Einstein’s words are even more applicable today.
“Insanity is the definition of doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results.”
Contrary to much that you may have read or heard, Einstein did NOT say the above quote, and, therefore, it will not be in this list.
This is probably one of the most famous incorrectly attributed quotes of all time.
And while no one is 100% sure who exactly said this, it does very much sound and feel like something Einstein would’ve said considering many of his philosophical quotes about life and happiness.
For all of his metaphysical genius of explaining the wonders of our universe, Einstein was also somewhat of a philosopher as it relates to sharing his ideas about life and what truly made it worth living.
And while perhaps the most famous “Einstein quote” was one that he never said, here are five verified quotes that give great advice as to what’s important in life for success and happiness that just might inspire you to make the most of it.
“The best way to cheer yourself up is to cheer somebody else up.”
While this statement may seem weird, it truly can get to the crux of happiness when you think about it.
The happiest people in the world aren’t generally the people who have the most stuff or can do the most things. Instead, they are the people who are able to make others the happiest.
Think about it. It’s almost impossible to feel sad if you are making someone else smile.
If we focus on our own wants and needs, we may find ourselves always wanting more, but if we focus on helping others get what they need and making them happy, it will tend to lead to happiness for the person who is creating the happiness.
Are there very many things more satisfying to watch than Drake’s God’s Plan video?
The next time you find yourself down or depressed, try to make someone else smile or feel good, and it will likely improve your mood.
“If you want to live a happy life, tie it to a goal, not to people or things.”
Putting your happiness in a person is dangerous.
Not because you shouldn’t risk loving someone because that is one of the greatest joys in life.
However, people and life can be very unpredictable and if you tie your happiness to a person (regardless of how amazing that person is), you put yourself at risk of that person no longer being in your life for whatever reason and your happiness being destroyed as a result of it.
If you put it in an object, as soon as you acquire that object, there is a good chance the feeling of joy and elation from first getting it will dissipate with time, and you’ll find yourself back longing for something else new to get that feeling again.
Therefore, as Einstein shared, having a goal that you are focused on for your future of either who you want to be or what your want to accomplish will keep you focused on something that you can control and, hopefully, help you prevent disappointment and sadness in your future.
And the great thing about creating a goal is that once you reach it, you can just create another one to keep you focused on growing and aspiring on creating a better future.
“The measure of intelligence is the ability to change.”
There’s nothing worse than having to deal with someone who thinks they’re right all the time.
We’ve all been around those people who seem to have an opinion about everything and always seem to want to tell you why your opinion is wrong.
In a world in which we have decided to go to our political corners and not talk to each other to see if anyone has any common threads of negotiation, finding someone who is willing to change her/his mind these days is a tall order.
The truly intelligent are the ones who are willing to listen to what others have to say and are open to reassessing their views if the facts call for it.
Individuals who want to live in the past or refuse to progress with the times because “the old ways were better” put themselves in danger of getting left behind as we grow and change as a society.
Darwinism is about the adaptation of species over time to evolve with the new dynamics of the environment in which they are living. Those who refuse to grow, adapt, and evolve typically become the minority over time before they typically cease to exist at all.
“A clever person solves a problem. A wise person avoids it.”
Ip Man is a great movie, but if one really thinks about it, much of the drama for the main character was caused by the main character himself.
In the movie, Ip makes a series of missteps due to his pride (wouldn’t take money or a job from his brother who owed him anyway; wouldn’t work until there was at dire need for food for his family; still refused to take rice back to his family after his defeat of the Chinese soldiers even though they were starving) that brings havoc and poverty to his family.
And while he is ultimately able to get out of it, it would’ve probably been much better for him and his family if he never had to go through it in the first place.
Life is something like that, in that people will make decisions that will make their lives harder than they need to be (e.g., having a kid before one is financially stable enough to raise one) and then will feel a sense of accomplishment as they overcome said hardship.
While raising your kid to go to college as a single parent is a great accomplishment, the better accomplishment would’ve been to never have gotten into a relationship with someone who wasn’t emotionally mature and stable in the first place, much less have a kid with that person.
Life can be hard, but most people make it a lot harder with the dumb choices they make.
Don’t be most people.
“The world as we have created it is a process of our thinking. It cannot be changed without changing our thinking.”
This one can be truly life changing if someone reads this slowly and truly takes it to heart.
We drive on the right side of the roads in the U.S. because someone a long time ago decided this was the correct side of the road to drive on in America.
We created the concept of marriage and that it should be between a man and woman because someone a long time ago said this was the correct concept of marriage.
We all grow up, get married, and have kids because somewhere along the way, we as a society decided this was the correct progress of one’s life.
The reality is that these standards and decisions were created by someone or a group of people who were no smarter than you or we are today.
Actually, there’s a very good chance that they were much less intelligent based on the volume of information and data that we have access to truly understand what is possible in the world today as opposed to in the past.
To allow ourselves to live by the dogmatic rules of individuals who created them thousands or even hundreds of years ago seems silly in light of all the knowledge that we have now and case studies of dumb sh*t people used to believe that we now know is completely ridiculous (e.g., rain is God’s tears, the sun revolves around the earth, smoking is good for you).
And while I don’t think Einstein is telling you to challenge this by driving on the left side of the road to prove a point (that would just be stupid), I do think he is suggesting you be a bit more open-minded by challenging society’s and your own thinking to see where it might take you.