Curiosity Chronicle (Sahil Bloom)

Today at a Glance:

• The Learning Pyramid indicates that teaching is a much more effective driver of retention than reading or lecture. The goal should be to move rapidly to teaching in order to cement new learning.
• Richard Feynman developed a learning framework grounded in teaching and iteration that was highly effective for him during his illustrious academic career.
• The Three-Step Learning Model: (1) Read & Research to build a base, (2) Teach to cement learnings and highlight knowledge gaps, and (3) Assess & Iterate to fill the gaps.

Last week was the biggest moment of my professional life: The release of my first book into the world. But I feel it's important to be honest here: The external reality seemed great—but my internal reality was a completely different story.

The day of release, rather than happiness and joy at the accomplishment, I was in the grips of a common psychological phenomenon: Imposter Syndrome.

This piece shares the exact mindsets and tools I used to navigate the experience—the playbook you can leverage the next time you find yourself in its grips.

•••

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Question: Do you want to be liked or loved?

Framework: Amor Fati

It all started with a simple journal prompt: Your entire life will change the moment you...

A few years ago, I wrote that prompt on a blank sheet of paper. Each time I made any life adjustment or adaptation that had a profound impact, I added it to my running list. Tiny actions, mindset shifts, behavior changes, life hacks, and everything in between.

The list is comprised of things I have (or currently am) struggling with. I'm not alone: These struggles are universal, but when we confront them head on, we're able to conquer them more effectively.

Today at a Glance:

• Warren Buffett is the most famous investor of all time. He is a treasure trove of frameworks, ideas, and insights, most of which apply well-beyond investing.
• Today's piece shares 8 of my favorite frameworks from the so-called Oracle of Omaha, including their application to your business, career, and life.

Question: If everything stays the same, what is the one change that would have the greatest impact?

Framework: The Locksmith Paradox.

The end of the calendar year presents us with a valuable opportunity to reflect on the year that was and plan for the year that will be. It's easy to glaze over the former and focus on the latter, but failure to reflect will eventually manifest as a failure to grow.

The Personal Annual Review is 7 questions: (1) What did I change my mind on this year? (2) What created energy this year? (3) What drained energy this year? (4) Who were the boat anchors in my life? (5) What did I not do because of fear? (6) What were my greatest hits and worst misses? (7) What did I learn this year?

You can download a beautiful (and free!) printable PDF of the template ​here​.

A Reddit post I shared that read, "PSA: 20 years from now, the only people who will remember that you worked late are your kids" sparked a lot of online dialogue last week.

Our default setting of work worship may be slowly, methodically robbing us of joyful, fulfilling, comprehensively wealthy lives. Perhaps it’s worth questioning the default setting—to begin living by design, rather than by default.

I am of two minds on this: (1) Being present and spending time with those you love is the most important thing in the end and (2) Having the people you love see you work hard on things you care about is a principle they'll remember for the rest of their lives. Understanding, navigating, and balancing the tension across these two minds is how you ultimately "win" the game.

Most people overestimate what they can do in a day and underestimate what they can do in a year. Don't be one of them.

Your entire life can change in one year. 2024 is officially upon us. Will it be the year that you change your life?

This piece contains 24 actionable ideas for making 2024 your best year yet—segmented into categories across life, work, health, and money.

In a world that values sameness, standing out is never free. But those who endure unlock the door to the most extraordinary lives.

This is a brutally honest list of the traits I've observed in people who truly stand out. These are the traits I aspire to live by.

9 uncommon traits that will make you stand out: (1) Be anti-insecure, (2) Cheer loudly (and without qualification), (3) Practice the art of studied nonchalance, (4) Surround yourself with Truth Tellers, (5) Embrace your beginner's mind, (6) Show up when no one's watching, (7) Tolerate uncertainty a little bit longer, (8) Do the old fashioned things well, and (9) Go all in on the things you want.

•••

My book has sold 200,000+ copies around the world and is a 7x NYT Bestseller.

If you've been wanting a copy (or are looking to gift copies to family or friends), there's a big 30% sale. Now’s a great time to get it.

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Traditional wisdom says you have to live life with an On-Off Switch Mentality: If you want to do well, you can have two areas switched ON, but if you really want to win, you can only have one area switched ON. The other areas are, by default, switched OFF.

The problem with this approach: If you leave an area OFF for too long, it becomes very difficult (if not impossible) to turn it back ON.

My solution is the Dimmer Switch Mentality: It says that each area of your life exists on a dimmer switch. If you want to focus on building one area, you turn that switch up, but rather than turning off the others, you just turn them down low.

•••

My book has reached over 100,000 people around the world in just one month since its release. It currently has a big 30% sale. Order it now and reply to this email with your receipt and I'll send you a 50+ page companion workbook to go deeper on the most important exercises.

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The Mechanics of a Meme Stock Rally

“Meme stocks” like AMC and GameStop have captured the attention of the financial world. But few understand what is actually driving these furious price rallies. Let’s dive into the mechanics of a meme stock rally…

First off, what is a meme stock? There is no single definition, but meme stocks can be understood as stocks that experience rapid upward price movements as a result of collective social media evangelism. The price movements are typically not related to business fundamentals.

AMC and GameStop are the two most salient examples of meme stocks from recent memory. Both experienced furious, Reddit-fueled rallies that left the financial establishment scratching their heads. Heroes emerged, like fearless leader Roaring Kitty (who is not, in fact, a cat!).

But how did it happen? Emotion (FOMO!) and the power of crowds played a role, but I’ll leave those to the sociologists and psychologists to analyze. There are two underlying financial dynamics at play: a short squeeze and a gamma squeeze.

