10 golden rules from Prof. Yunus Çengel
For a Happy and Successful Life10 GOLDEN RULES
Compiled by Yunus Çengel
1 Be fair, do the right thing Be righteous and act justly. Take only truth and fairness as points of reference. Everybody is content with justice. Do not take others’ unjust acts as your reference point; do not retaliate. Do not give in to the temptation of tit for tat. Discover the power of not resorting to power, even if you are powerful. Two wrongs do not make a right. Presume the innocence of others. Crimes and mistakes are personal. One cannot be held responsible for the mistakes of others. To remain silent in the face of injustice is to perpetrate injustice. It is better to misjudge a criminal as innocent than to misjudge an innocent person as a criminal. A man without ethics is a wild beast running loose. True civilization is humanity. Judge things on the basis of virtue, not self-benefit. The true measure of a man is how he treats others who can do him no good. Even if something is legal, popular and even beneficial to you, do not do it if it is not right. Be constructive, not destructive. Be wronged but do not wrong others. Be deceived but do not deceive others. Empathize with others and try to see things through their eyes. The true reward for a deed is not what you get for it but what you become by it.
2 Do good, find favor. Treat everybody well whether they deserve it or not, and whether they treat you well in return or not. Do it not because they are good, but because you are worthy of goodness. Do not stop being good on account of those who abuse your goodwill. Those who sow the wind, will reap the whirlwind. He who does a favor will be done a favor. If you show respect, you will be shown respect. If you forgive, you will be forgiven. Treat others, when they make a mistake, as you want to be treated when you make a mistake. To thank and compliment is to encourage appreciation and goodness. It is good to be important, but it is more important to be good. Do not be yourself, be someone better. He who stops being better stops being good. True generosity is to do a favor to someone who will never find out. The world in which those who owe nothing give nothing, is a poor world. To change one person's world is to change the whole world. The smile you give someone one day may be the only sun that rises in that person’s world that day. Every person is a mysterious seed; he is planted at an appropriate time, watered with the conditions of life, and bears the fruit of his character.
3 Be positive, think positively, act positively Make optimism your basic philosophy of life. Be positive and look at everything positively. Respond sensibly to negativity. Optimists interpret incidences positively and spread hope; pessimists interpret incidences negatively and spread despair. A person is what he eats with his eyes, ears, mouth, imagination, thoughts and emotions. Let in the clean and the beautiful; leave out the filthy and the ugly. Feelings that are fostered, nourish; feelings that are starved remain undernourished. A polite word is a feast for the ears. Have eyes only for goodness, beauty, cleanliness and excellence; shut your eyes to the opposites. Build your world with good attitudes, words and deeds. Nobody has hurt his stomach by not uttering bad words but swallowing them instead. A content person is a happy person. The higher the level of expectation, the lower the level of satisfaction. An optimist sees the rose, a pessimist sees the thorn. A person who wears black glasses makes the world dark for himself alone. Goodness, beauty and utility are the essence in unspoiled nature. When in doubt, give the benefit of the doubt and adopt a positive view. Viewpoint is a magical pair of spectacles. You shall see as you view; you shall become as you see. Perception is more important than reality. The world is what one sees from his own window, with his own lenses, through his own filters. The same world is paradise for one, hell for another. No development occurs in an environment in which trust is not established. Trust and hope give life, fear and despair erode life. Goodwill, good opinion, good character and good thoughts bring happiness.
4 Be kind, act with love Nurture love for love, foster hostility for hostility. Ensure that people do things out of love, not out of fear. If you love yourself, do not allow hatred, malice, envy, revenge, jealousy, enmity, conceit and arrogance enter your heart. Have a heart that never hates, a smile that never fades and a touch that never hurts. Those exhibiting love find more admiration than those exhibiting brainpower. He who cannot forgive, cannot love. The magical weapon that crushes enemies is love. Vanity lowers, humility elates. The measure of superiority is humility, the measure of inferiority is vanity. He who pretends greatness by boasting shows his lowliness. If you don’t care, you will not be cared for. Those who adore themselves are not adored by others. Lenience is a mark of maturity. The secret of lasting relations is not being faultless but overlooking faults. A wise person sees his flaws when he looks at himself, and others' merits when he looks at others. Virtue is that which is admired by friends as well as foes.
