Antifragile: More Than Being Resilient
One interesting concept that I read in Skip the Line is the difference between being resilient and being antifragile. The term “antifragile” comes from a book by Nassim Taleb but I read about it in Skip the Line by James Altucher.
I always thought that being resilient is good, but it turns out that being antifragile is better. What’s the difference between them? Well, being resilient means that when something hurts you, you bounce back to where you were before. It’s a good thing, right? But being antifragile goes one step further. Being antifragile means that when something hurts you, it makes you stronger than ...
Source: Life Optimizer - March 4, 2022 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Attitude Source Type: blogs
Feel Fulfilled by Cultivating Your Portfolio of Passions
If you want to live a fulfilling life, you should cultivate your portfolio of passions. What I mean is that you should make room for different passions of yours and nurture them.
Why is this important? Because reaching your full potential will make you feel fulfilled. The keyword here is full. Reaching your potential in one or two areas of your life is good, but it’s not the same as reaching your full potential. To reach your full potential, you should make room for multiple interests of yours and grow yourself there.
Let me share my personal story with you.
An early passion of mine is coding. I started coding i...
Source: Life Optimizer - February 9, 2022 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Learning Source Type: blogs
Upgrading Your Life Through Virtual Mentors
A book that I’m reading is Skip the Line by James Altucher. It has many interesting ideas, but here I’d like to share just one of them with you: reading books can give you virtual mentors. In fact, the author wrote that reading is a “superpower” because of it!
You see, we need mentors to get ahead in life. But in real life, your options are limited to those around you. Compared to the world as a whole, that is a very small circle.
Moreover, there is the danger of getting stuck in a local maximum. You could try to reach the peak of a “hill” as defined by those around you without reali...
Source: Life Optimizer - January 20, 2022 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Learning Source Type: blogs
Three Simple Things You Might Want to Do This Year
We are now in 2022! To be honest, I’m excited about this year. I believe it’s a year of possibilities. There could be many challenges ahead, but I’m sure there are also many opportunities. It’s up to you and me to make the most of those opportunities.
To help you make the most of 2022, here are three simple things that you might want to do this year.
1. Read Books More
Notice that I didn’t say “read more books” but instead “read books more”. What’s the difference? Well, what I’m suggesting is not to increase the number of books you read but to spend more time on reading books.
If you simpl...
Source: Life Optimizer - January 3, 2022 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Learning Relationships Source Type: blogs
Ask the Readers: What Life Lessons Have You Learned in 2021?
Here we are near the end of 2021. We will soon enter 2022. I believe it’s a good time to reflect on the lessons that we have learned this year. The lessons we learned this year will help us start the new year strong. So here is my question to you:
What life lessons have you learned in 2021?
Please share your answer in the comments so that everyone can read it. Thanks for being with me in 2021 and I wish you a great 2022! (Source: Life Optimizer)
Source: Life Optimizer - December 30, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Learning Source Type: blogs
The Courage to Reinvent Yourself
A book that I recently read is The First Tycoon by T.J. Stiles. It’s about the life of Cornelius Vanderbilt. Inspired by the book, I wrote Appreciating Our Modern World a while back. Now, I’d like to discuss the courage to reinvent yourself.
Vanderbilt was born in 1794. Transportation was a big problem back then (as described in my previous post). In the early 19th century, the main solution was steamboats. With their steam engines, steamboats were far superior to schooners that came before them. Vanderbilt quickly switched from schooners to steamboats when the technology became available.
Over the next few decad...
Source: Life Optimizer - December 9, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Purpose Source Type: blogs
Blinkist Black Friday 2021: Get 50% Off
Quick link: click here to get 50% off Blinkist
Knowledge is power. Benjamin Franklin once said that “An investment in knowledge always pays the best interest.” I’m a big believer in self-education myself.
Related to that, there is a Blinkist Black Friday deal for you: for a limited time, you can get 50% off a Blinkist subscription.
Blinkist is the app for you if you want to learn from many nonfiction books but lack the time to read them. It solves the problem of having to spend a lot of time finishing a book. With Blinkist, you can get the key ideas from a book in just 15 minutes. You can even li...
Source: Life Optimizer - November 24, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Announcement Source Type: blogs
Appreciating Our Modern World: A Lesson From the First Tycoon
I’m currently reading The First Tycoon by T. J. Stiles. It’s a Pulitzer-prize winning book that tells the story of Cornelius Vanderbilt. From a humble beginning, Vanderbilt became the first tycoon in America. He was the precedent to other tycoons like Rockefeller and Carnegie.