Let’s cover the mechanics of each…

The Short Squeeze

First, a short squeeze. The "short" in "short squeeze" refers to the concept of short selling. The basics are covered in my thread below. TL;DR - short selling is a way of betting against a stock - i.e. betting that its price will decline.

"Short interest" is a measure of how heavily an asset is shorted by the market. It is the total number of shares that have been sold short (borrowed and sold), but have not yet been covered (bought and returned). It is usually measured as a % of the # of shares outstanding.

A "short squeeze" occurs when a heavily-shorted asset experiences a rapid upward price movement. When this happens, short sellers may be forced to close their short positions (i.e. buy the stock and return it to the broker), further accelerating the upward price movement.

In the case of the recent meme stocks, as AMC or GameStop stock rose, short sellers were forced to close their shorts all at once. This created a surge of buying (to return the borrowed shares) and drove the price up further. It created an accelerating upward price movement.

The Gamma Squeeze

So that’s a short squeeze, but what about a gamma squeeze? It’s a bit more complicated, but let's attempt to simplify it here...

A gamma squeeze is all about options contracts and their indirect impact on the underlying stock. For a primer on options, see my thread below.

When you buy a call option on AMC, someone has to sell you that option contract. You pay them a bit of money (the premium) and they make a commitment to deliver you the underlying stock at a future date for the strike price of the option. It's a pretty simple transaction.

But in the background, the seller (often called a "market maker") has to think about their risk exposure. If AMC rises above your strike price, they will have to buy the stock at the market price and sell it to you for the strike price, incurring a (potentially large!) loss.

To hedge this risk, when the market maker sells you the option, she also goes into the market and buys a bit of the underlying stock. The amount of stock she buys is based on the "Delta" - a ratio of how much the option price moves relative to a $1 move in the stock.

"Gamma" is the rate of change of the "Delta" of the option. As Delta and Gamma rise, the market maker gets more and more nervous! She has to buy more stock to hedge the risk of the option being exercised in the money (i.e. with the underlying price above the strike price).

So here we have the (simplified!) makings of the gamma squeeze. As call option purchasing volumes on AMC suddenly surged, market makers had to purchase a lot of AMC stock to hedge. This set in motion a self-fulfilling prophecy...

Market makers rushed to purchase AMC stock to hedge exposure. This drove the price of AMC up! As the price of AMC went up, the Delta and Gamma of AMC call options rose. This meant market makers had to buy more stock, further driving up the AMC price! Reflexivity.

So to summarize: With AMC and GameStop (and other meme stocks!), we had both (1) a short squeeze - short-sellers frantically buying the stock to close/cover their shorts and (2) a gamma squeeze - call option market makers frantically buying the stock to hedge their exposure.

The result? Check the charts…

I hope this piece was helpful and makes you feel more well-informed on what is happening under the surface with meme stocks!

Enjoy this and want to share it with family and friends? You can find the original thread below. Subscribe now and follow me on Twitter so you never miss a beat.

Until next time, stay curious, friends!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sahilbloom.substack.com

Question: What are the boring, basic actions that you are avoiding right now?

Framework: The Fosbury Flop

A parable is broadly defined as a succinct story that illustrates one or more instructive lessons or principles. My view is that these parables have a sort of “Lindy effect” signaling, whereby their survival and re-telling across the generations is a signal of their usefulness and value.

The Parable of the Farmer and the Horse is about cultivating a "maybe" mindset. The villagers constantly tell the farmer that he has had good or bad luck, but he simply replies with "maybe" each time.

Two powerful lessons: (1) Life is cyclical—the seeds of destruction are sewn during creation and the seeds of creation are sewn during destruction; and (2) Dispel the narratives—allow events to simply flow with and past you as they are, not as you want them to be.

Question: What would you do if you had zero fear of judgment?

Framework: Truth Tellers

For the last several years, I've kept a running list of my favorite life hacks. I add and subtract from the list whenever I come across new ideas that create value in my life.

I'd like to make a tradition of sharing that list annually with all of you—in the hope that you take action on them and feel their impact on your life.

Here are the most powerful life hacks I've found to date: 50 tips, tricks, ideas, and techniques for building a healthier, wealthier life.

This is an Ancient Roman phrase I find echoing in my brain:

"Age Quod Agis"

Translation: Do what you are doing.

A simple concept, yet so very powerful in the attention-splintered world we live in.

Question: How can I bring the after into the before?

Framework: The Gold Medal Fallacy

On January 1, 2014, I wrote a letter to my future self just before graduating. Ten years later, I opened it, and it hit me hard. Everyone should do this.

My core reflection: We have the answers, we just haven't asked the right questions yet.

To write your own letter to your future self, cover four key areas: (1) Reflections on the present, (2) Vision for the future, (3) Changes to make, and (4) Fun predictions. Use a technology tool (like FutureMe) or store a physical letter somewhere safe. Set a calendar reminder to open it on the set date in the future.

I have spent time with a lot of very successful people. I have observed two common trends: (1) A struggle to appreciate the present and (2) A struggle to identify the key actions to create the desired future.

The tool we can all use to fight back: Mental Time Travel. This involves the vivid imagination of both the past and the future. You use your mind to figuratively "travel" to the experienced past and the envisioned future.

Professionally, Mental Time Travel allows us to consider both (1) the gap between where we are and where we want to be and (2) the gain between where we were and where we are. Personally, Mental Time Travel allows us to build a robust gratitude practice and appreciate the present state.

Question: If you hired the best CEO in the world to be the CEO of your life, what actions would be on their 100-day plan?