5 Reconcile and be peaceful In peace there is mutual benefit. Peace of mind lies in reconciliation. Reconciliation comes from humility; quarrels come from conceitedness. The most important journey in life is the steps taken towards reconciliation. He who is not at peace with himself will not be at peace with others. Just because something is not fully attained, it should not be fully abandoned. The best is the nemesis of the good. Sometimes good is better than the best because there is agreement and unity in good, but disagreement and conflict regarding the best. He who walks fast walks alone. Even the smallest member of a great team is great. Synergy stemming from harmony makes the whole bigger than the sum of its parts.
6 Make happy, become happy Be other-centered rather than self-centered. It is better to give than to receive. The road to receiving passes through giving. Happiness is to give a little more than you receive. Do not miss the opportunities to make others happy. Justice is beautiful; but kindness, grace and generosity are more beautiful. The noble joy in compassion is the prepayment of gratuitous giving. Most precious things in life are those that cannot be bought with money. The stingiest of tongues is the one that cannot utter sweet words. The highest and everlasting happiness befitting humanity is the happiness that comes from making others happy. Those who strive to chase happiness for themselves miss it; those who strive to give happiness to others find themselves indulged in it.
7 Look critically, aim for the better Critical thinking is more important than knowledge. What distinguishes the kernel from the husk, the diamond from coal, and the truth from falsehood is critical thinking. Questioning is the engine of discovery and progress. Innovating starts with a dream. Today's dream is tomorrow's reality. Creative thinking is to bring the nonexistent into existence in the imagination. Rote learning is to abandon critical thinking and to stop exploring. Most truths are relative, not absolute. When conditions change, many rights become wrongs. Many of yesterday’s truths are today's fallacies. Everything you say must be true, but it is often not wise to tell all the truths. Saying the right thing at the wrong time or place is to do wrong. Strip yourself of prejudice and bigotry and be a free-thinking agent. Have a critical eye but a constructive tongue. It is easy to wreck, but difficult to mend. Don’t get rid of anything unless you can put something better in its place. Avoid generalizations that stop thought and disengage reason. Be open to new thoughts, value those who think differently. Pay attention to the necessities of the situation, the realities of the age, and the rising values of the time, and fly high by getting their wind behind you. Don’t remain indifferent to paradigm shifts that block out the prevailing truths and defy current understandings.
8 Focus on outputs, not inputs Think of the possible consequences before you say or do something. Sow the seed that will yield the desired fruit. Adopt a holistic view. See the whole picture before judging the parts. Make a rational benefit/cost analysis based on complete and correct information before taking major decisions. Adopt reason and confirmed knowledge as the guide. Feel with your emotions but decide with your mind. Think before saying anything; resist the urge to say everything you think. Rules are made for the majority but without disregarding the minority. A person whose good deeds surpass his bad deeds is a good person. Abandon customs that cause more harm than good. It is not how much resource is used for a particular task, but how much work is done with that resource. The secret of success is not to work a lot, but to work efficiently and effectively. Whatever you prepare yourself for in life, life will prepare the same thing for you.
9 Be enterprising, take risks Change and progress are the two unchanging values of our time. He who cannot adopt to change in this fast-changing environment will go backwards. Be innovative and entrepreneurial. Do not let fear and anxiety influence your decisions. To reject a deal that will lead to a great good, in order to avoid a small evil, is to perpetrate a great evil. Be zealous and passionate, but not greedy and fanatical. Success comes from perseverance. Don’t be afraid of making mistakes and failing. Don’t let your past failures discourage you. One with no mistakes is one with no great successes. If there is no risk, there is no great potential gain. Obstacles are there to be overcome. If the most valuable thing you have is your life, then you are not living.
10 Aim for perfection and beauty Beauty and perfection are loved for their own sake. Beauty manifests itself in conformity, compatibility and exactitude. No matter what you do, do it as well as you possibly can. If something is worth doing, it is worth doing well. Simplify, do not complicate. Discover the power and the allure of simplicity. Disposition and action speak louder than words. One’s work is the mirror of one’s own self. Perfection in an act is a reflection of the perfection in the actor. Greatness is not in wealth and rank; it is in the deed done perfectly. And in the end, what counts is not the years in your life, but the beauty and perfection amassed during your lifetime. Those names that endure are the names written not on cold tombstones but in warm hearts.