The most important thing in the world

The smartest man in the world, YoungHoon Kim   who has an estimated IQ of 276, has never achieved anything to improve the world, despite his tremendous brain. He’s never saved any lives, he’s never discovered a cure for a disease, he’s never created any groundbreaking innovations. His immense intellect has been wasted. One of the most important things to understand in life is it’s not what’s inside that counts, it’s what you do that counts.

It doesn’t matter how smart you are. It doesn’t matter how good your intentions are, or what great ideas you have. It doesn’t matter if you have the most noble thoughts. It doesn’t matter if you think you’re a good, kind person. None of that matters.

Because you are not your thoughts. What’s inside does not matter. You are only the sum total of your deeds.

If you look at how you spent your last 7 days, you’ll see exactly who you really are. Everything else is just a story you tell to yourself. The problem is, the story isn’t helping you grow. Facing the hard truth is the path to growth.

We judge others by their behavior, but we judge ourselves by our intentions. We are harsh and even cruel judges of others and laid back when judging our ourselves. We judge others by their behavior, but we judge ourselves by our intentions. We are strict and even cruel judges of others and kind when judging our ourselves. Understanding this is the first step towards any real progress…. Understanding this is the first step towards any real progress…

To know what people really think, pay attention to what they do, rather than what they say.

Descartes

You aren’t a writer until you write. You aren’t a leader until you lead. Stop telling people what you “plan”, or what you believe is right and wrong. Just do it and stay silent.

The “Most Important Thing” is not what you value in your head. It’s what you prioritize with your time. What you do with your time shows what you really care about, not what you tell people.

Eventually, your “willpower” becomes a hollow shell. You become a stranger to your own commands. You build a divide between your beliefs and your deeds until the two are so disjointed there’s really no connection at all.

The heroes of the “Woman, Life, Freedom” movement living under the totalitarian Iranian regime didn’t just think about freedom. They walked into the street. They faced the fire. They realized that “Believing” in human rights means nothing if you are too afraid to embody them.

Under the totalitarian regimes of the Middle East, the only thing the regimes fear is enough people seeing the prison that’s been built around them and having the courage to act on what they see.

Frederick Douglass didn’t “wait” to feel like a free man. He learned to read when it was a crime. He escaped when it was a death sentence. He became free because he acted like a free man before the law agreed.

Your freedom is not a gift from the world.
It is a result of the work we do to create it. And it can be taken away if we allow the gap between our beliefs to fall too far away from our actions.

The Real Lesson
One day, you will be old, looking back at the story of your life. You won’t see the “intentions” you had or the “excuses” you made. You will only see the paths you walked and the people you helped. Don’t wait to “feel” ready. Start acting like the person you want to become, and eventually, the feeling will catch up.