Framework: Return on Luck

Question: What are the lesser goals keeping you from your real goals?

Framework: The Riptide Mentality

Question: What am I avoiding because it's too painful to address?

Framework: Fundamental Attribution Error.

President Dwight D. Eisenhower was known for his prolific, almost otherworldly productivity. His secret: He never confused the urgent with the important.

The Eisenhower Matrix is a 2x2 visualization tool that forces you to differentiate between the urgent and the important in order to prioritize and manage your time more effectively.

The Goal: Manage urgent and important tasks, spend most of your time on the not urgent and important tasks, and spend less time on the not important tasks.

Question: What would this look like if it were easy?

Framework: The wind and the sun.

Question: How will this struggle fuel my inevitable growth?

Framework: Monkeys & Pedestals

What have you changed your mind on recently? Egocentric Bias says that we convince ourselves of the accuracy of our own personal perspective—that we view ourselves as unimpeachable—and therefore struggle to acknowledge any perspectives or data that may alter our understanding of the world.

The parable of The Blind Men and The Elephant tells the story of six blind men who examine one part of an elephant and each come to very different conclusions on what an elephant is. They are all partly right, but also all entirely wrong.

The information you have about the world represents a tiny fraction of the information available, yet you use it to form a view of how the world works.

Remember the Blind Men Razor: "Never attribute to malice, ignorance, or stupidity that which can be adequately explained by different information."

Question: What are the boat anchors in your life?

Framework: Q1 relationships.

In my discussions for the Life Lessons from 1,000 Years, one of my 90-year-old participants shared a piece of poignent wisdom on lies: "The most damning lie is the lie you tell to yourself."

I began reflecting on what lies I've been telling myself, as well as ways to reframe them to fight back.

Here are the 10 most dangerous lies we tell ourselves (and reframes that will help change the internal narrative).

This is the first in a new series of shorts that will cover one question and one framework to get you thinking heading into the weekend.

Question: What are the elements of your ideal life at 80-years-old?

Framework: Self-Handicapping (and how to avoid it). 

Question: Are you allowing self-protection to become self-rejection?

Framework: Hedgehogs vs. Foxes

Intellectual curiosity is a competitive advantage.

But contrary to what you’ve been told, it has nothing to do with intelligence.

10 ways to start developing your intellectual curiosity today:

#1: Scrub Your Windows

“Your assumptions are your windows on the world. Scrub them off every once in a while, or the light won't come in.” - Isaac Asimov

Curiosity is a light that can only enter when your mental windows are clean. Scrub them off now and then. Let the light in.

#2: Embrace “I Don’t Know”

“The only true wisdom is in knowing you know nothing.” - Socrates

Avoid false confidence (and the people that display it!). Embracing what you do not know is a superpower. Recognize your gaps and blind spots. Slowly, methodically fill them in.

#3: Go Down Rabbit Holes

When you find a spark of curiosity, dive in and don’t look back. You cannot control when they come, so you must embrace them when they do.

The rabbit hole is the amusement park of the intellectually curious mind. Enjoy it!

#4: Ask “Dumb” Questions

When we are young, we always ask “Why?” But over time, we develop a fear of asking the “dumb” question that may draw the ire of our peers.

That fear stifles our intellectual curiosity. Fight it back. Face it. When in doubt, ask.

#5: Build Curiosity Circles

Curiosity is communal. Find a group of friends who are motivated by learning and growth. Share ideas, learnings, and insights with each other.

You’ll build bonds and have a constant source of stimulation for your intellectual curiosity.

#6: Make Learning the Goal

Learning with a specific end goal in mind often becomes a chore - it is a fast track to stifled curiosity. Focus on the learning itself - not other outcomes. Take pride in learning something new every single day.

“Learn as if you were to live forever.”

#7: Open Up to the World

The diversity of human experience in our world is one of the greatest gifts to the intellectually curious mind. When you meet someone new, take genuine interest in their life and experiences.

The world opens up to you, when you open up to the world.

#8: Focus on Your Passions

Forced learning is for school. It doesn’t work in practice. It stifles curiosity. Find what you truly enjoy learning about. It doesn’t matter what it is. It doesn’t have to be “intellectual” or impressive.

Remember: You are learning for you!

#9: Read Flexibly

Books are a life-changing investment that you can make for under $100.

But to take advantage, you must read flexibly. Read what you love. Read what draws you in. When it stops doing so, put it down. Forced reading is the antidote to curiosity.

#10: The Curiosity Chronicle

And last - but certainly not least - sign up for this newsletter...

A weekly short-form newsletter with five pieces of content curated to spark your intellectual curiosity.

So those are 10 ways to start developing your intellectual curiosity today.

For additional writing related to cultivating intellectual curiosity in your children, check out my friend Ana Fabrega at Synthesis, who is putting out incredible content. Synthesis is building something special disrupting traditional childhood education. Check them out here!

Enjoy this and want to share it with family and friends? You can find the original thread below. Subscribe now and follow me on Twitter so you never miss a thread.

Until next time, stay curious, friends!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sahilbloom.substack.com

Last weekend, I attended Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting in Omaha, Nebraska. It is my favorite event for one simple reason: Idea density.

This piece shares 9 powerful ideas from a weekend spent in the presence of legends.

Welcome to the 398 new members of the curiosity tribe who have joined us since Friday. Join the 28,496 others who are receiving high-signal, curiosity-inducing content every single week. Share this on Twitter to help grow the tribe!

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Today at a Glance:

Children ask questions to understand the world around them and establish first principles; but somewhere along the way, they are told to stop exploring.

