My cousin and I often talk about ways to do better in different parts of our lives. How to win at different things, perform better, and how to manage ourselves so we do what our executive brains actually know will be good for us. My cousin is the type of guy that does a lot of research on stuff and finds the good shit. The best book on X topic, the best software for Y, or the best bag for work.

He told me about the concept of having some rules that you just memorise, and sent me a link to this blog post that he had read.

It is great. I immediately went out and wrote a draft list of about four or five and have revisited it many times since then. It is ok to update it, but you just have to lock some in. Memorising things is not seen as sexy these days because we have our device right there. However, I think it is actually really important, especially when we’re time poor. There is sometimes too much friction to access it, or we plan to do it later and don’t actually end up doing so.

Without further ado, my six memorised rules for life currently are:

1. Close it out. This is my number one “philosophy”. Leaving loose threads of ideas, plans or concepts stops you from actually getting things done or progressing BIG TIME. Just close it out. Get it done.
2. The time passes anyway. This is super similar to #3, but feels a little different to my brain. Some things feel like a chore or a weight, and it (subconsciously) feels like doing them could slow other things down or even my life down. But for lots of things, especially things that compound, they don’t, and the time is going to pass anyway.
3. Maintain health and money, no matter what. No matter what changes in my life, health and money are constant needs and will determine the life I can live. I am not saying they are more important than things like my loved ones (they are not) but they are constant needs and will always be. So, to prepare for the future, I should always be working to maintain these.
4. You will regret a year from now what you didn’t start today. Exactly what it says on the can. Just get started.
5. Preparation is sexy. Winging it is some people’s strong suit. It is not really mine. Practice makes perfect.
6. Minimise friction. Friction are things that make me not want to do something. But I have to parent myself, we all do. Make it easy to do the things that I want to do. Examples:
   • Have the pre-workout by the bed and my clothes laid out to encourage me to go to the gym.
   • Have bookmarks set up in Chrome (neatly organised in folders) to encourage me to regularly look at important things like logs and tickets.

I thought about the themes for them and I could categorise them as:

• The idea of compound interest in many areas of life – 2,3,4
• The idea of executing now, because if not now: when? – 1,5,6

Edit (6/9/24): Definitely considering adding “Don’t ask, don’t get” to this list.