The Art of the Good Life, Rolf Dobelli

MENTAL ACCOUNTING

Parking tickets used to infuriate me. These days I pay them you with a smile. I just debit the sum from the account l've earmarked for donations. Each year I set aside 10,000 francs for good causes, and I all my fines out of that. In the world of psychology, this simple trick is known as mental accounting. (Page 1)

The most common misunderstanding I encounter is that the good life is a stable state or condition. Wrong. The good life is only achieved through constant readjustment. (Page 6)

CHAPTER 2. THE FINE ART OF CORRECTION

We've got to get rid of the stigma attached to correction. People who self-correct early on have an advantage over those who spend ages fiddling with the perfect set-up and crossing their fingers that their plans will work out. There's no such thing as the ideal training. There's more than one life goal. There's no perfect business strategy, no optimal stock portfolio, no one right job. They're all myths. The truth is that you begin with one set-up and then constantly adjust it. The more complicated the world becomes, the less important your starting point is. So don't invest all your resources into the perfect set-up-at work or in your personal life. Instead, practice the art of correction by revising the things that aren't quite working-swiftly and without feeling guilty. It's no accident that I'm typing these lines in Word 14.7.1. Version 1.0 hasn't been on the market for years. (Page 8)

Once you've pledged something, you don't then have to weigh up the pros and cons each and every time you're faced with a decision. It's already been made for you, saving you mental energy. (Page 11)

General Eisenhower deliberately crafted a persona for the outside world. New York Times columnist David Brooks talks about Eisenhower adopting a "second self," which is at odds with the common contemporary belief that there is only a single, "true" self. This second persona isn't a contrived pose; rather, it's a professional, consistent, and reliable outwardfacing stance that leaves no room for doubts, frustrations or disappointments-those are for your diary, your partner or vour pillow. I recommend you take a cue from Eisenhower and adopt a second self of your own. Restrict authenticity to keeping your promises and acting according to your principles. The rest is nobody else's business. (Page 37)

Think of yourself as a nation, with a State Department and a secretary of state. Write down the basic precepts of your foreign policy. You'll have to play the role yourself-like a sort of personal union. You don't want a secretary of state who broadcasts every thought in his head, who shows weakness or dissolves into self-doubt. You want a secretary of state who keeps promises, acts according to agreements, behaves professionally, avoids gossip, limits whining and stays polite. Check in from time to time on how well you're doing your job as secretary of state. Ask whether you'd reflect yourself. (Page 37)

Focusing illusion: "Nothing in life is as important as you think it is while you are thinking about it," (Page 43)

We're especially vulnerable to the focusing illusion when it comes to money. How much happier would you be as a multimillionaire? Warren Buffett, one of the richest people in the world, once compared his own life with that of an average citizen. It didn't feel that different. (Page 45)

That's why one of my golden rules for leading a good life is as follows: "Avoid situations in which you have to change other people." (Page 72)

My recommendation? Leave your goals deliberately a little vague ("well-off" instead of "billionaire," for instance). If you achieve them, wonderful. If you don't, you can still interpret your situation as though you had (at least in part). It doesn't even have to be a conscious process. Your brain will do it for you automatically. (Page 77)

How do you establish a circle of dignity? Not through deliberation. Rather, it's something that crystallizes with time-for most people, by middle age. This process of crystallization is an indispensable step toward becoming a mature adult. You need to have experienced certain things-wrong decisions, disappointments, failures, crises. And you need to be self-aware enough to know which principles you're ready to defend and which you're prepared to give up. Some people never develop a circle of dignity. Such people lack a foundation, so they're perpetually vulnerable to cunning arguments. (Page 104)

But be prepared for one thing: you'll disappoint some people by defending your principles-especially people you care about. You'll hurt people. You'll snub people.

You'll be disappointed, hurt and offended in turn. It's critical you be prepared to deal with all these emotions, because that's the price you pay for a circle of dignity. Only puppets live free of conflict. The circle of competence-that's ten thousand hours. The circle of dignity-that's ten thousand wounds. (Page 105)