The Socratic Method is a cooperative, argumentative process of asking questions to expose flawed logic, establish first principles, and generate creative, imaginative solutions to complex problems.

It can be put to use in a wide variety of scenarios, including in the worlds of investing, startup building, and education.

Productive Discomfort: The Socratic Method

Humans are born with remarkable curiosity. But somewhere along the way, we are told to stop asking questions. We are told to just accept things. We are told to stop exploring.

The result? Unimaginative, linear minds and atrophied critical thinking skills.

Fortunately, there is a proven strategy for reclaiming your curiosity, stimulating critical thinking, and establishing first principles.

The Socratic Method.

Introduction

The human mind is naturally wired for critical thinking.

Children are born with an innate curiosity - a desire to understand the world and all of its complexities. If you have kids (or have been around them), you’ve seen this in action. They constantly, incessantly ask “Why?” about absolutely everything.

Here’s a common occurrence for any parent:

Mom: “Ok, it’s time for bed. You need to get some sleep.”

Kid: “Why?”

Mom: “Because you need sleep to think clearly and grow.”

Kid: “Why?”

I’ll stop. You can see where this is going…

The reality is they aren’t doing it to be annoying (contrary to what many parents might think!). Children ask questions in order to develop a deeper understanding their existence and surroundings. The world is fascinating. Everything is so new to a child.

They ask questions in an effort to dive deeper, think critically, and establish first principles. And newsflash…it works!

How many times has a parent had the above interaction, only to realize that they themselves do not know the answer to the questions being asked? If open to the idea, it leads to new learning of fundamental truths (e.g. why humans need to sleep!).

Children are the original first principles thinkers.

Unfortunately, as we get older, we are typically told - by teachers, our parents, or otherwise - to stop asking questions. Responses like “Because I said so” or “Because that’s how we’ve always done it” pile up. Our critical thinking muscles begin a slow, steady decay into adulthood. We begin to rely on base assumptions that we have been told are true (but have not independently verified).

In certain cases, this can be (mostly) fine. Heuristics and decision-making razors are helpful in making quick decisions.

But when dealing with more complex edge cases where creativity is required, using heuristics can lead to unimaginative, linear solutions that closely resemble what has been done before.

So how do we fight back, rebuild our critical thinking muscles, and establish first principles?

Enter our powerful tool: The Socratic Method.

History

The Socratic Method is a process of asking and answering questions to stimulate critical thinking and expose and vet underlying assumptions and logic. It is both cooperative and argumentative. It is a strategy for establishing first principles (the basic, foundational truths) in a problem solving process or discussion.

Its aim is to create an environment of productive discomfort for its participants.

The Socratic Method is named after the Greek philosopher, Socrates, who developed it as an alternative method of debate and teaching. Socrates disagreed with the style of the “sophists” of the era - teachers who used rhetoric and gravitas to entertain and persuade students.

Believing that sophists were promoting a self-centered style, he began promoting the Socratic Method as an alternative. The basic structure involved progressive questioning to expose flawed logic, eliminate hypotheses, and sharpen thinking.

Let’s cover how it works…

The Socratic Method in Practice

The Socratic Method is dynamic, but typically follows a general four step structure:

Start with open-ended questions.

Propose ideas based on these questions.

Probe these ideas with progressive questioning.

Repeat steps 2 and 3 until the best ideas are developed.

Imagine your team has encountered a challenge that requires an imaginative solution.

Start at the surface. Start asking questions. What is the problem you are trying to solve? We often waste time and energy trying to solve the "wrong" problem. Identify the “right” problem before you try to solve it!

This is where it gets fun. Dive deeper. Sketch out your current thinking on the problem, including the origins of that thinking. Open the floor for targeted questioning. Why do you think this? Is the thinking too vague? What is it based upon? Challenge each other (collaboratively!).

Challenge the assumptions underlying the original thinking. Why do you believe this to be true? How do you know it’s true? How would you know if you were wrong? Identify the source of beliefs on a problem. Be ruthless in evaluating their integrity and validity.

Evaluate the evidence used to support the thinking. What concrete evidence do I have? How credible is it? What “hidden evidence” may exist?

Understand the consequences of being wrong. Can this be quickly fixed? How costly is this mistake? Always understand the stakes.

Evaluate the potential alternatives. What alternative beliefs or viewpoints might exist? Why might they be superior? Why do others believe them to be true? What do they know that I don’t? Evaluate them on their merits and ask these same fundamental questions about them.

After zooming in, zoom out. What was my original thinking? Was it correct? If not, where did I err? What conclusions can I draw from the process about systemic errors in my thinking?

So we have seen how it works. Let’s cover some practical applications of the Socratic Method…

The Socratic Method in Investing

The best investors have long been proponents of the Socratic Method. They build structure to enforce a Socratic approach to the investment decision-making process.

Every proposal before the “investment committee” is questioned and dissected from a variety of angles (at least in theory). It makes it difficult for an investment based on flimsy assumptions to pass through.

Note: This doesn’t mean every investment made ends up being a successful one! It simply ensures that investments are grounded in clear, evidence-backed assumptions (even if cha...

One of the great joys of my life is that I get to spend time with some of the world's foremost experts and builders and call it work. I've recently decided that I'd like to try to record and share the insights from some of these natural conversations so that everyone can benefit from them in the way that I have.

Dr. Robert Waldinger is the director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which is the longest-running study on adult life, health, and happiness in the world.

5 lessons from our conversation: (1) Relationship satisfaction impacts health, (2) Loneliness kills (and it's more prevalent than ever), (3) Make social fitness a priority, (4) Check your energy to improve your life, and (5) Ambivalent relationships are the most toxic.

