one thing at a time.

Why Focus On One Thing At A Time

Our brains, like computers, really can’t think of that many things in parallel. In fact, most of the time, it can only think of one thought at a time. That means if you are thinking about donuts, you probably aren’t thinking about how to finish your project at the exact same time. In some sense, every project can be completed given a certain amount of thought dedicated to it. If it’s a computer science project, the actual change might only be a few lines of code, taking a few seconds. Therefore, most of the cost of doing something is in figuring out exactly what to do.

Following that logic, the more thought we dedicate to a project, the more likely it is to be complete. Since thinking about donuts isn’t a thought about the project, you essentially waste a “computer cycle” when you could have spent it on your project. Focusing on one thing at a time will help you save these cycles. This is a very literal interpretation of “you become what you think about”.

Secondly, thinking about several things or switching between them incurs a “context switching cost”. It takes time for you to gather the relevant information for a project into your brain. For example, if you were to consider buying a house, you’d have to remember the mortgage rates, how much you have in the bank, how much income you expect, the cost of the house, etc. All that information takes a while for you to actually comprehend before you can make a decision on whether you’d like to buy a house. What if you had to go to sleep today? Tomorrow, it might take you another little while to fetch that same information into your brain again (although it’ll probably be faster this time).

This extra fetching time can add up to very substantial amounts, especially if you are switching between two things constantly. Consider working on a project and talking with a friend on IM at the same time. Every time you switch between your project and an IM window, it takes maybe 5 seconds for you to gather yourself and figure out where you were in the conversation. It then takes another 15 seconds for you to figure out what you were working on before being interrupted. Say there’s about 100 such interruptions an hour, that’s about 33 minutes of time spent on switching between the window and your project alone!! The worst part about this is, you’re not having a conversation OR doing a project during those 33 minutes.

Someone else might be able to do their job twice as fast as you, but if they’re wasting those 33 minutes and you’re not, you’ll still produce more than them. Additionally, your work and your relationship with your friend would probably be better too, as they’ll both get your full attention.

How To Focus On One Thing At A Time

Since it’s so important to not waste your brain cycles on switching between things, how do we go about minimizing this loss of time? Well, my personal method is to use a schedule. Then, during the allocated time on your schedule, focus on the task at hand. Just having a schedule itself is helpful since it drives your thoughts towards your goal. Most of the time, our thoughts aren’t focused just because we don’t exactly know what we’re supposed to be working on.

Then, try to tune out distractions during your allocated time. Go to quiet spot where you can get things done in peace. Discourage people from interrupting you and schedule them in to other time slots. For example, if your coworkers continuously interrupt you during work with questions, ask them to use email or schedule meetings to you for less important questions. If your friends are always sending you instant messages during your study session, simply stay off IM.

Additionally, try to focus on one thing at a time to completion. That way, you don’t have to go back to it later and spending time getting into context again. These can really add up!

These are only physical distractions though. This actually also applies to thought. Since our memory is associative (i.e. you think of something and something related comes up), random thoughts can start pulling you in different directions. Therefore, when you are studying say a math problem and a thought of a watermelon pops up because the question talks about watermelons, recognize that and don’t get pulled into a memory of interactions with watermelons! My way of doing this is to give yourself a mental “slap on the wrist”. Imagine that image and start doodling it out with like a big X, all the time giving yourself a “this is bad” thought. If you do this often enough, it becomes almost second nature to hold off certain thoughts.

There you have it: Many, many extra hours per day – if you choose to use them!

Sure, you did just buy a ticket. Then again, we could have just ripped off a random piece of paper and gave it to you. Hey, that’s a ticket too. Ah, so you didn’t really want the ticket, but what the ticket represents! That is, you paid money to be able to enter the event of your choice when it happens, with the ticket being a symbol of your right to enter.

However, the keyword here is your right to enter. That means you don’t have to go if you don’t want to. If your mother was dying or something, you would probably miss the event right? So what you’ve bought is actually the option of being able to get into that event. It’s kind of like voting. We have the right, but we’re not forced to do it.

When you buy a tomato, you buy the right to hold it and eat it. You can also throw it away for any reason you chose. When you buy an airplane ticket, you buy the option of being able to fly at a particular time. You can choose not to fly if you don’t feel like getting up in the morning. When you buy a laptop, you buy the option of using it as a computer. If you so choose, you can use it as a pillow, or a welcome mat.

