Standing On The Shoulders of Giants

 Everything in life is made from the same 4 building blocks. Hydrogen, Carbon, Oxygen and Nitrogen. So everything you ever see, however different and unique it may seem, has in its structure the same building blocks. In the same way every new idea, technique or mental tool is just a different combination of the same building blocks.

When you read a book or take a course, essentially what you are getting is the fruit from a tree. They have taken a number of seed ideas… planted them… nurtured them and watched them grow into strong trees. Year after year these trees will produce fruit.

Now the fruit on its own, looks nice when it’s fresh and tastes great. But two weeks later its rotten… it doesn’t look so great and it tastes awful. This is just like the way that many people learn something from a book or course, they feel confident in it but they do not have the mental infrastructure to nourish and maintain the idea.

So they’ll come across a situation and they’ll think,

‘Hmm, I learnt how to deal with this… now let me think I need to do X and then Y, and what was that other thing’.

 Now perhaps if you are able to devote the time you can integrate the concepts into a mental infrastructure that supports and allows the concepts to develop. But it is only by becoming the idea that you fully understand it. You do not get this from others or books or courses. They will give you seeds, but you must grow and nourish them.

The key is to take the main idea from a book or course, not use the idea as a substitute for your own thoughts. Process the ideas down to their root and mix them altogether for your own unique life philosophy.

It isn’t necessary to reinvent every idea. We are here at this time and era in history not to start again in every generation, but to build upon the past. So our job is to discard, refine and synthesise concepts and ideas.

Although we do not need to reinvent the wheel, we do need to update and refine the ideas we currently hold. Tradition is not a valid reason for believing something. Businesses have learned that if they don’t identify the loopholes and weaknesses in their products and strategies that they will be overtaken by their competitors. They call it Creative Destruction. Its not a new concept. It happened to the Dinosaurs. It doesn’t matter how big or powerful you are… if you don’t change when the tide changes you’re going to get swept away.

Now through this book you have been given concepts, processes and ideas. In themselves they are worthless, just as the greatest speech without a listener. But planted, nourished and developed they are all you need to make everything you could wish for in your lifetime.

It’s down to you now.

How many creative ways can you apply them in your life?

Which will you discard?

How will you refine them?

What new combinations will you make of them?