Status can be defined as the standing or positioning of one person in relation to another person or group. Status is a basic form of social currency—it dictates our interactions with those around us.

There are two types of status: Bought Status and Earned Status.

Bought Status is the improved social positioning garnered through acquired status symbols (cars, watches, etc.). Earned Status, however, is the real respect, admiration, and trust received through hard-won treasures (healthy body, meaningful relationships, strong purpose, etc.).

Status games are a part of life. You will never escape them—you simply need to play the right ones. Focus on Earned Status games and you'll live a more fulfilling life.

We're less than one week away from the launch of my first book, The 5 Types of Wealth.

Order today to Unlock Exclusive Bonuses

The 5 Types of Wealth provides the actionable tools to define, measure, and design your life around the pillars that truly create lasting happiness and fulfillment.

Order now and you'll unlock several exclusive bonuses, like a ticket to our virtual launch event, a companion video series, and more.

Order your copy today! 

The Learning Pyramid indicates that teaching is a much more effective driver of retention than reading or lecture. The goal should be to move rapidly to teaching in order to cement new learning.

The Feynman Technique is a learning model that leverages teaching and prioritizes simplicity to help you develop a deep understanding of any topic.

The four key steps of the Feynman Technique: (1) Set the Stage, (2) ELI5, (3) Assess & Study, and (4) Organize, Convey, & Review.

In a famous story, Cicero wrote of Diagoras, an atheist who, when confronted with paintings of people who prayed and then were saved from a shipwreck, replied, "I see those who were saved, but where are those painted who prayed and drowned?"

Survivorship Bias is the error resulting from systematically focusing on survivors (successes) and ignoring casualties (failures) that causes us to miss the true base rates of survival (the actual probability of success) and arrive at flawed conclusions.

To avoid the trap, we must consider the unseen evidence just as much as the seen. To develop a better perspective on base rates of success, consult a Possibility Grid, which lays out completed and not completed actions of both winners and losers.

Question: Are you allowing their narrative to impact your life?

Framework: The Skyscraper Mentality

•••

Order My First Book to Unlock Exclusive Bonuses:

The 5 Types of Wealth is the compass for your journey to a life of wealth that goes far beyond money. It provides the actionable tools to define, measure, and design your life around the pillars that truly create lasting happiness and fulfillment.

It will help you find your True North and build your life around it.

Order now and you'll unlock several new, exclusive bonuses:

• The 5 Types of Wealth Workbook: A step-by-step companion guide designed to help you work through the book’s key concepts and exercises.
• Access to The 5 Types of Wealth Digital Community: Join a vibrant group of like-minded individuals committed to creating a life of comprehensive wealth. Connect, collaborate, and grow together.
• Access to The 5 Types of Wealth Launch Workshop: Get exclusive access to the full recording of this transformative virtual workshop, where I’ll guide you through specific exercises designed to help you apply the principles of the book. Watch it anytime at your convenience!

A few months ago, I had an experience that stopped me in my tracks. It was a reminder that sometimes in life, the things we pray for can become the things we complain about, but only if we let them.

How many times has the thing your younger self dreamed of become the thing you complain about after you’ve gotten it?

There are a lot of beauties in life that are easy to miss if you’re moving too fast to appreciate them. Sometimes, you are quite literally living out your prayers. Remember that.

•••

Order My Book to Go Deeper on This Topic!

The 5 Types of Wealth provides the actionable tools to define, measure, and design your life around the pillars that truly create lasting happiness and fulfillment.

Order now and you'll unlock several new, exclusive bonuses:

• The 5 Types of Wealth Workbook: A step-by-step companion guide designed to help you work through the book’s key concepts and exercises.
• Access to The 5 Types of Wealth Digital Community: Join a vibrant group of like-minded individuals committed to creating a life of comprehensive wealth. Connect, collaborate, and grow together.
• Access to The 5 Types of Wealth Launch Workshop: Get exclusive access to the full recording of this transformative virtual workshop, where I’ll guide you through specific exercises designed to help you apply the principles of the book. Watch it anytime at your convenience!

Order The 5 Types of Wealth Now!

You're firing on all cylinders personally and professionally—inspired and motivated. Then, suddenly, you aren't. Things become very, very difficult. You're in a rut.

I've developed a useful set of principles for managing these swings and working out of them. My three-step method to work out of a rut: (1) Stop digging, (2) Change direction, and (3) Create movement.

Ruts will happen. When they do, slow down and allow yourself to work through them. The worst thing you can do is push the engine harder and risk taking yourself out of the game for a longer period than if you had worked through it.

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Lifelong Learning Habits

Lifelong learning is a competitive advantage. But contrary to what you’ve been told, lifelong learners are built, not born.

20 lifelong learning habits you can start developing today:

Stimulate Dynamically

The mind is a muscle - it needs to be stimulated dynamically to continue to grow. Don’t rely on one “exercise” - develop a menu of options. Write, read, listen, watch. Solve puzzles, play games. Enjoy it! Stimulate dynamically, learn dynamically.

Build Learning Circles

The most powerful learning is communal, not individual. Build learning circles with other intellectually curious minds. Engage regularly with no set intention or goal. Community is everything. Embrace it.

Keep Asking Why

“Why?” is the most useful tool in our learning toolkit. But somewhere along the line, we are told to stop asking why and just accept “facts” as we are told them. Reject the norm. If you want to understand the world, take a cue from our kids - keep asking why!

Adopt a Process Orientation

Prioritize process. Learn for the sake of learning, not always for a specific goal. When you prioritize process, you become flexible in where you are headed. Life is a winding, confusing journey - forward progress is all that matters.