Because we tend to use the things we buy, it naturally becomes a habit to use them and to use them for their intended purpose. This can be a bad thing because it locks us into just one option, so we don’t get everything we paid for. For example, if you bought some non-refundable non-transferable vacation tickets for a few thousand dollars, you may feel like you have to go on this vacation. If you happen to win a contest that also gave you a vacation ticket, but to another spot that’s better than the one you had originally planned, you might hang on to your original plans because that’s the one you paid for. However, you would’ve given up a vacation that you liked more.

Before we buy something, all we have is one option – to live our life as it is without that thing. After we buy it, what we have is the option to use that particular thing if we choose to. If instead, we thought of it as something that we must do because we paid for it, then we’re once again left with just one option – to live our life with that thing. That could be just as limited an option as living without the thing you have bought!

Thinking this way has several advantages. First, you can pick your best option regardless of your “sunk costs”. That way, you can make a decision in the best interest of your future self. Secondly, when the thing you’ve bought doesn’t work out as planned, you are much less stressed out. Afterall, it’s only an option to use that thing, so this would just be one of those times where you don’t exercise your option.

So go ahead, keep your options open. You paid for it!

Show Appreciation

In Dale Carnegie’s How To Win Friends And Influence People, one of the most important qualities he mentioned in getting along with people is honest and sincere appreciation. This has proven to be quite true in reality for me, from both the giving and receiving end. I have noticed people’s eagerness to help out when little things they do are remembered, and also experienced first hand the devastatingly de-motivating effects when my efforts go unnoticed.

Why Show Appreciation?

So why is appreciating people for their efforts so important? This goes back to the meaning of life and finding out what you want. People are programmed to want to exist, with their feelings guiding them towards the path of “most existence”. Some of these ways of existing include existence in other people’s memory, existence by altering history, and existence by contributing something to society. Let’s examine what messages you are sending when you appreciate someone’s efforts versus when you don’t care what they are doing.

When You Don’t Show Appreciation

When you don’t care what other people are doing, you are basically telling them that what they are doing doesn’t matter all that much to you. After all, if it did matter, you’d notice it, wouldn’t you? Since they are doing it, they obviously think it matters. Add in the fact that part of their existence is tied up in what they do, what else can they conclude but that you think they are not all that important. Obviously, if you find them unimportant, their existence in your memory is minimal. Additionally, since what they do is unimportant, you are basically telling them that they’re not really significantly affecting history either, decreasing that aspect of their existence. Along the same lines, it also implies they’re not really contributing anything to society.

When You Do Show Appreciation

Contrast that to acknowledging people’s contributions and appreciating them for their efforts. That sends a completely different message. It shows the person that what they are doing is so important that you remember every little detail. Their existence in your memory is indelible! Not only that, if you are so excited about what they are doing, it must have similar effects on some other people too. That must mean what they’re doing is creating a lot of value for some group of people and irrevocably altering history.

When To Show Appreciation

One says the other person is nothing; the other says the other person is everything. The difference? Only a few words expressing how you feel (assuming that you do feel that way).

Of course, that begs the question, what if you don’t really think some of the things that the person does is all that important? How do you show appreciation then? Well, in that case, you don’t! Remember that the appreciation has to be honest and sincere. A fake show of appreciation is just for your benefit, which doesn’t indicate to the other person they are actually important to you at all. In fact, it will probably offend him/her since if you’re not showing real appreciation, then you’re basically showing a lack of appreciation, resulting in the same feelings as those in the “When You Don’t Show Appreciation” section above.

How To Show Appreciation

So what do you do in this case? Well, you simply ignore the things that you don’t appreciate and focus on the things that you do appreciate. Did people say something nice to you? Tell them that you appreciate how nice they are. Did they do something unique that excites you? Tell them you appreciate how excited they made you feel.

Showing appreciation doesn’t have to be some gesture where you bring a ton of flowers or anything like that. All the “fluff” is just icing on the cake, but be sure to have the cake! The core of showing appreciation is to convey the message to the other person that you appreciate something they have done for you. Usually, just saying it sincerely is sufficient to convey the message.

Go ahead and thank someone for something they’ve done for you. It costs you so little, but it might mean the world to the other person!

Alone Time In A Busy World

In today’s busy world filled with all sorts of flashy things, it’s quite easy to get distracted. You get up in the morning and an alarm clock greets you with a series of loud beeping sounds. You check your email and 42 spam emails pop up and ask you if you’d like some viagra. You microwave a sandwich and an annoying flashing clock reminds you that it’s time for work. You buy a sandwich and all sorts of signs and cardboard thingys hanging from the ceiling tell you that you probably want a drink with that. You go to sleep and the buzzing of your fridge reminds you that there’s stuff to be eaten in there.

It seems like everywhere you look, there’s something yelling “Do Me!!”, “Buy Me!!”, “Look At Me!!”, etc.

