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    “We’ve already seen occupations like typesetting, switchboard operation, data entry, travel planning, and even retail sales dwindle or become obsolete, and technology will continue to replace manual work with machines. We need equitable retraining solutions for people who lose their livelihoods, but otherwise, this is a good change. The vast majority of people have more to offer than pressing buttons or sorting widgets. We need their contributions.”

    Aytekin Tank, Automate Your Busywork (Page 158)

      “It’s impossible to build something that is of a higher quality than the quality of the people around you.”

      Will Smith, Will (Page 318)

        “Look for situations where the energy is already flowing downhill. Invest in relationships where there is already mutual respect. Create products that tap into a desire people already have. Work on projects that play to your strengths. And then, once the potential of the situation is already working for you, add fuel to the fire. Pour yourself into the craft. Act as if you have to outwork everyone else—even though the wind is at your back. The idea is to sprint downhill, not grind uphill.”

        James Clear, Blog

          “If you’re sticking with a job, even though it’s making you miserable, because you think that grit is the same thing as character and that it is weak-willed to walk away from something—the problem is you forget that you’ll be walking towards something. And the thing that you would be walking towards could actually be a lot better. And so sticking has the associative cost of not just the misery you’re currently feeling in that horrible job but also all the happiness you could be gaining from the other things you could be doing.”

          Annie Duke

            “In school, you are graded on every test—even if it’s your weakest subject. In life, you can choose the tests you take—even if they always play to your strengths. Maintain a baseline so your weak areas don’t hold you back, but design your life so you are graded on your strengths.”

            James Clear, Blog

              “Practical knowledge is the ultimate commodity and is what will pay you dividends for decades to come—far more than the paltry increase in pay you might receive at some seemingly lucrative position that offers fewer learning opportunities.”

              Robert Greene, The Daily Laws (Page 53)

                “No calling is superior to another. What matters is that it be tied to a personal need and inclination, and that your energy moves you toward improvement and continuous learning from experience.”

                Robert Greene, The Daily Laws (Page 28)

                  “Scoff at the need for attention and approval—they will lead you astray. Feel some anger and resentment at the parental forces that want to foist upon you an alien vocation. It is a healthy part of your development to follow a path independent of your parents and to establish your own identity. Let your sense of rebellion fill you with energy and purpose.”

                  Robert Greene, The Daily Laws (Page 26)

                    “Your Life’s Task does not always appear to you through some grand or promising inclination. It can appear in the guise of your deficiencies, making you focus on the one or two things that you are inevitably good at. Working at these skills, you learn the value of discipline and see the rewards you get from your efforts. Like a lotus flower, your skills will expand outward from a center of strength and confidence.”

                    Robert Greene, The Daily Laws (Page 24)

                      “If you wouldn’t do it if nobody was watching, don’t do it.”

                      Cole Schafer

                        “Work is life. Not having something to do with one’s life, something important or unique to your talents or however you put it, is a bigger killer than cancer.”

                        Ray Mungo, via Sunbeams (Page 138)

                          “Work is love made visible. And if you cannot work with love but only with distaste, it is better that you should leave your work and sit at the gate of the temple and take alms of those who work with joy. For if you bake bread with indifference, you bake a bitter bread that feeds but half man’s hunger.”

                          Kahlil Gibran, The Prophet, via Sunbeams (Page 119)

                            “We cannot predict the value our work will provide to the world. That’s fine. It is not our job to judge our own work. It is our job to create it, to pour ourselves into it, and to master our craft as best we can.”

                            James Clear, Blog

                              “The more you try to force it, I learned, the less likely you are to succeed. True missions, it turns out, require two things. First you need career capital, which requires patience. Second, you need to be ceaselessly scanning your always-changing view of the adjacent possible in your field, looking for the next big idea. This requires a dedication to brainstorming and exposure to new ideas. Combined, these two commitments describe a lifestyle, not a series of steps that automatically spit out a mission when completed.”

                              Cal Newport, So Good They Can’t Ignore You