Become a Polymath

A polymath is a person with wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary knowledge. Lifelong learners tend to be polymaths - their curiosity naturally leads to knowledge accumulation in a variety of disciplines. Learn both horizontally and vertically. Become a polymath.

Build a Learning Engine

The “learning engine” is at the core of every lifelong learner. It is comprised of all the learning “inputs” regularly consumed - books, newsletters, podcasts, videos, etc. The internet has opened access to it all. Build an unstoppable learning engine.

Avoid Noise Bottlenecks

Consuming more does not equate to knowing more. As you consume more data, you may find the noise-to-signal ratio increases (a classic Taleb “noise bottleneck” appears). Consume less, but consume intelligently. More signal, less noise.

Embrace All Types of Learning

There are two types of learning: surface and deep. Surface learning is quick and easy. Deep learning is more challenging. It requires a willingness to slow down and let ideas mature in the mind. Lifelong learners embrace both.

Seek Mentors & Coaches

“If I have seen further, it is by standing on the shoulders of giants.” You can’t do it alone. Seek out mentors and coaches to help you on your journey. Never be afraid to ask. You’ll be amazed by the kindness of strangers and their willingness to help.

Embrace Failures

Lifelong learners recognize that failures are learning opportunities. They don’t fear them. They embrace them. It’s easier said than done. Failures are painful - physically and emotionally. But stay the course and you’ll find learning on the other side.

Follow Your Curiosity

When you have a spark of curiosity, follow it. Moments of pure, unadulterated curiosity are fleeting, so you have to prioritize them when they come. Seek out curiosity-inducing content (like my Curiosity Chronicle newsletter!).

Become a Teacher

Teaching is often the most powerful path to learning. The Feynman Technique (explained below) is a foundational mental model for unlocking learning and growth through teaching. Use it! If you want to learn, teach.

Take Breaks

Humans were not made for constant motion. Learn to sprint, then rest. Taking breaks can be the easiest, most effective unlock for learning and growth. If you want to learn to grow, first learn to rest.

Learn from Strangers

Every conversation with a stranger is an opportunity to learn something new. Be present in every conversation with everyone you meet. You never know what might come of it.

Seek a Stimulating Job

Try to find a job that is intellectually stimulating. I know this is a luxury - if you are lucky enough, take advantage. P.S. I want to help. Check out my job board for interesting roles at companies that believe in open access.

Change Your Mind

Lifelong learners are always willing to change their mind. Believe something to be true? Ok, but be sure to open your mind to counterarguments. Stubborn refusal to acknowledge alternative perspectives stalls progress. Strive for strong opinions, weakly held.

Embrace Novel Formats

2020 was a tough year, but it did bring an upswell of novel learning formats. Cohort-based courses - which foster community! - are a great innovation. Cool Example: Ascend - a program for women looking to accelerate their careers.

Practice Mindfulness

A healthy mind is a powerful mind. Set aside time for mindfulness. Practice meditation - start with 5 minutes a day and build up from there. There are plenty of great apps to help you get started. With a healthy mind, anything is possible.

School as the Starting Line

All lifelong learners recognize that school is nothing but the starting line of our true education. Once you internalize this, you’ll start doing things differently.

Play the Long Game

The greatest riches in life - personal or professional - come from compound interest. But it takes time. Lots of time. Knowledge is no different - it compounds. So lifelong learners play the long game. Let the magical power of compounding work for you.

So those are 20 lifelong learning habits you can start developing today. What are some that I am missing?

If you are a job seeker, check out The Bloomboard for unique roles at high-growth companies in finance and technology.

Enjoy this and want to share it with family and friends? You can find the original thread below. Subscribe now and follow me on Twitter so you never miss a thread.

Until next time, stay curious, friends!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sahilbloom.substack.com

Hank is a 95-year-old man who asked to spend a day at Harvard for his 90th birthday. He arrived early, sat in the front row, took notes, and asked questions. He learns with no end in mind. He learns because he loves learning.

The forced structure of our formal education years often saps the innate curiosity and excitement for learning. New knowledge is crammed into closed containers in our brains--it's not allowed to mingle and network in a way that sparks new thinking pathways.

5 core habits of highly-effective lifelong learners: stimulate dynamically, build learning circles, build a learning engine, consistently ask why, and read daily.

One of the greatest joys of my life is that I often get to spend time in rooms surrounded by big thinkers. Rooms with an extraordinary idea density.

There are certain times when, even long after leaving the room, the ideas linger in my mind. I wrestle with them to develop my only lens for each.

This piece shares 24 short ideas I can't stop thinking about.

Episode at a glance:

• What do you think you're in the top 0.1% of the world at? This question from a friend sparked me to think deeply about my own answer. I would encourage everyone to think about the question for themselves.
• My response: I legitimately enjoy being wrong. My father once told me that the most important thing wasn't being right; rather, it was finding the truth. From that point forward, I began embracing new information as “software updates" to improve upon the old.
• One result of this practice has been the logging of a long list of "truths" that I now believe are anything but. In today's piece, I share a portion of that list: 23 lies you've been told about careers, business, life, and more.

Read the full post

We live in a culture that endlessly promotes and celebrates the achievement of the extraordinary—of those who accomplished some supreme feat in a single, narrow domain.

The Trap of the Extraordinary is that we conflate success with the achievement of the extraordinary. Winners are those who achieve the extraordinary, losers are those who do not.

To escape the trap, there are two mindset shifts to focus on: (1) It’s not about achieving the extraordinary, it's about finding purpose, joy, and fulfillment in the ordinary along the way; and (2) The prize is not the achievement you strive for, but the striving itself.

