Ideal Decision-Making

Ryoma, a 19th century samurai, played a key role in the movement to overthrow the Tokugawa shogunate & end Japan's 300-year isolation. He established the nation's first trading company & helped Japan become a naval power.
A portrait of Ryoma, hangs in the office of SoftBank chief Masayoshi Son. Every morning when he comes to office, it reminds him to make a decision worthy of Ryoma.

#MyLearning
Ideals are born, not of logical analysis, but of feelings which have no language of words to measure them. Holding ourselves to the ideals of our heroes invests the ideals with a measure for our actions.

Intentional Living

“Intentional living, basically, is about choosing your spots. You can’t be on 24/7, but you can identify the spots when you are going to be on. So I think a lot of high energy is a result of intentionality, looking at your schedule and saying, OK, I’d better be good here, here, here and here. But hey, this is just lunch, and I can be 50 percent and be OK there.” - John Maxwell, Leadership Guru

#MyLearning
Clarity and strength of intention (aka purpose) can help us intuitively decide how much energy to expend in a situation.
Action
Clarify my Purpose, define my goals and set priorities. For a deeper analysis, talk to a coach.

Relationship Boundaries

Elizabeth Gilbert’s memoir Eat, Pray, Love became a bestseller, and from being an artiste living close to the bone, she found herself in possession of a giant pile of money. Feeling lucky and wanting to do something for her friends who still lived in poor circumstances,  she gave away a lot of money to them.  But by doing this, she found that in many cases, far from strengthening relationships, it actually spoilt them.

#MyLearning
Money, religion and politics are divisive. Best to keep them out of relationships, both at home and work.

Picture Source : Souleylo

Lifework Results Calculator

Entrepreneur Kazuo Inamori believes the formula for calculating the results of someone's lifework is Attitude x Effort x Ability.

#My Learning   
To work the formula into my life I have to commit to an:
Attitude: Constantly demanded perfection for yourself.

Effort: When launching a new project start off with a dream. Once the planning stage begins, become a pessimist in order to recognize every possible difficulty, then it’s back to optimism for thee execution.

Ability: Live by the belief that you have the ability to do anything

The Elixir of Knowledge

In the 6th century, Borzuy, the personal physician of the Persian emperor came to India looking for the Mritsanjeevani, the mystical herb that could revive a corpse. He did not find the herb but found the Panchatantra instead. After reading it, he  realized that the magical herb was knowledge and the corpse was ignorance.

#MyLearning
May I have the  wisdom to use the elixir of knowledge, not only for my own benefit, but also for the benefit of others.
May it not instil in me the pride of knowing what I know, but the humility to understand that there is yet more to know and learn.