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#53 Don’t Take Things Too Seriously

A family member breaks down crying. Your partner makes a big deal over the fact that you forgot to pick something up at the store. A friend lashes out for no apparent reason. In either scenario, you may have done something wrong. OR, equally as likely, the other person’s emotions may have nothing to do with you. In his article, “The Art of Not Taking Things Personally,” CEO coach Dave Bailey urges us to nurture more generous interpretations of other people’s difficult (and at times, strange) behaviors. For example, if someone is:

Overreacting... Could they be dealing with other things, like a stressful work scenario?

Putting things off... Are they feeling insecure/worried about failure?

Giving unsolicited advice... Is it their way of “reliving” the past and dealing with regret?

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#52 Live Below Your Means

Living below your means does NOT mean you can’t go out for dinner or afford nice things. It simply means that you spend less money than you earn, which in turn ensures that you have money left over at the end of each month. The benefits of this are many and varied and include things like not having to go into debt to pay for a car repair or some other unforeseen emergency, being able to quit a job you hate to do a job you like, and reaching your financial goals faster. To quote Nerd Wallet, when you live below your means, YOU take control of your money, rather than the other way around.

39 Best Websites to Find Free Textbooks, Research Papers, Study Guides, and Books

Whether you’ve just received a long list of textbooks you need for a specific uni class or are looking for a particular book/research paper for a high school project, books (and journal subscriptions) can be expensive.

The good news is that there are plenty of resources online where you can find free PDF versions of most written materials, starting with Atkinson & Hilgard’s Introduction to Psychology and ending with Shakespeare’s Macbeth.

Note that although some of the websites below provide access to copyright-free texts only, or texts that publishers/authors have agreed to share freely, others have been accused of internet privacy.

However, many people see open access practices as morally acceptable, especially considering the unsustainable prices of academic textbooks and papers.

To quote a recent paper on the topic:

"Since shadow libraries are a product of the cooperation between scholars, who contribute texts and other resources (such as donations, volunteer work, etc.), shadow libraries represent a ‘bottom-up’, radical approach to open access: a physical approximation of the Platonic ideal of knowledge sharing that would exist if there were no legal, economic, or institutional barriers to the circulation of scholarly knowledge."

Free Textbooks

Library Genesis

Library Genesis, or Libgen for short, is a shadow online library website where college students can find academic books (including those that are hard to find/very expensive) and scholarly journal articles.

The site also hosts general-interest books, audiobooks, comics, magazines, and images.

Z-Library

Z-Library is another shadow library website that hosts college textbooks, scholarly journal articles, and general-interest books. It calls itself “the world’s largest e-book library.” It mirrors Library Genesis.

The front page also features some of the most popular books at the time. When we viewed it, these included “Thinking Fast and Slow” by Daniel Kahneman, The Book Thief by Markus Zusak, and Harry Potter the Complete Collection by J. K. Rowling.

You can also use the right-hand navigation menu to see the books that have been added most recently, as well as sort through books based on category.

Use the Book Request option if you can’t find a book you’re looking for. There’s no guarantee your book will be added, but community members look at requests to see what books to upload (you can also upload books).

PDF Drive

PDF Drive is an online library with a ton of free ebooks and PDF textbooks in various categories, including academic & education (but also lifestyle, personal growth, art, linguistics, etc.)

ForCoder.su

Forcoder.su has lots of online textbooks on programming. It also provides free access to online courses, like Apache Kafka for beginners and object-oriented programming with Python. Currently, there are hundreds of free courses available.

Online Mathematics Textbooks

Online Mathematics Textbooks is your source for free digital textbooks on all things math. It’s just one page featuring 77 textbooks.

Tech Books for Free Download

Tech Books for Free Download is where you’ll find free science and engineering books on topics ranging from data mining to general relativity.

There’s no way to search for books easily. However, the site is divided into books on Linux, Java, Microsoft, C and C++, Perl/Python, Science, Networking, Database, Security, and Assembly.

Free Tech Books

Free Tech Books is an open textbook library. It provides access to free computer science books and textbooks, plus lecture notes. All the books and lecture notes listed on this site are freely available on authors’ and/or publishers’ sites.

You can browse books by category (computer science, mathematics, supporting fields, operating system, programming/scripting, miscellaneous), author, publisher, or license.

Directory of Open Access Books

Directory of Open Access Books (DOAB) is a website that indexes and provides access to academic, peer-reviewed open-access books. All disciplines are covered, but there’s a particular emphasis on humanities, social sciences, and law.

