Belonging To A group

21–35% of our life is spent at work, making it a crucial part of our lives to spend at something we find meaning in.

Meaningful work should be:

• Motivating and purposeful.
• Should be coherent and make some sense.
• Should be significant.

Meaningful work is when we feel a genuine connection with what we do for a living and our larger spectrum of life.

It is motivating, creates deep relationships and helps others.

When you have fewer things to react to or you make it harder to react to them, you’ll be less reactive.

We find motivation when something is meaningful. Meaning is much bigger than the enjoyment of a moment. It can include something we don't like. Soldiers risk being killed every day to serve their country. New parents handle poop daily for years.

Meaningful things give us purpose. This means doing something that serves a larger cause than yourself or, at least, making a contribution in your own world.

When a task you have to do doesn't seem meaningful, reframe your experience. You may not always be able to change what you have to do but you can change how you view it. When you look at it in light of how it helps others, you'll often find motivation.

You're not "filling out boring paperwork, you're helping people get the insurance that could save their life. You're not slaving over a hot stove, you're showing your family how much you love them.

You need to have a beginning that builds to a middle and an ending, or at least an idea of where you’re going, as it is key to explore your themes and foreshadow things properly.

Another important thing is to revise your writings. Your first draft is likely to contain multiple errors, poorly phrased sections, and inconsistencies.

To do it, you must know what your audience expects from the type of writing you’re doing and then defy it.

Without the surprise, without the twist, if you don’t pull the wool over the audience’s eyes, then it’s unlikely you’re going to be memorable. It’s precisely the fact that things are not what they seem that makes a story interesting.

...is the belief that your abilities can be improved through effort. 

And this means you can get better and hard work pays off.

• Don’t praise ability or intelligence: That promotes a fixed mindset. Compliment effort, process and choices.
• Don’t ignore outcome, tie it to effort: You can be happy about success, but attribute it to effort.
• Respond positively to failure: Failure isn’t bad, it’s a tool for improving.
• Don’t just say “Try hard.” Set goals: Blind repetition doesn’t work. 
• Practice a Growth mindset in all areas of life: There’s no area where they cannot improve with hard work.
• Share your own Growth mindset efforts: Practice it yourself and share your results.

70% of our happiness comes from your relationships with other people. And the social distancing situation has left some with zero people around them. 
So reach out. Extended time without social contact is bad: Send a text, make that phone/video call, anything you want to let people know you care and are thinking about them.

Ask people if they need anything.  There are people out there in need of a little more than well wishes right now. And when people see others helping, they’re more likely to help. 

Also, if you need help, don’t be afraid to ask for it.

It’s key to connecting with people to suspend your ego; to put your own needs, wants and opinions aside. Anxiety does the opposite bringing your feelings and expectations to the forefront.

Focus on the other person. Simply listen to what they have to say and ask them to tell you more. 

Just because you feel it doesn’t make it real. Feelings come from beliefs. Change the beliefs and feelings will change.

Research and anecdotal evidence show that the simple act of positively reimagining something can be enough to decrease anxiety.

To live a significant, worthwhile life, one has to do something beyond oneself. The two ways to transcend oneself outside of work are:

1. Pursuing Mastery.
2. Performing acts of kindness.

"When people say that their lives have meaning, they evaluate their lives as significant and worthwhile, as part of something bigger."

Time spent making friends has a higher happiness Return on Investment than time spent making money.

Also, introduce friends to friends. Friends becoming happy increases your chance of happiness by 45%. Keeping the network happy protects you against unhappiness.

A few studies looked at the genetic similarity between friends and found that on a very deep level you resemble your friends genetically. 

What this means is that, basically, your friends are kin that you choose.

• Be Optimistic. Confronted by a bad situation, optimists perceive it as a challenge and try harder.
• Find Meaning In What You Do. When you find true meaning in your work — when it’s not a job, it’s a calling — you don’t burn out.

• Double Down On Relationships. Those who increase their social activity when things get hard handles stress the best.