I had picked up this book from a small bookstore in Riverside, CA on my way to Australia and New Zealand last month. Had not expected much but turned out to be a very interesting book. By the way, two weeks back, I was in Boston and while strolling thru Beacon Hill, chanced upon a cute little bookstore with a cafe. Went in and guess what – there were four of these books right there in front of me as I entered!! Never thought I would see another copy of this book.

Well, turns out this book has nothing to do with meditations. Not one word of it. What it is though is about how to make your time in life count. If you read this book, be prepared for a lot of contrarian thoughts. Including why Todo Lists, 4 quadrants and Streaks are actually detrimental to you…

Here are some interesting lines from the book…

1. Once you realize that you will never be able to go thru all your action items – there are indeed infinite of them – and you will never ever get done – a psychological shift happens where you unclench and get relaxed. Perhaps focus on what you are doing now more.

2. The real way to optimize your finite time is not task lists and prioritization schemes. Take the thing that inspires you most and just do it for some time. That which seems like a false step is just the next step.

3. There are no solutions. Only trade offs. You are free to do whatever you want. As long as you are okay paying for the consequences.

4. “One never notices what has been done; one can see what remains to be done” – Marie Curie. One interesting idea – maintain a “done list”

5. Resist the urge to stockpile knowledge. Read like the book/magazine is a flowing river. No need to finish it. Sometimes, it is ok to read just whatever seems fun.

6. “The art of being wise is the art of knowing what to overlook”. Social media / news channels do not care about the news itself. They care about your attention. Most of us have started “living inside the news”.

7. Let the future be the future. Today is the tomorrow you were worrying about yesterday.

8. Driving in the night, you cannot see further than your headlights. And you can go thousands of miles just that way.

9. Every worthwhile goal is supposed to feel hard, unglamorous, unsexy at least some of the time you’re actually putting in the work.

10. “Dailyish” is the best frequency. Do not need to do everyday to grow a habit. You can ignore those apps that advertise “don’t break the chain”

11. Develop a taste for problems. “Beyond the mountains, more mountains” – Haitian proverb. Life is not a race to a state of no problems. Life IS an unending series of complications. Live it.

12. “Inspiration is for amateurs. The rest of us just show up and get to work.” – Chuck Close

13. “I only write when inspiration strikes. Fortunately, it strikes at nine every morning.”

14. Act on a generous impulse the moment it arises. Do not wait.

15. Everything that happens in life is either a good time or a good story. “It helps if you can realize that this part of the life when you don’t know what’s coming is often the part that people look back with the greatest affection.” – Ann Patchett

16. Fire your inner quality controller. Set quantity goals. Quality will flow someday from quantity.

17. Not enjoying the present moment in an endeavor to enjoy some future ones is akin to not enjoying time with your cat so that you can enjoy time with the cat’s kittens. Or the cat’s kittens’ kittens.

18. “To treat life as a pilgrimage to a future and better existence is to disown its present value” – W. Somerset Maugham

19. Everyone is screwed up, broken, clingy and scared, even the people who seem to have it more or less together. They are much more like you than you would believe. So, try not to compare your insides with their outsides.

20. You cannot hoard life. Enjoy the moment and let it pass.