自律:有效生活的基础(3/6)

Knowledge itself is only part of the path. Knowledge is not productivity. It's not efficiency. It's a necessary step, and the first step towards those things, but implementation is the step that makes it worth the time and efforts spent learning. Primarily, remember to start small, work up to big. If you haven't been able to implement ideas in real life on a small scale, then the chances that you can do something big this week, such as kick a ten-year smoking habit, are pretty small. It can and has been done, but good luck trying. There are exceptions to every rule. This is where the comparison of self-discipline to the use of a muscle is important, because if you keep trying to tackle the big problems in your life from the get-go, you set yourself up to fail again and again. The more you fail on the big things, the more motivation you lose and the more it looks like the problems are too big to be beaten.

知识本身只是这条路的部分。知识既非生产力也不是效率，它是实现这些东西不可或缺的首要步骤。然而，实践却是让你花在学习上的努力与时间变得有意义的的一步。记住凡事都是先从小做到大的。倘若在实际生活中你无法先从小范围开始实行自己的想法，那么这周你能完成大事的几率则相当小。比如想一下子改掉十年的抽烟习惯，这想法可能实现也有人正在实践，但是……祝君好运。凡事都有例外。这就是我们说自律好比使用肌肉的重要原因，假如你在生活中一开始就只想着解决大问题，你只会再三地失败。你越失败就会越没有动力，似乎要解决这问题变得更加难如登天了。