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Tactics are often presented as lists. These lists are both helpful and useless at the same time. They are helpful because they allow people to pick up a thing or two that they have not seen before, but they are useless because few people are capable of memorizing hundreds of little rules that might not even apply directly to their situation and remember to obey all of them. In that sense, tips are like a collection of pretty postcards or pictures of specific instances of a particular way of living. They are interesting to look at, but they do not substitute for a map of the lifestyle, nor do they substitute for navigating the map, and most importantly, knowing them does not make anyone an expert. This is why lists and tips in any field, while greatly entertaining, often fail to deliver the desired results. Conversely, once the underlying principle has been identified, the approach becomes intuitive and automatic, thus obviating the need to follow lists and mechanical methods like budgets or diets.