SDS 144: Two Things to Remember and Two Things to Forget

Welcome back to the Super Data Science podcast, and today I’ve got a concept, a phrase that really resonated with me, and I would like to share it with you. So, I was listening to a different podcast, I was listening to Lewis Howe School of Greatness podcast, episode number 608. If you haven’t heard Lewis Howes podcast School of Greatness, I highly recommend check it out, you can start off at this episode, 608.

It’s with Jay Shetty. Jay is a guy from London who went and lived as a monk in India for three years, and then came back, and now he’s teaching people the things that he learned. Mostly through videos, so you may have seen his videos on Facebook or YouTube, they go viral, they get like 50 million views. So you may have actually already seen a couple of his lessons that he’s shared.

And in this podcast, there’s lots and lots of valuable things that they discussed, and lots of valuable knowledge that he shared, especially wisdom from his time as being a monk. But one thing that really resonated with me, and I remember I was walking onto the tarmac, off the plane onto the tarmac, and for me, when something resonates with me, when it really sticks in my mind, I can remember the location where I was, it’s just how my brain works. And I can clearly remember that I was getting off the plane, and walking onto the tarmac to get to the bus that takes you away from the plane.

And I heard him say this, so here we go. What Jay said, and what he learned, one of the things he learned as a monk is two things to remember and two things to forget. So let’s go through this, the two things to remembers are always remember the bad you’ve done to others, and the good others have done to you. So, again, always remember the bad you’ve done to others, and the good others have done to you.

And he explains it this way, that by remembering the bad you’ve done to others, you will always feel grounded and humble, and you’ll never let your ego get over you. So as soon as you start thinking how amazing I am, or how great I am, and how I’m achieving success, or I’m doing so many great things, all it takes is to remember what bad things, what have you done that’s bad, and you’ve done it to others in your past. When you were younger, or years ago, or months ago. And we all have moments we’re not proud of, we all have moment which we might even be embarrassed by.

And so keeping those in your memory actually helps you to control your ego, to always realize that we’re all not perfect, that we all make mistakes. That we all need to work on ourselves constantly to become better and better, there’s no stopping with that. And it really keeps our ego under control, or helps keep your ego under control.

And the other one is to remember the good things that others have done to you, and by remembering the good things others have done to you, you’re always going to feel grateful. So those are the two things to remember.

Now, the two things to forget, forget the good things you’ve done to others, and forget the bad things others have done to you. So again, forget the good things you’ve done to others, and forget the bad things others have done to you. And the reason for that is if you don’t forget, like if you keep thinking about the good things that you’ve done to others, then you will get fixated on that for too long, and again, your ego is going to grow from that. So if you just keep remembering how you helped that old lady cross the street, or how you donated $200 to charity, or whatever it was, if you just keep remembering that all the time and fixating on that, that’s just going to perpetuate that feeling, and it’s going to enable your ego to keep growing all the time, and you don’t want that.

So, once you’ve done a good thing, there’s no need to constantly be proud of it and remember it all the time. It’s okay to forget that. And forget the bad things others have done to you. Why should you forget that? Well, he also explains it in a way that you don’t have to necessarily become their best friend after that, but the reason for that is that if you keep thinking about the bad things others have done to you, and you fixate on that, you’re just going to drain your energy forever. You’re not going to be able to look forward, not going to be able to live life in the present, and move on with your life, you’re just going to constantly lose energy because of something that happened in your past. And sometimes it’s necessary to forget those things.

So there we go, that’s two things to remember and two things to forget. Always remember the bad things, the bad you’ve done to others and the good others have done to you. And forget the good things you’ve done to others and the bad things others have done to you.

Something to ponder on this weekend, once again, it’s from the Lewis Howes podcast, episode 608, make sure to check it out if you’re interested to learn more of Jay Shetty’s teachings and wisdom. And I hope you have a fantastic weekend ahead and you’ve got some plans, or even if you don’t, I hope you have a quiet one, and have some rest.

I look forward to seeing you back here next time, until then, happy analyzing.