Ubiquity Press

Ubiquity Press has been an open-access publisher of academic, peer-reviewed books and journals since 2012. It was founded by University of College London (UCL) researchers.

Research Papers

Sci-Hub

Sci-hub has the most expansive collection of research papers. Its mission is to “remove all barriers in the way of science.”

Directory of Open Access Journals

Directory of Open Access Journals (DOAJ) is an online directory of open-access, peer-reviewed research journals covering humanities, social sciences, technology, science, medicine, and art.

The directory indexes journals from different countries and languages. DOAJ is supported financially by publishers, libraries, and other organizations.

Wiley Open Access

Wiley Open Access provides peer-reviewed open-access journals across topics like biochemistry, economics, sociology, mathematics, and law.

SpringerOpen

SpringerOpen publishes open-access journals across a wide range of areas, mainly STEM.

Elsevier

Elsevier publishes open-access, peer-reviewed journals. You can search for journals by title, keyword, or subject (dentistry, nursing, decision sciences, etc.)

Springer Link

Springer Link provides access to ebooks, peer-reviewed journal articles, and other resources (mostly scientific).

BASE

BASE is a search engine for academic texts, including journals, digital collections, institutional repositories, etc. You can access about 60% of the indexed texts for free.

Study Guides

Bibliomania

Bibliomania has study guides to the most-read books, like “A Hero of Our Time,” “Animal Farm,” and even Irish politics. It also has over 2,000 classic texts, book summaries, author biographies, and more.

Books

Open Library

Open Library is an open library catalog of more than 3 million new and old books. The project was created by the nonprofit organization Internet Archive. It has also received partial funding from Kahle/Austin Foundation and the California State Library.

You can read old books without an account. However, for new books, you’ll need to set one up (it takes just a few minutes).

Internet Archive

Internet Archive is a digital library of ebooks. It also has free movies, music, and software.

Project Gutenberg

Project Gutenberg is a famous site where you can find lots of free books. There are more than 60,000 books in its collection.

Standard Ebooks

Standard Ebooks take public domain texts and make them as nice as new books. They fix typographical errors and typos, create cool cover art, and format the text for e-readers like Kindle and iPad.

Planet eBook

Planet eBook is where you can download free PDF copies of classics like Franz Kafka’s The Metamorphosis, Fyodor Dostoyevsky’s Crime and Punishment, and Joseph Conrad’s Heart of Darkness.

What really makes Planet eBook stand out is its UX. It’s one of those rare sites that are super easy to navigate and actually look good (aesthetically speaking).

The Ultimate Book Search Engine

The Ultimate Book Search Engine is an ebook search engine that includes 350 open directory sites that relate to ebooks. It was created by the Reddit user u/NotoriousYEG.

Classic Bookshelf

The Classic Bookshelf is a site where you’ll find lots of classic novels, everything from Charles Dickens and Leo Tolstoy.

Literature.org

Literature.org features classic works of English literature, both fiction and non-fiction.

Bartleby

Bartleby is a site that features both fiction and nonfiction books.

Fiction.us

Fiction.us has a ton of books, including fiction, short stories, children's picture books, poetry, books on writing, and plays.

Classic Literature Library

As the name suggests, Classic Literature Library is where you’ll find classic literature works.

Ideology.us

Ideology.us is a site that has ebooks on philosophy, psychology, sociology, politics, and education.

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare

The Complete Works of William Shakespeare is where you’ll find all of Shakespeare’s work. The site is run by The Tech, the largest and oldest newspaper by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge.

Read Books Online

Read Books Online has around 6,000 ebooks, including novels, short stories, poems, essays, plays, and non-fiction.

Public Bookshelf

Public Bookshelf is a site dedicated to romance novels.

Categories of ebooks here include contemporary romance, romantic suspense, historical romance, regency romance, inspirational romance, vampire romance, western romance, general romance, and fantasy and paranormal romance.

The Perseus Project

The Perseus Project is a digital library created by Tufts University with books from Ancient Rome and Greece, published in original languages and English.

Chest of Books

Chest of Books has books on a ton of different subjects, including animals, finance, real estate, science, and travel.

The Literature Network

The Literature Network has books by authors like Anne Bronte, Lewis Carroll, and Lord George Gordon Byron. It also features forums, literature summaries, and quizzes.

