The 16 things we should know before 28 years old 

　　A teacher probably spoke about some of these 16 things in this article in class, but I forgot about them or didn't pay attention。

　　Some of it would probably not have stuck in my mind anyway. Or just been too far outside my reality at the time for me to accept and use。

　　1. The 80/20 rule. 二八定律：80%的收获源于20%的付出

　　This is one of the best ways to make better use of your time. The 80/20 rule – also known as The Pareto Principle – basically says that 80 percent of the value you will receive will come from 20 percent of your activities。

　　So a lot of what you do is probably not as useful or even necessary to do as you may think。

　　You can just drop – or vastly decrease the time you spend on – a whole bunch of things。

　　And if you do that you will have more time and energy to spend on those things that really brings your value, happiness, fulfilment and so on。

　　2. Parkinson's Law. 帕金森定律：你的做事速度可以比你想象的更快

　　You can do things quicker than you think. This law says that a task will expand in time and seeming complexity depending on the time you set aside for it. For instance, if you say to yourself that you'll come up with a solution within a week then the problem will seem to grow more difficult and you'll spend more and more time trying to come up with a solution。

　　So focus your time on finding solutions. Then just give yourself an hour (instead of the whole day) or the day (instead of the whole week) to solve the problem. This will force your mind to focus on solutions and action。

　　The result may not be exactly as perfect as if you had spent a week on the task, but as mentioned in the previous point, 80 percent of the value will come from 20 percent of the activities anyway. Or you may wind up with a better result because you haven't overcomplicated or overpolished things. This will help you to get things done faster, to improve your ability to focus and give you more free time where you can totally focus on what's in front of you instead of having some looming task creating stress in the back of your mind。

　　3. Batching. 批量做事：将一些琐事放在一起做完

　　Boring or routine tasks can create a lot of procrastination and low-level anxiety. One good way to get these things done quickly is to batch them. This means that you do them all in row. You will be able to do them quicker because there is less "start-up time" compared to if you spread them out. And when you are batching you become fully engaged in the tasks and more focused。

　　A batch of things to do in an hour today may look like this: Clean your desk / answer today's emails/do the dishes/make three calls/write a grocery shopping list for tomorrow。

　　4. First, give value. Then, get value. Not the other way around. 先付出，再索取，切莫颠倒

　　This is a bit of a counter-intuitive thing. There is often an idea that someone should give us something or do something for us before we give back. The problem is just that a lot of people think that way. And so far less than possible is given either way。

　　If you want to increase the value you receive (money, love, kindness, opportunities etc。) you have to increase the value you give. Because over time you pretty much get what you give. It would perhaps be nice to get something for nothing. But that seldom happens。

　　5. Be proactive. Not reactive. 以积极主动为荣，以消极怠惰为耻

　　This one ties into the last point. If everyone is reactive then very little will get done. You could sit and wait and hope for someone else to do something. And that happens pretty often, but it can take a lot of time before it happens。

　　A more useful and beneficial way is to be proactive, to simply be the one to take the first practical action and get the ball rolling. This not only saves you a lot of waiting, but is also more pleasurable since you feel like you have the power over your life. Instead of feeling like you are run by a bunch of random outside forces。

　　6. Mistakes and failures are good. 失败同样宝贵

　　When you are young you just try things and fail until you learn. As you grow a bit older, you learn from – for example – school to not make mistakes. And you try less and less things。

　　This may cause you to stop being proactive and to fall into a habit of being reactive, of waiting for someone else to do something. I mean, what if you actually tried something and failed? Perhaps people would laugh at you?

　　Perhaps they would. But when you experience that you soon realize that it is seldom the end of the world. And a lot of the time people don't care that much. They have their own challenges and lives to worry about。

　　And success in life often comes from not giving up despite mistakes and failure. It comes from being persistent。

　　When you first learn to ride your bike you may fall over and over. Bruise a knee and cry a bit. But you get up, brush yourself off and get on the saddle again. And eventually you learn how to ride a bike. If you can just reconnect to your five year old self and do things that way – instead of giving up after a try/failure or two as grown-ups often do – you would probably experience a lot more interesting things, learn valuable lessons and have quite a bit more success。