The Unanticipated Alone Time

Usually, this effect isn’t even noticed. We kind of tune out all this stuff and barely notice that it’s there. However, a recent even made me realize that they do have their effects.

The last two days, Pacific Gas & Electric had the good sense to remind me that I had forgotten to pay my electric bill – by turning my electricity off. It resulted in a day without electricity, but eventually a little adrian monk got my power turned back on. The surprising is that while my power was off, I felt completely unstressed and relaxed.

There’s no whirling of my computer fans when I’m sleeping. There’s no buzzing of my fridge. There’s no clocks to tell me that it’s time to do something. In fact, since it was night time, there wasn’t even any light to show me the stuff in my room. There’s just me.

Clarity In My Alone Time

In this peaceful state, I found it very easy to focus my thoughts on the things I wanted. I thought about doing a good job at work and making my boss proud. I thought about the large, happy family that I’m going to have some day. I thought about the billion dollars I’m going to make in the next 30 or 40 years. I thought about the great problems I’m going to solve with those resources and the example that I would set for future generations.

These are thoughts that would not have flowed so naturally if there had been all kinds of distractions around.

Why Have Alone Time?

This experience made me realize that it is extremely important to have alone time. With so many distractions around us all the time, it’s very important that we know what we want. Otherwise, we get into the habit of going where these distractions tell us to go, without thinking about it. They suck up your time from the things you want the most, without you even realizing it.

You can’t be thinking about helping your family when you’re deciding if you want large fries with your drink. You can’t be thinking of buying your wife a flower when you’re thinking about being late to work. You can’t be thinking about your purpose in life when you’re trying to figure out what someone else is saying.

Just try it once. Turn everything off. Sit around for a while. Are you a different person in the dark?

Being alone really allows you to find out who you are as a person. Who are you when there is nobody around? What do you want to do? There’s nobody to impress, no approval to gain, no work to be done, no schedules to be followed. At this moment, there is just you. What do you want?

Having alone time allows you to re-experience being this person. You can really think about whether the things you are doing during the day are truly the things you’d like to be doing. It allows you to focus on your needs and wants without the distracting input of other people and devices. You get to think about how you are becoming (or not becoming) the person you want to be and have time to make the necessary adjustments for the next day.

Scheduling Your Alone Time In

This is clearly a pretty important process. After all, how do you know you’re doing the things you’re doing because you want to and not because someone else wants you to? Don’t you deserve to do the things you want?

Make a resolution now to take some time out every once in a while and go somewhere without distractions to reflect. Think about what you want and make sure that you are doing them. After all, you only have one life to live!

Seeing the stern look on his face, I begrudly checked all the boxes to the multiple choice question that asked, “Which of the following is nutritious?” I wondered what I was going to say when the teacher asks me why I picked all the vegetables in the list.

It had been a tradition ever since I was little. I would do my homework the moment I got home from school each night, and my father would check my homework for mistakes. He would tell me how many mistakes I had made in my homework, and I would need to find all of them before going to bed. Of course, in situations like the one above, where we disagree on the answer, it may take many many passes before we sit down and discuss the problem in question.
“Warren, will you come up to the table please?” my teacher asked me in front of the entire class.
I gritted my teeth and walked up to the table, knowing exactly what this was all about.
“For this question, why did you check all the boxes?” the teacher inquired. I had been the #1 student in her class for the entire year, so her confusion was quite understandable.
“Because everything is nutritious,” I replied, remembering exactly what my father had said the night before.

The teacher couldn’t help but laugh, at what I presume to be the strangeness of the situation. After all, I’m sure she could see how that answer made sense. Yet, she asked me, “So, is a table nutritious?”

Unsure of what to say, I returned to my seat.

While this experience wasn’t particularly pleasant for me, it’s really not nearly as bad as it sounds. Memories like these form the basis of my character today and is probably why I am a scientist. That day, my father handed me a very important lesson. He taught me to stand up for what is right, even if the stance is unpopular. He taught me to question the things that I have been taught, because they may be incorrect.

I also learned that standing up for what is right often meant taking an unpopular stance and earning the disapproval of my peers. However, disapproval is really not all that bad. Sure, the teacher and the whole class laughed at me, but so what? Life went on the next day, and I am all the better for it. Nothing was lost, while I probably earned the respect of my classmates.

Don’t be afraid to do what you feel is right. Most of the time, the worst thing that will happen is that some people will disapprove. However, like most of people’s opinions about stuff, it’s usually a fleeting thing. Just let some time pass and people will forget. A few weeks (or maybe months/years) from now, no one will care except you. Why not make your long term memories ones you are proud of?