As you start and run a business, or even in personal life, relationships and social interactions, you face greys all the time. You try reading up about the lives of the greats, philosophies that might help you deal with it. You try formulating rules and policies and tweak them as you face new situations. You ask around for help for how to react when your faith is shaken, or doubts enter the head.
The simplest solution to all of this is easily summarized in one straightforward mantra:
Don’t be a jerk.
Applies to everything – driving on the road, having an opinion about anything, dealing with your co-founders and employees, treating vendors right, handling irate customers – everything.
It doesn’t matter if the other person’s being a jerk – or you think they are. That’s no excuse to be one yourself.
Just try very very hard at not being a jerk (even go an extra mile, when in doubt), and you’ll see how things sort themselves out, and how stress melts away, and how what you do starts to be a lot more fun.
It’s really that simple – so we’ll keep it short. You go and have a wonderful jerk-free 2013!
PS: Mathematically speaking, Jerk is the derivative of acceleration 😀 and hence Jerk = d3s/dt3
