Barry Schwartz says we have to become “choosers” instead of “pickers.” A picker selects from the options available, leading us into false dichotomies… - Eric Barker

Walker Smith of Yankelovich Partners told The Wall Street Journal, “Right now, there’s no aspiration to be middle class. Everyone wants to be at the top.” We probably have far more now than we ever had in the past, but we’re probably not much happier. And instinctively we think the problem can still be fixed by more. More money. More food. More things. Just more. We’re not even sure what we need more of, but whatever we have now sure as hell isn’t doing it, so turn it up to eleven, Bertha.

Success is something you will confront constantly in business. You will always be interpreting it against something, and that something should be your own goals and purpose.

Anyone who knows baseball knows Ted Williams. He played professionally from 1939 to 1960 and is one of the undisputed greatest hitters of all time, right up there with Babe Ruth. But whether you’re familiar with him or not, I have news for you: Ted Williams never played baseball. Nope, he never did. The problem there is the verb: Williams wasn’t playing. To him, hitting a baseball wasn’t a game. He always took it very, very seriously. In a 1988 interview he said as a child he literally wished on a falling star that he would become the greatest hitter to ever live. But he didn’t sit around and wait for the dream to come true. His obsessive, perfectionist work ethic would bring him more success than any descending celestial body would. Williams said, “I . . . insist that regardless of physical assets, I would never have gained a headline for hitting if I [had not] kept everlastingly at it and thought of nothing else the year round . . . I only lived for my next time at bat.” Ten thousand hours to achieve expertise? Williams probably did that a few times over. He was obsessed. After school, he’d go to a local field and practice hitting until nine P.M., only stopping because that’s when they turned the lights out. Then he’d go home and practice in the backyard until his parents made him go to bed. He’d get to school early so he could fit in more swings before classes started. He’d bring his bat to class. He picked courses that had less homework, not because he was lazy but so he’d have more time for hitting.