Farewell


In Lewis Carrolls Through the Looking Glass , the Red Queen drags Alice into a mad dash:

they were running hand in hand, and the Queen went so fast that it was all she could do to keep up with her: and still the Queen kept crying, Faster! Faster!, but Alice felt she could not go faster, though she had no breath to say so.

The most curious part of the thing was, that the trees and the other things round them never changed their places at all: however fast they went, they never seemed to pass anything

Now! Now! cried the Queen. Faster! Faster! And they went so fast that at last they seemed to skim through the air, hardly touching the ground with their feet, till suddenly, just as Alice was getting quite exhausted, they stopped , and she found herself sitting on the ground, breathless and giddy

Alice looked round her in great surprise. Why, I do believe weve been under this tree the whole time! Everythings just as it was!

Of course it is, said the Queen. What would you have it?

Well, in our country, said Alice, still panting a little, youd generally get to somewhere else if you ran very fast for a long time as weve being doing.

A slow sort of country! said the Queen. Now, here, you see, it takes all the running you can do, to keep in the same place. If you want to get somewhere else, you must run at least twice as fast as that! [2]

Lewis Carroll could have been satirizing todays fast-track world, which urges us to go faster and seek more with more. But as Alice found, when we speed up we exhaust ourselves without getting anywhere . The treadmill of modern life relentlessly cranks up, we run faster and faster, but never arrive at happiness. Like running at the gym, we sweat, we get tired , yet we stay where we were.

The fast track bestows only the illusion of speed. Like a theme park rollercoaster, its scary and thrilling, yet it takes us nowhere.

If speeding up takes us nowhere, slowing down can take us everywhere. Contrary to common opinion, less is more. Only by concentrating on the few important and vital things, and refusing to worry over the mass of trivial ones, can we find happiness. Only by doing less can we live more. Only by insisting on more with less can we fulfill our individual destiny.

We have seen that more with less is the principle behind marvelous achievements in business, economics, science, and technology. The watchwords of success are focus, selectivity, and innovation.

The 80/20 Way translates the same principle to our individual lives. We dont have to accept the current fad surely one that will seem bizarre and ridiculous to observers a few decades ahead for more with more. More with more is stupid. It wastes human potential. It insults human intelligence and ingenuity. It flunks any objective test of social progress. More with more is just a wet dream for misguided yuppies.

To find meaning in life, we have to reach inside ourselves: define the few things that we care about, the things we want to love and devote ourselves to, the things we are good at and enjoy. Having found these things, everything else is trivial. Fulfilled and happy creating more with less, we can safely ignore the shrill fad for more with more and Faster! Faster!.

But

the 80/20 Way

still requires

effort

In this book Ive suggested a more intelligent and worry-free path through life, an easier way to achievement and self- realization. More with less is much easier than more with more.

Yet in one respect, the 80/20 Way is harder. It is harder to start. Because all the assumptions of the modern world push us toward more is more and more with more, we need self-confidence and resolve to leave the crowd .

To reject more with more in favor of more with less requires less labor and yields greater happiness and fulfillment, yet also demands a degree of intellectual courage. We have to reject the modern treadmill and stop doing what other ambitious people are doing. We must get rid of more is more and more with more. We have to work out where less can be more and stick to our guns when friends and colleagues think were nuts.

I dare to guess that you now believe in less is more and more with less. But reading this book has been useless unless you start behaving differently.

Albert Einstein said that every problem should be made as simple as possible, but not simpler. The 80/20 Way makes everything as easy as possible, but not easier. Ultimately, to make a life to take action that will lead to the best life you can make requires some new and different effort. Otherwise, we would be robots and life wouldnt be worth crafting .

Nevertheless, effort is effortless when driven by desire and love. Too often were driven not by desire , not by what we love, but by the dead hand of guilt, worry, or duty. Duty, John Fowles wrote, largely consists of pretending that the trivial is critical. Duty wastes life energy. All great human accomplishments have been driven not by duty but by passion.

Our lives are most enjoyable and valuable when we are driven by the few things that excite us. If we are not excited, nothing is of any use. If we are not ourselves, little will come of our lives. If we are excited and ourselves, however, there is no limit to our happiness or achievement.

The vision behind the 80/20 Way is a world where we are all individuals, responsible for ourselves, discovering and enjoying our unique place in the universe, leaving behind fond memories, happy children, or some enhancement of art, science, literature, or service to other people.

It is awesome to realize that most of life is trivial and most of what we do is unworthy of us. Of course, we shouldnt look down on the mundane tasks of life: the cleaning, the washing-up, the need to make a living. What matters is how and why we do what we do. Anything that gives meaning to our life or happiness is precious. But to drift aimlessly through life, without being happy or making other people happy, without realizing the best of what we could become what a waste!

Yes, it takes a little effort to get on the 80/20 Way you dont need 20/20 vision, but you do need 80/20 vision. Yes, it requires a different attitude. Yes, you must stand out from the crowd. Yes, you must cast off the sticky chains of modern convention. Yes, it takes action. But you can do it. Decide now that you will . Start to do it! Once you get the hang of it, it will seem the easiest way of all.

Without action, you may have enjoyed this book, but that pleasure will soon fade. My warm wish is that you take the few, small but well-directed actions that will transform your life, enabling your happiness to overflow and flood the people around you, the ones you love. To multiply happiness, start those few actions right away.

[2] Lewis Carroll (1872) Through the Looking Glass, and What Alice Found There , London: Macmillan. See Penguin Classics edition of Lewis Carroll (1998) Alices Adventures in Wonderland and Through the Looking Glass , London: Penguin, pp. 1413.




Living the 80. 20 Way. Work Less, Worry Less, Succeed More, Enjoy More
Living The 80/20 Way: Work Less, Worry Less, Succeed More, Enjoy More
ISBN: 1857883314
EAN: 2147483647
Year: 2003
Pages: 86
Authors: Richard Koch

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