The Online Books Page

The Online Books Page is a site by the University of Pennsylvania that houses books in categories like philosophy, history, medicine, science, agriculture, music, anthropology, and more. The site also links to the following:

Banned Books Online: A directory of books that were once banned and links to places where you can read them in full.

A Celebration of Women Writers: A directory that lists online editions of literary works by women as well as resources about women writers.

Prize Winners Online: A directory of prize-winning books.

Many Books

Many Books is “your friendly neighborhood library.” It houses over 50,000 books in genres like romance, mystery, young adult, horror, and non-fiction. You can read books online or download them to your device.

Authorama

Authorama turns public domain books on sites like Google Books and Project Gutenberg into HTML format, making it easier to read them.

Audiobooks

Librivox

Librivox has free audiobooks that you can listen to from any device.

#51 Save the Job Description

It will come in handy when you’re applying for other jobs. Use the duties and responsibilities section from a job ad as a starting point when describing your previous (or current) role in your resume. That way, you won’t accidentally overlook something important. Also, the responsibilities section in most job descriptions is worded by HR. Since many resumes nowadays go through screening software before they are read by humans, this will ensure that you don’t miss any crucial keywords. However, be careful how you save the job description. A link to it will eventually expire, so print it out or take a screenshot of it.

#50 Don’t Break the Chain

The best way to get better at something is to practice that thing as often as possible. Unfortunately, finding the motivation to do something daily can be... difficult. One way to beat procrastination is to use a productivity strategy called “don’t break the chain.” Supposedly (but not really) invented by the comedian Jerry Seinfeld, the strategy expounds that every time you accomplish a daily goal (for example, work out or read), you should mark that day with an “x” on your calendar. After a few days, you’ll see a chain of x’s forming. As the chain grows longer, your satisfaction will increase, and you’ll be less likely to break your habit, whatever it may be.

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#49 Be Polite

In life, you’ll inevitably want to tell some people to go to hell. Try not to. According to writer Paul Ford, being polite buys you time and leaves doors open. It also makes awkward encounters less excruciating. For instance, you know those situations when someone you’ve just met tells you what they do for a living? Most of us have no clue what to say next, whether because we don’t actually know what their job entails or we don’t care. But Ford does. His trick is to ALWAYS respond with, “Wow, that sounds hard.” Because, apparently, pretty much everyone thinks that their job is difficult — and they would probably love to tell you all about it.

#48 Follow the 20-20-20 rule

Nope, staring at a computer screen will NOT slowly make you go blind. However, it could make your eyes more strained and tired. This is mostly because we tend to blink less when we concentrate on something for long periods of time, whether that’s our phones, laptops, TV, or even a book. One thing you can do to prevent your eyes from getting dry is follow the 20-20-20 rule, where, every 20 minutes, you look away at something 20 feet away from you (like a tree or building across the street) for 20 seconds. You can set a reminder on apps like Eye Care 20 20 20 or simply use the Tomato Timer.

#47 Have something to look forward to

Whether it’s something tiny (like a good cup of coffee every day at 2 pm) or something big (like a vacation), we all need something to look forward to. Rather than just a motivating factor to get out of bed, planning for your future can also significantly boost your mood. Particularly when you have to do something stressful (say, give a presentation or a public speech), positive anticipation can help you rebound from stress WAY quicker than if you had nothing to look forward to.

#46 Collect rejections

Getting rejected sucks. It is also inevitable. Instead of letting rejections make you feel like shit, embrace them. In her article, “Why You Should Aim for 100 Rejections a Year,” writer Kim Liao quotes a friend whom she attributes with giving her life-changing advice: “Collect rejections. Set rejection goals. I know someone who shoots for one hundred rejections in a year, because if you work that hard to get so many rejections, you’re sure to get a few acceptances, too.” Some of the most successful people today have been rejected numerous times, but because they persisted, they eventually got to where they wanted to be. To quote literary figure Samuel Beckett, “fail, fail again, fail better.”

#45 Build your own "personal board of directors"

That way, when you’re presented with a challenging situation in life, you have someone competent to turn to for advice. While a mentor can fulfill a similar role, having a group of individuals will ensure that you get a broader base of experience and insight and numerous different perspectives. Even though the idea of having a personal board of directors (PBOD) is most commonly mentioned in relation to jobs and startups, PBODs are not just for your career. Besides individuals who are leaders in your industry, you may also want your PBOD to include people who are or have been in similar circumstances as you in life, whether that’s being a single parent, moving to a new country, adopting novel (to you) spiritual beliefs, or something else entirely.

