Who Will Cry When You Die\?: Life Lessons From The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari pdfdrive com

37.
Master Your Time
I have always found it ironic that so many people say they would do anything for
a little more time every day and yet they squander the time they already have.
Time is life’s great leveler. We all have the same allotment of twenty-four hours
in a day. What separates the people who create great lives from the also-rans is
how they use these hours.
Most of us live as if we have an infinite amount of time to do all the things
we know we must do to live a full and rewarding life. And so we procrastinate
and put the achievement of our dreams on hold while we tend to those daily
emergencies that fill up our days. This is a certain recipe for a life of regret. As
novelist Paul Bowles once wrote:
…because we don’t know [when we will die], we get to think of life as an
inexhaustible well. Yet everything happens only a certain number of times,
and a very small number, really. How many more times will you remember
a certain afternoon of your childhood, some afternoon that’s so deeply a
part of your being that you can’t even conceive of your life without it?
Perhaps four or five times more. Perhaps not even that. How many more
times will you watch the full moon rise? Perhaps twenty. And yet it all
seems limitless.
Commit yourself to managing your time more effectively. Develop a keen
sense of awareness about how important your time really is. Don’t let people
waste this most precious of commodities and invest it only in those activities that
truly count.

---

38.
Keep Your Cool
“Anyone can become angry—that’s easy. But to be angry with the right person,
to the right degree, at the right time, for the right purpose, and in the right way—
that is not easy,” taught Aristotle. With all the stress and pressure in our lives, it
is easy to lose our cool at the slightest irritation. While we are rushing home
from work at the end of another exhausting day, we scream at the slow driver in
front of us who apparently has all the time in the world. While we shop at the
grocery store, we get annoyed with the stock clerk who sends us to the wrong
aisle when we are in search of the ingredients for tonight’s lasagna. And while
we are eating our dinner, we yell at the telemarketer who has the nerve to
interrupt us in an attempt to sell us their latest wares.
The problem with losing your temper on a daily basis is that it becomes a
habit. And like most habits, a time arrives when it becomes second nature.
Personal relationships start unraveling, business partnerships begin to fall apart
and your credibility decreases as you become known as “a loose cannon.”
Effective people are consistent and, in many ways, predictable. Tough times call
for cool people and they are always cool and calm when the pressure is on.
Keeping your cool in a moment of crisis can save you years of pain and anguish.
Hurtful words unleashed in a single minute of anger have led to many a broken
friendship. Words are like arrows: once released, they are impossible to retrieve.
So choose yours with care.
An excellent way to control your temper is simply to count to 100 before
you respond to someone who has irritated you. Another strategy to use is what I
call the “Three Gate Test.” The ancient sages would only speak if the words they
were about to utter passed three gates. At the first gate, they asked themselves,
Are these words truthful? If so, the words could then pass on to the second gate.
At the second gate, the sages asked, Are these words necessary? If so, they
would then pass on to the third gate, where they would ask, Are these words
kind? If so, then only would they leave their lips and be sent out into the world.
“Treat people as if they were what they ought to be and help them become what
they are capable of being,” said the German poet Johann Wolfgang von Goethe.
These are wise words to live by.

---