Focus is a competitive advantage.

But in a noisy world, it is increasingly difficult to find.

5 tactics for finding focus in your career, startup, or life:

#1 - Eliminate Low-Value Decisions

Mark Zuckerberg is famous for having only one outfit in his closet.

While an extreme example, there is a lesson here: Eliminate decisions that require energy but do not create commensurate value.

Redeploy that energy into high-value decisions.

#2 - Sprint Then Rest

The human mind is not designed to be on at all times.

It needs rest.

Work in short blocks (1-2 hours).

You can schedule the blocks - I call it "deep work" on my calendar - or leave yourself more flexibility.

Use biology to your advantage: sprint then rest.

#3 - Noise Cancellation

The world is noisy. We are constantly being hit by stimuli competing for our attention.

Learn to tune out and zone in.

Noise-canceling headphones can be an unimaginably helpful tool.

Find your "in the zone" soundtrack and play it on repeat.

#4 - Sleep Tight

It may seem contrarian in the hustle culture era, but deep, restful sleep is critical to finding focus.

I am a culprit. I used to say I would "sleep when I was dead" - I've changed my mind.

Better sleep is perhaps the single greatest unlock for your performance.

#5 - Train Your Mind

We train our bodies, why not our minds?

Practice meditation - start with 5 minutes a day and build up from there. There are plenty of great apps to help you get started.

You'll find yourself better able to process daily stressors and focus on the task at hand.

These are 5 tactics for finding focus. What are some others you would add to the list?

Additionally, here are a few high ROI tools and resources related to these tactics that I have personally found useful:

For better sleep and performance: White Noise Maker & Athletic Greens

For a powerful mind: Meditation App

For tuning out the noise: Noise Canceling Headphones

Enjoy this and want to share it with family and friends? You can find the original thread below. Subscribe now and follow me on Twitter so you never miss a thread.

Until next time, stay curious, friends!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sahilbloom.substack.com

Welcome to the second half of 2023. If you've kept up your New Year's resolutions and feel on track, great! If not, that's ok, because even if the best time to start was 6 months ago, the second best time is today.

Today, I'd like to share a distillation of my 10 favorite ideas from the 52 newsletters I've written so far this year.

The ideas covered: Spotlight Effect, 1-1-1 Method, Eisenhower Matrix, Surfer Mentality, Feynman Technique, 4 Types of Luck, Trap of the Extraordinary, Character Invention, Think Day, and Time Billionaire.

Question: What would happen if you gave just a little bit more?

Framework: The 5 Levels of Financial Wealth

•••

My book is officially a three-peat New York Times Bestseller, hitting the list for the third consecutive week since launch!

The hardcover has a big 30% sale on Amazon right now.

Order the book and reply to this email with your receipt and I'll send you the 50+ page companion workbook, along with a few other special bonuses!

Order The 5 Types of Wealth Now!

Question: What would you attempt if you knew you couldn’t fail?

Framework: The Red Team

Last weekend, I attended my 10-year Stanford University reunion. It was an opportunity to look back on those formative years, reconnect with old friends, and reflect on the lessons learned.

10 lessons from 10-year college reunion: (1) The Medici Effect is real; (2) Your daily habits show up on your face after 10 years; (3) Insecurity tells, confidence shows; (4) Plans are great, but life will generally laugh at them; (5) Fighting the Zebra Effect is hard (but worth it); (6) Identity is the real thing we're searching for; (7) Freedom is rare, but incredibly apparent; (8) We get more embarrassing with age (or we're just mature enough to embrace it); (9) Shared struggle builds unbreakable bonds; (10) Life is much more fragile than you think.

If you've been reading my work for a while, you know that I'm a big proponent of the simple, boring basics. I don't have any e-books to sell you. I just want to see you make progress. This piece shares my favorite—very simple, very boring, and very effective—strategy for making dramatic progress in any arena: The 30-for-30 Approach.

With whatever you're trying to improve at, do it for 30 minutes per day for 30 straight days. It works because the 30 minutes is low intimidation, the 30 days is a meaningful commitment, and the 900 minutes of accumulated effort creates surprisingly significant results.

Question: What is the burden that you're still carrying?

Framework: The Capability Gap.

There is a cost of entry for everything you want to achieve in life.

Everyone wants the reward:

• The growth
• The level-up
• The next chapter

But few are willing to pay the cost of entry to achieve it...

•••

My book has sold 200,000+ copies around the world and is a 7x NYT Bestseller.

If you've been wanting a copy (or are looking to gift copies to family or friends), there's a big 30% sale. Now’s a great time to get it.

Order The Book Now!

Join me as I sit down with my friend Dr. Robert Waldinger, the director of the Harvard Study of Adult Development, which is the longest-running study on adult life, health, and happiness in the world.

The study tracked the lives of 700+ original participants and 1,300+ descendants over 85 years. Dr. Waldinger's Ted Talk has been viewed nearly 50 million times and his book, The Good Life, was an instant New York Times best-seller.

We dive deep into the study's most intriguing and surprising findings, discuss strategies for fighting back against loneliness in the modern era, and much more.

You won't want to miss this one!

P.S. I don't want to do a formal "podcast" and turn something fun into a business, but I will organically start recording and sharing my conversations with amazing experts so that everyone can benefit from them in the way that I have. If you're interested in seeing me do more of in the future, comment YES on the video! 

