What habits should you practise to become smarter?

Smart habits? I know a few. Most of them aren’t what you might expect.

Habit #1: Treat Facts The Way You Treat Food
What do I mean by this? Let’s talk about food for a moment. Not all food is good for you.

  • Some food tastes bad and is very nutritious.
  • Some food tastes good and will kill you slowly.

Information is like food.

There is junk information, same as there is junk food. Be wary when people confirm your expectations. For example, anyone with easy truths could be telling you what you want to hear.

And if it seems plausible and likely, it just matches what you already know. If so, have you really learned anything?

Examine information before you take it in. Some facts may be uncomfortable, but that doesn’t make them less true.

Habit #2: Break Your Toys
Take something you absolutely know is true. For best results, choose a personal, deeply-held truth.

Then look for examples where it isn’t true.

  • For some people it will not be true.
  • In some places, it will not be true.
  • At some point in history it was not/will not be true.

In this way, you can find the edges of your world – and start filling in the missing pieces.

Smart people think differently. This is one way of doing that.

Habit #3: Learn How to Take a Punch
There are two parts to this:

1 – If you don’t own your failures, you won’t learn from them.

Stupid is doing the same dumb thing twice or more. And some mistakes, you can’t walk away from. Learn from your mistakes.

2 – “No battle plan ever survives contact with the enemy

Even if your planning is perfect, the world is complex. You will fail at some point, or you aren’t really trying. How you deal with that really matters.

Can you absorb the defeat, or are you crushed by it? Being prepared to take a punch (metaphorically speaking) will help you to be resilient.

Resilient people succeed. It’s smart to join them.