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#44 Update your resume as you go along

No more scrambling trying to remember what it was that you actually did at your job when you go to apply for a new one. Update your resume the moment you land a job and keep adding to it as you take on more responsibilities, complete projects, and earn new degrees or certificates. Do the same with your LinkedIn page. When you lose your job or a new job that you’re qualified for nd pays way better comes up, you’ll be able to apply immediately instead of having to spend hours updating a resume that’s several years out of date first. Having an updated resume can also come in handy if you want to go for a promotion or pick up some side work.

#43 Create routines

In Neil Postman’s Advice on How to Live the Rest of Your Life, professor Janet Sternberg gives some great counsel: “regularize the trivial to cope with the significant.” In other words, create as many routines as you possibly can. Although some people may think that routines = BORING, having a structure to your day can make you feel more in control of your life. Not only can routine improve your focus and increase your productivity, but predictable structures have also been proven to alleviate insomnia, ADHD, and bipolar disorder. Most importantly, as Sternberg points out, not having to make decisions about small, insignificant things (like what to eat for breakfast) means that you can use your energy to make sound decisions when major life questions arise.

#42 Stop overexplaining

In 1956, the American writer E. B. White (best known for Charlotte’s Web, for anyone wondering) declined an invitation with, “I must decline, for secret reasons.” Let this be a reminder that you don’t always have to overexplain why you are going to do or NOT do something. In most cases, a polite “sorry, but I can’t make it today”/”I will not be able to do that” is more than sufficient. If pressed to elaborate, just respond with something like, “something has come up, thanks so much for understanding.” (And if you’re wondering why we tend to overexplain... This article by Mic goes over some of the reasons. Tl;dr: some of us use people-pleasing behaviors to cope with past trauma, whereas some of us are hypersensitive to other people’s reactions.)

#41 Deal with (perceived problems) in daylight

The writer Austin Kleon lives by one rule that EVERYONE should follow: “don’t think too much about your life after dinner.” Nothing good ever comes of it. Whether it’s your career or social life, or familial relationships, everything looks worse at night than it actually is. Plus, it’s not like you can do anything (or much) about your problems (or, more likely, perceived problems) in the evening/at night, anyways. If you’re finding it difficult to control your anxiety, a reader of the lifestyle blog Cup of Jo recommends giving it a name. “His name is Alexander, and I visualize him walking away and closing the door behind him,” she says.

#40 Schedule a hate day

You know those pesky little tasks that spring up out of nowhere and take you forever to accomplish? Instead of doing them as they come up, writer and career coach Michael Thompson recommends that you schedule what he calls a “hate day” to knock them all out in one go. It’s not a totally new idea. Apparently, Germans have “Kleinscheiss Tag” or “little shit day” where they do the same. Putting essential but non-urgent tasks like responding to emails and making calls on a “little shit” list will free up your brain to focus on other, more important things that you NEED to get through. Can’t dedicate a full day to “little shit”? Try setting up “Kleinscheiss Stunde” or “little shit hour“ instead.

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#39 Start building your life

Steve Jobs famously said, "don't just live a life, build one." If you're wondering how to do just that, watch Professor Emeritus at Harvard Business School, Howard H. Stevenson's one-hour lecture "Building a Life." A few noteworthy nuggets of information: be careful what you constitute as "success." If you focus solely on your career, neglecting family and community in the process, you might realize that when you retire, and it's finally "time for you," you don't actually know who you are. Also worth remembering is that things change, and so do you. The things you wanted at 20 won't be the same things you'll want at 30, 40, 50, and beyond. That's just from the first 5 minutes of the lecture. So, you're in for a treat.

#38 Make a decision matrix

According to management consultant Amy Drader, a decision matrix can help you prioritize your work based on how urgent each task is and how much effort it requires. To create a decision matrix, draw a simple graph, then name your x-axis as "effort" and the y-axis as "urgency." At the top of the y-axis and the right end of the x-axis, write down "high." Where the x and y-axis meet, write down "low" (it should look like the graph here). Then, place your tasks within the matrix. Tasks that are high urgency and low effort, as well as tasks that are high urgency and high effort, should be addressed first (you might have to postpone or cancel less important chores). Tasks that are low urgency and high effort are likely not due anytime soon, so schedule them for the future. Finally, low urgency and low effort tasks can be tackled last.

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