Everything you desire creates a fear of not getting it. The same is true with wanting to “win” or find “success.” You want to be successful so badly that the fear of failing actually hurts your chances of succeeding. That’s the paradox of success. To win big, you have to let go of the outcome.
Read MoreMost people never think about designing their lifestyle. So, society designs it for them based on the incentives of those with the most power: corporations and governments. Where does that leave the mass majority of us? Living for the evenings and weekends, spending our money on cheap dopamine, and forgoing what actually makes us feel alive. And we live this life because we settle for it. You get only what you settle for.
Read MoreAnyone can read a book about a subject and apply what they learn. But that isn’t going to give you the success of the true masters in the field. To master something, you can’t just learn it. You have to practice it with your natural instincts guiding the way.
Read MoreIt feels good to collect intellectual prizes. When you finish a book, bookmark a Twitter thread, or watch a YouTube video, you feel like you’ve accomplished something. And you have. But the danger is that you keep collecting these intellectual prizes at the expense of building something - at the expense of creativity. Learning is great. But doing is better.
Read MoreWhere you focus your time, so goes your life. And one of the big decisions you have to make is whether to go really deep into one topic / subject / skill / profession or to jump around and take shallow slices from various domains instead. Should you specialize or diversify?
Read MoreEveryone wants to be lucky, but few know specifically what kind of luck they are after. There are actually four different kinds of luck. Some luck you have no control over… but others you can influence with your actions. If you want to get rich, you need to learn to capture luck instead of waiting around for it.
Read MoreYou are weird. That’s not an insult - it’s the best compliment! Because you have something strange and exciting to offer the world. You just have to embrace your strangeness and use it to fuel your creativity. The last thing we need is more of the same. We don’t need more sequels, reboots, and repetitive sludge. We need you to lean into your “strange” and create whatever it is that keeps you up at night. Embrace what’s weird about you. The world needs it.
Read MoreAlmost all “jobs” are hierarchal. Each person answers to the person with a higher rank. This is a terrible way to organize people. First, hierarchies reinforce the principal / agent problem - a critical issue in business. Second, hierarchal relationships don’t compound over time because of the leader / follower dynamic. You need an equal partnership where both people bring value to compound trust and align incentives. Work in partnerships, not hierarchies.
Read MoreWhen was the last time you focused on a single activity for sixty minutes straight? Success in any endeavor depends on a singular focus in the same direction. The best entrepreneurs in the world can bring a singular focus to projects that take decades. Steve Jobs wanted to put a computer in your pocket. Jeff Bezos wanted to use the internet to sell books. Elon Musk is going to Mars. What are you going to do?
Read MoreThere is no easy way to build wealth. If there were, everyone would already be rich. As Charlie Munger says: “It’s not supposed to be easy. Anyone who finds it easy is stupid.” There are no shortcuts. Every “get rich quick” scheme gets the person selling the scheme rich, not you. Stop cutting corners and start focusing on creating value instead. Start compounding small amounts of money and skill and watch it grow for decades.
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