The Best Online Content I Read in 2013
Last year, I came across a lot of great content that really struck a chord with me. These pieces continue to resonate and shape the choices I make each day.
If I had to choose the best non-book content that could change your life for the better, these would be it. Enjoy, and happy new years!
Career
“In a world marked by constant change, where the rich of today are often the poor of tomorrow, due to circumstances beyond their control, the only security is your ability to produce something of value for your fellow man, and your only guarantee of happiness is your joy in producing it.
2. Hunter S. Thompson’s Advice on How to Find Your Purpose in Life
“He has NOT dedicated his life to reaching a pre-defined goal, but he has rather chosen a way of life he KNOWS he will enjoy. The goal is absolutely secondary: it is the functioning toward the goal which is important.”
3. Forget Setting Goals. Focus on This Instead.
“When it comes to actually getting things done and making progress in the areas that are important to you, there is a much better way to do things. It all comes down to the difference between goals and systems.”
The Importance of Quitting
1. What’s The Most Important Life Lesson Older People Feel You Must Know?
“What piece of advice were they more adamant about than any other? More adamant about than lessons regarding marriage, children and happiness? Do not stay in a job you dislike.”
2. Why I Quit Major League Baseball
“I quit because baseball was sacred to me until I started getting paid for it. The more that “baseball” became synonymous with “business,” the less it meant to me, and I saw less of myself in the game every time I got a check…It was only after I quit that I wished I hadn’t always kept my head down, relentlessly climbing to reach the top of the game, to fulfill an American dream. I wish I had looked up more often, even at the cost of some of my success.”
3. Ten Reasons Why You Have to Quit Your Job This Year
“The course of history has finally written it’s next chapter. There’s no more bullshit. I’m going to tell you why you have to quit your job. Why you need to get the ideas moving. Why you need to build a foundation for your life or soon you will have no roof.”
Friendship
“I’ve watched some of my friendships fade out of the corner of my eye, and I don’t want that to happen with you. It’s a kind of love, by the way. It’s awkward to say that, but it is. Not as binding in the day-to-day as love for lovers, but it has the same responsibilities, and I need to remind myself of that from time to time, so thank you for being my friend.”
“Loneliness is not just making us sick, it is killing us. Loneliness is a serious health risk. Studies of elderly people and social isolation concluded that those without adequate social interaction were twice as likely to die prematurely. The increased mortality risk is comparable to that from smoking. And loneliness is about twice as dangerous as obesity.”
3. American Mens’ Hidden Crisis
“Men are pressed — from the time they’re very young — to disassociate from everything feminine. Paradoxically, it makes men feel good because of a social agreement that masculine things are better than feminine things, but it’s not the same thing as freedom. It’s restrictive and dehumanizing. It’s oppression all dressed up as awesomeness.”
Life
“We as a society have been conducting a play-deprivation experiment with our children. Today’s children are much more deprived than children were 60 years ago and much, much more than children were in hunter-gatherer societies. The results, I think, are in. Play deprivation is bad for children. Among other things, it promotes anxiety, depression, suicide, narcissism, and loss of creativity.”
2. Life is easy. Why do we make it so hard?
“Now I feel free. I don’t worry about anything much. I have less fear. I can do whatever I want in my life. Before that I have a lot of fear. I cannot do anything.”
3. Ted Hughes on the Universal Inner Child
“The only calibration that counts is how much heart people invest, how much they ignore their fears of being hurt or caught out or humiliated. And the only thing people regret is that they didn’t live boldly enough, that they didn’t invest enough heart, didn’t love enough. Nothing else really counts at all.”
“Everyone carries a piece of the puzzle. Nobody comes into your life by mere coincidence. Trust your instincts. Do the unexpected. Find the others…”
And some self-promotion…
How I’m Marketing My Self-Published Book
Recession-Proof Graduate (revised and redesigned)
How a 29-Year Old Street Artist got his own Coca-Cola Commercial
# # #
What was the best / most life-changing content you came across in 2013? Post your link(s) in the comments below and tell us why it made such an impact on you.
Member discussion