Derek Sivers Quotes

We shouldn’t preserve our first opinions as if they reflect our pure, untarnished, true nature. They’re often just the result of inexperience or a temporary phase. Old opinions shouldn’t define who we are in the future.

Information doesn’t stick without emotion.
You learn better when you’re having fun.

Busy is what happens when you’re at the mercy of someone else’s schedule.

Success in business comes from helping people — bringing the most happiness to the most people.

Don’t be on your deathbed someday, having squandered your one chance at life, full of regret because you pursued little distractions instead of big dreams.

Since you can’t avoid problems, just find good problems.
Happiness isn’t everlasting tranquility.
Happiness is solving good problems.

Delegate but don't abdicate

We want to see the world clearly and know what’s what. But once we’re past the first stage of wisdom, the next stage involves adapting to new changes. We don’t get wise just by adding and adding. We also need to subtract.

a big difference between being self-employed and being a business owner. Being self-employed feels like freedom until you realize that if you take time off, your business crumbles. To be a true business owner, make it so that you could leave for a year, and when you came back, your business would be doing better than when you left.

If you set up your business like you don’t need the money, people are happier to pay you. When someone’s doing something for the money, people can sense it, like they sense a desperate lover. It’s a turnoff. When someone’s doing something for love, being generous instead of stingy, trusting instead of fearful, it triggers this law: We want to give to those who give.

You have different sides to your personality, with conflicting needs.
Instead of ignoring one, make sure you balance them.
Balance time with others and time alone.
Balance your need for stability with your need for surprise.
Balance input and output, consumption and creation, stability and adventure, body and spirit.
Your opposing needs become each other’s remedy.

It’s so important to separate the real goal from the old mental associations. We have old dreams. We have images we want to re-create. They’re hard to untangle from the result we really want. They become excuses, and reasons to procrastinate.

The biggest obstacle to learning is assuming you already know.
Confidence is usually ignorance.

The future is unpredictable and uncontrollable.
Picture all the things that could go wrong.
Prepare for each, so they won’t surprise or hurt you.

He taught me that “the standard pace is for chumps” — that the system is designed so anyone can keep up. If you’re more driven than most people, you can do way more than anyone expects. And this principle applies to all of life, not just school.