It’s an eye-opening book for me. I didn’t know much about the world of the early 19th century so I learned a lot. A big lesson for me is not to take our modern world for granted.
You see, we have so much convenience these days compared to those days. Transportation is a clear example. Here is an excerpt from the book (emphasis min...
Source: Life Optimizer - November 18, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Attitude Innovation Source Type: blogs
Introducing Habit Ace 2.0
Building good habits is essential to living a fulfilling life. That’s why I’m happy to announce that Habit Ace 2.0 is now available! Habit Ace is an iOS app I develop that can help you build good habits. This is the app that I’ve been using to optimize my life.
You see, I started Life Optimizer back in 2006, but for years I didn’t know how exactly to optimize my life. I didn’t have a systematic way to do it. Only later did I realize that the best way to optimize my life is through habit tracking. That is, I set some habits to build and then track how good I am at keeping them. Doing this ha...
Source: Life Optimizer - November 10, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Apps Source Type: blogs
Eric Hoffer and the Power of Self-Education
I recently read The True Believer by Eric Hoffer. It’s a book about how mass movements evolve. With a lot of historical examples, the book explains the patterns and common threads among them. It’s an insightful book and reading it was a great learning experience for me.
What I’d like to share with you here is not the content of the book, though. Instead, I’d like to share with you about the author.
You see, I didn’t know about Eric Hoffer before. But I imagined he must be a famous professor from a well-known university. I mean, what else could explain the depth of his insights? The True Believer is an i...
Source: Life Optimizer - November 5, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Learning Source Type: blogs
Why Energy Management Is Important: A Lesson From Theodore Roosevelt
What is a key factor for personal productivity? For many people, the answer is time management. Time management has even become synonymous with personal productivity. The assumption is that the better you manage your time, the more productive you will be.
But there is a missing element here. With good time management, you can allocate the time you need to do your tasks. But what about the way you use that time? Well, that’s a different matter! Let’s say two people spend one hour on the same task. One of them can make a lot of progress while the other one barely makes any progress. What makes the difference?
One p...
Source: Life Optimizer - October 22, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Health Productivity Source Type: blogs
Life Optimizer ’s New Tagline: Live a Fulfilling Life
Recently I changed the tagline of Life Optimizer to “Live a fulfilling life”. It replaces the previous tagline “Insights to reach your full potential”. Why did I change it? Because I believe that the new tagline can better describe the mission here. It can give you a better description of how Life Optimizer can help you.
The previous tagline was pretty good, but it has a couple of shortcomings.
First, it could cause a misconception about what it means to reach your full potential. Some people might think that it means reaching the maximum level of wealth or fame. But that’s not what I mean. ...
Source: Life Optimizer - October 2, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Announcement Purpose Source Type: blogs
The Power of Imagination: A Lesson From David Yonggi Cho
I have been writing about personal effectiveness since 2006. Over time, I have learned more and more about the factors that can help you live a fulfilling life. Recently, one thing that has caught my attention is the power of imagination.
You see, the more I study those who have gone far in their lives, the more I see how imagination plays a role. It’s not the only factor, of course, but it’s often a starting point. When you imagine a future you believe in, that belief will get stronger and will drive actions in that direction. Not only that but also the belief can help you get through a lot of obstacles. You will h...
Source: Life Optimizer - September 17, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Purpose Thinking Source Type: blogs
Today Is Life Optimizer ’s 15th Anniversary
I published Life Optimizer’s first post on September 7, 2006. That’s 15 years ago! Wow, time flies.
Back then, I was a graduate student, and I decided to start a blog on personal effectiveness. I was inspired by the race to optimize performance in computer science, and I thought that something similar could be done to optimize our lives. I was also inspired by the possibility of reaching a worldwide audience after reading Thomas Friedman’s The World Is Flat.
From these inspirations, Life Optimizer was born.
It was a humble beginning. For months, there was no reader. I felt like speaking to an empty room. But...
Source: Life Optimizer - September 7, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Miscellaneous Source Type: blogs
Freedom: The True Objective of Productivity
What is the goal of productivity? In Free to Focus, author Michael Hyatt gave this answer (emphasis mine):
Productivity should free you to pursue what’s most important to you. The goal, the true objective of productivity, should be freedom.
He went on to define freedom in four ways:
Freedom to Focus: the ability to do your task with absolute attention and no distractions.Freedom to Be Present: the ability to be fully present wherever you are (e.g. with your family) without being interrupted.Freedom to Be Spontaneous: the ability to drop whatever you are doing and respond to a new situation spontaneously.Freedom ...
Source: Life Optimizer - September 3, 2021 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Donald Latumahina Tags: Productivity Source Type: blogs
