At the very beginning, Ray requires the readers that they 1)be open-minded and 2) honestly answer some questions about what you want, what is true and what you want to do about it.
If you do these things, I believe that you will get a lot out of this book. If you can’t do these things, you should reflect on why that is, because you probably have discovered one of your greatest impediments to getting what you want out of life.
In fact, when opening any book, we should begin with this state of mind. After closing the last page, we should also ask ourselves these questions: What have I got? Which part is not agree with my past experience? Is it true? How can I put it into my business?
Master Wang Yang-ming, a nearly perfect saint in Ming dynasty said, better understanding is always compatible with action, and it is not true knowledge without putting into action and stress-test the principle from the books by others.
I’m shocked even terrified to find there is no principles in my mind,and that’s why my life is in chaos. My doing something right by odd owes to luck and randomness without any consciousness, and seldom draw conclusion. A man’s life without principle is like a life of a fish, a bird or anything else.It’s cruel yet true. A life without principle is like a boat in the ocean without a sail.
Principles are concepts that can be applied over and over again in similar circumstances as distinct from narrow answers to specific questions... Your values are what you consider important, literally what you “value.” Principles are what allow you to live a life consistent with those values.? Without principles, you would be forced to react to circumstances that come at you without considering what you value most and how to make choices to get what you want. This would prevent you from making the most of your life because it leads to people randomly bumping into each other without understanding their own values and how to behave in order to be consistent with those values.
Different principles apply to different aspects of life - e.g., there are "skiing principles" for skiing, "parenting principles" for parenting, "management principles" for managing, “investment principles” for investing, etc - and there are over - arching "life principles" that influence our approaches to all things.
There are principles of all degrees ranging from life to specific sports, which means all can be attained by practice. In a way, destiny is in the hands of everyone! We can choose our own fate by observing others and reading books.
I also believe that those principles that are most valuable to each of us come from our own encounters with reality and our reflections on these encounters – not from being taught and simply accepting someone else’s principles. So, I put these out there for you to reflect on and not for you to blindly follow. ...So, when digesting each principle, please ask yourself: “Is it true?”
Sometimes we accept others’ principles, or holistic packages of principles, such as religion and legal systems. While it isn’t necessarily a bad thing to use others’ principles—it’s difficult to come up with your own, and often much wisdom has gone into those already created-adopting pre-packaged principles without much thought exposes you to the risk of inconsistency with your true values.
In the autocratic society, the boss left no stone uncovered to wash the mass’ brain. so, independent thinking, rather than taking most followed-path as a sheep or having a trust what the administrative broadcast (one can believe the opposite in most cases) is the first step towards a free life, refusing to accept blindly the official preach and self-asking why and “Is it true”over and over again.
Holding incompatible principles can lead to conflict between values and actions—like the hypocrite who has claims to be of a religion yet behaves counter to its teachings.
