#12 RULES FOR LIFE BOOK HOW TO#
#12 RULES FOR LIFE BOOK FULL#

It requires strength and daring to stand up near such a person. People who are not aiming up will do the opposite.ĭon’t think that it is easier to surround yourself with good healthy people than with bad unhealthy people. This will help bolster your resolve to do what you should do, in the most appropriate and careful manner. They will instead encourage you when you do good for yourself and others and punish you carefully when you do not. If you surround yourself with people who support your upward aim, they will not tolerate your cynicism and destructiveness. It’s appropriate and praiseworthy to associate with people whose lives would be improved if they saw your life improve. It’s a good thing, not a selfish thing, to choose people who are good for you. You should choose people who want things to be better, not worse. You are not morally obliged to support someone who is making the world a worse place. If you have a friend whose friendship you wouldn’t recommend to your sister, or your father, or your son, why would you have such a friend for yourself? Friendship is a reciprocal arrangement. In this manner, you strip him or her of all power. Besides, if you buy the story that everything terrible just happened on its own, with no personal responsibility on the part of the victim, you deny that person all agency in the past (and, by implication, in the present and future, as well). In my experience - clinical and otherwise - it’s just never been that simple. It’s the most unlikely explanation, not the most probable. You shouldn’t merely assume that he or she is a noble victim of unjust circumstances and exploitation. RULE 3: MAKE FRIENDS WITH PEOPLE WHO WANT THE BEST FOR YOUīefore you help someone, you should find out why that person is in trouble.

#12 RULES FOR LIFE BOOK HOW TO#

You need to determine how to act toward yourself so that you are most likely to become and to stay a good person. You must keep the promises you make to yourself, and reward yourself, so that you can trust and motivate yourself. You have to articulate your own principles, so that you can defend yourself against others’ taking inappropriate advantage of you, and so that you are secure and safe while you work and play. You must determine where you are going, so that you can bargain for yourself, so that you don’t end up resentful, vengeful and cruel. You should take care of, help and be good to yourself the same way you would take care of, help and be good to someone you loved and valued. You are, therefore, morally obliged to take care of yourself. You have some vital role to play in the unfolding destiny of the world. You are important to other people, as much as to yourself. RULE 2: TREAT YOURSELF LIKE SOMEONE YOU ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR HELPING Encourage the serotonin to flow plentifully through the neural pathways desperate for its calming influence. Put your desires forward, as if you had a right to them - at least the same right as others. If you start to straighten up, then people will look at and treat you differently. If you present yourself as defeated, then people will react to you as if you are losing. It will increase your susceptibility to heart disease, cancer and dementia.

#12 RULES FOR LIFE BOOK FULL#

It will render you more likely to abuse cocaine and alcohol, as you live for the present in a world full of uncertain futures. It will also decrease the probability that you will get to live in a good neighbourhood, have access to the highest quality resources, and obtain a healthy, desirable mate. This will make you less happy, and more anxious and sad, and more likely to back down when you should stand up for yourself. Then your brain will not produce as much serotonin. If you slump around, with the same bearing that characterizes a defeated lobster, people will assign you a lower status, and the old counter that you share with crustaceans, sitting at the very base of your brain, will assign you a low dominance number. Nonetheless, even if you came by your poor posture honestly - even if you were unpopular or bullied at home or in grade school - it’s not necessarily appropriate now. Maybe you’re even just a collection of bad habits. And maybe you’re not - but if you are, you don’t have to continue in that mode. RULE 1: STAND UP STRAIGHT WITH YOUR SHOULDERS BACK

12 rules for life book