“Judge a man by his questions rather than his answers” – Pierre-Marc-Gaston

This is the question that Tim Ferris brings up in his book ‘Tools of the Titans’. It goes “What might you do to accomplish your 10-year goals in the next 6 months if you had a gun against your head?”

So often we settle for the norm. People normally work 8 hours a day and take 2 days off on the weekend. That’s the norm, the mediocre. But I know I don’t want to settle for a mediocre life. I want to create a life out of the norm. Whatever it looks like. That’s why I have been leading the life I have. 

I moved to the states from Malaysia when I was 20. I started my first company when I was 26. At age 31, I downsized my belongings to a 40L backpack and traveled the world with no return ticket. 

All of these moves are out of the norm. Throughout my life, I just happened to always live differently than my peers. I am seen as an outcast in my family. They can define me as being different but I know they are also proud that I live a different life.

So goes back to the question, what if I have to accomplish what I think I can do in 10 years in 6 months. That opens my brain immediately. I still a lot of times settle into what’s comfortable, what’s easy. I have a blueprint to expand my business. Though I understand most things take time, Rome wasn’t built in one day, I also understand there’s a lot more that I can do. 

Not in the sense that I am forcefully forcing myself, but instead, creating a momentum I can ride in. Recently, I started building myself a more concrete routine. This jumpstarts my momentum and makes it easier for me to tackle work that requires more energy. 

If I were to plan what I do in the next 6 months as something I could have achieved in 10 years, I would design my life differently. I’d set my daily goals differently. I’d bring a different focus into my work. 

Keeping up with my routine has been wonderful. As I mentioned in my previous post, I plan my routine for my worst days and during the normal days, it just creates a nice flow to my day, my life. 

If I design my routine a.k.a. my system to produce certain results I want, then I can shift my focus from attaining the results to simply following and improving my system. I let my system run me. 

Discipline equals freedom. When I don’t have to think about what to do, instead, following the system I have designed for myself, my mental capacity is freed up to actually doing the work. 

I didn’t grow up as a disciplined person. I was quite the opposite. But as I grew older, discipline and routine became the guiding force in my life. Dare I say it even contributes to my happiness and fulfillment. I am sure if I told this to my 20-year-old self, I would think I was crazy. 

So here, I’ll close up this post to contemplate what I plan to achieve and what level of focus I want to bring into the next 6 months.