3677: Fish don't know they're in water AND What do you hate not doing? by Derek Sivers on Chasing Goals

Optimal Living Daily - Personal Development and Self-Improvement

Optimal Living Daily LLC

Education, Mental Health, Self-improvement, Health & Fitness

4.6 • 3.2K Ratings

🗓️ 23 July 2025

⏱️ 8 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Discover all of the podcasts in our network, search for specific episodes, get the Optimal Living Daily workbook, and learn more at: OLDPodcast.com. Episode 3677: Derek Sivers shares two compact yet profound reflections: one on the paradox of chasing goals and the other on handling hatred. In the first, he reminds us that striving too hard can backfire, sometimes what we want only comes when we stop chasing. In the second, he offers a liberating reframe: you don’t need to hate something just because it’s not for you. Read along with the original article(s) here: https://sive.rs/fish & https://sive.rs/hatenot Quotes to ponder: "If you chase a fish, it will swim away. But if you go about your business calmly, it may come to you out of curiosity." "Not liking something doesn’t mean you have to hate it." "It’s a relief to realize you don’t have to fight everything that’s not for you." Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Transcript

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1:06.0	Optimal Living Daily. This is Optimal Living Daily. Fish don't know they're in water. And what do you hate
1:15.5	not doing? Both by Derek Sivers of Sivers, that's SIVE.R-S. I'm your narrator, Justin Mollick.
1:22.9	Welcome back to the show where I read articles to you with a bit of my commentary at the end
1:27.3	and always
1:27.9	with permission from the authors, but a special two posts today. So let's get right to them as
1:33.7	we optimize your life. Fish Don't Know They're in Water by Derek Sivers of Sivers, SIVE.R-S.
1:46.9	Fish don't know they're in water. If you try to explain it, they'd say, water, what's water?
1:53.4	They're so surrounded by it that it's impossible to see. They can't see it until they jump outside of it.
	...

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