There are many things we can all learn from the story of Regie Shaw. The one that stands out most is probably this: each one of us could have easily been him, and still any one of us can easily become him.

What is the first word that comes to mind when you think of productivity? Probably not “flexible“. Most tools, systems and methods require you to follow a rigid procedure.

In Greg McKeown's 2014 book, Essentialism, he explains the way of the Essentialist—the disciplined pursuit of less but better. "It's about making the trade-off between pursuing lots of good things OR a few really great things."

Chances are you shouldn’t be reading this right now. You set off to do something else, yet somehow you ended up here. Welcome to the Age of Unlimited Distraction.

Do you know which shoelace you tied first this morning? Left or right? Did you give much thought to what you did first when you started up your computer? Do you recall how you ended up on this page?

Have you ever seen someone show up in the most professional snowboarding gear on the planet, on his first lesson? Had an intern who insists he needs a MacBook Pro to properly write his graduation report?

What have you changed about yourself in the past 12 months? It’s one of my favorite questions when doing job interviews. It tells you quite a few things about the candidate.

One Ring to rule them all, One Ring to find them, One Ring to bring them all and in the darkness bind them.” – J.R.R. Tolkien

When everything becomes a priority, nothing is a priority. In fact, until around 1950, people hardly ever used the plural “priorities”. They seemed content to only have one “priority."

Do you plan to go to the gym more often in the new year? Smoke and drink less? Get more engaged at work? Or maybe quit your job and go on that travel adventure you’ve always dreamed of?

"Having a lot to do isn’t the same as actually getting a lot done. Most of the time, people who have a lot to do end up doing a lot of unimportant, unnecessary things.” Leo Babauta

Jonah Peretti is to BuzzFeed what Howard Schultz is to Starbucks. And since BuzzFeed is to media what Starbucks is to coffee, the analogy runs deeper than them just sharing the same job titles.

In a matter of minutes, hours or days, you can sometimes learn something which initially took others weeks, months, years or even lives to figure out.