— 

00:00 - Introduction
00:48 - Key Insights from the Harvard Adult Development Study
03:10 - Highlighting Major Discoveries from an 80-Year Study
04:50 - Primary Factors for Health and Longevity
07:04 - The Loneliness Epidemic
08:43 - Comparative Study: Solo vs. Social Vacations in Sweden
10:13 - Understanding and Measuring Loneliness
11:30 - The Pursuit of Wealth: Necessary or Excessive?
13:20 - Which Age Group Feels the Loneliest?
14:33 - Navigating Social Media Impacts on Youth
20:14 - The Importance of Gratitude Practices
21:18 - Essential Advice for Thriving Relationships
24:06 - How to Surround Yourself with Positive Influences
25:31 - A Stark Reality About Relationships
27:38 - How Our Minds Shape Our Realities
28:24 - The Hidden Risks of Smartphone Use
30:29 - The Impact of Technology on Young Children
32:20 - The Influence of Mobile Devices on In-Person Interactions
33:12 - Marital Challenges in the First Year of Parenthood
34:30 - Common Communication Errors in Relationships
35:25 - The Concept of 'Together Alone' Time with Your Partner
36:31 - The Value of Personal Space in Relationships
39:11 - The Effects of Toxic Relationships: A Scientific Perspective
42:43 - Constructive vs. Demeaning Feedback
45:48 - Exploring the Relationship Between Love and Sadness
47:24 - Embracing Life's Complex Tensions
49:08 - Empathy: Everyone Has Their Own Struggles
50:43 - Habits of Individuals in Exceptionally Healthy Relationships
52:41 - Social Wellness for Introverts vs. Extroverts
53:28 - Strategies for Maintaining Social Wellness
54:51 - Making Social Wellness a Priority

—

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Today at a Glance

Inversion is a simple, powerful mental model for solving complex problems.

When problems become challenging to solve forwards, they may be more readily solved backwards.

Inversion has a wide variety of applications, ranging from investing to business to leadership to relationships.

Invert, Always Invert

The world is an exceptionally complicated and competitive arena. On any given day, you wake up, encounter a wide array of challenging, multivariate problems, make decisions with highly-imperfect information, and then plan to do it all over again the next day.

To outperform in this complicated and competitive arena, you need serious problem-solving skills. Fortunately, contrary to what many of you have been told, these skills can be learned.

Today, I’d like to cover inversion - a simple, powerful mental model for thinking clearly and solving complex problems.

The History of Inversion

When solving problems, the human mind is wired to think in linear, logical, forward terms. This is (probably, I’m not a scientist!) due to the types of problems our ancestors faced - avoiding getting eaten by large animals, hunting other large animals, searching for the next meal, etc. These problems were inherently ephemeral and discrete - they had clear lines of action/reaction and obvious allies and enemies.

But as humanity entered the Agricultural Age, followed by the Industrial Age, followed by now the Digital Age, our problems seemed to change. They got much more complex. As Notorious B.I.G. famously said, “Mo technology, mo problems” (or something like that?).

As the problems get increasingly complex, the forward, logical process evolved in our ancestors often fails. Enter our simple, powerful mental model: inversion.

Let’s start with the basics. What is inversion?

Inversion is a mental model and thinking tool used by some of the world’s greatest thinkers and problem solvers. Simply put, it says that when problems become challenging to solve forwards, they may be more readily solved backwards.

Inversion as a general thinking tool has been around for millennia. Stoic philosophers would perform an exercise they called “premeditatio malorum” - roughly translating to “the pre-meditation of evils” - in which they would imagine the worst case scenario ahead of time. They believed that this exercise would force them to engage in behavior and make plans to avoid this outcome.

The more formal mental model was popularized by German mathematician Carl Jacobi in the mid-1800s. Jacobi was famous for his work in advancing the field of elliptic functions. Wikipedia tells me elliptic functions are “a special kind of meromorphic functions, that satisfy two periodicity conditions” - which provided approximately zero clarity, so I’ll just stick to my lane.

When faced with difficult problems (which happened frequently!), Jacobi had a strategy: “Man muss immer umkehren.”

The loose translation: “Invert, always invert.”

Jacobi frequently used this strategy if he were to be stumped on a challenging math problem. Rather than continuing to look at it the same way (forwards), he would restate it in inverse form (backwards). This new, creative perspective often allowed him to solve the problem more easily.

Fast forward 100+ years and inversion went mainstream when Charlie Munger made one classic, quintessentially pithy remark:

“All I want to know is where I’m going to die, so I’ll never go there.”

Munger realized that forward, logical thinking can only take you so far. To solve certain problems, you have to think differently.

Inversion is just that: a method for thinking about a problem differently. It requires you to look at things from a different angle to embrace a new perspective. Just as the captain surveys the battlefield for a new vector of attack, you too have to uncover a novel approach.

Perhaps more importantly, inversion trains your mind to think dynamically. Athletes have long known that training in a single plane leads to stasis. The same principle applies to the mind. Inversion trains it from multiple angles.

But let’s get practical. How and where can you apply it in your life?

Inversion in Investing

Warren Buffett famously stated that there were only two rules of investing:

"Rule #1: Never lose money. Rule #2: Never forget Rule #1."

Buffett (and his business partner Charlie Munger) have often evangelized the benefits of simply avoiding stupidity vs. seeking brilliance. This is a classic example of inversion in action.

When it comes to investing, the first point to internalize is that achieving long-term outperformance is extremely challenging (some would argue impossible!).

(Note: If anyone tells you otherwise, you should run in the other direction!)

Applying inversion, rather than solving for how to achieve outperformance, try solving for how to achieve underperformance. This sounds crazy, but bear with me…

What type of behaviors, thought patterns, and decisions would effectively guarantee you underperform the market? Said differently, how do you guarantee you break Buffett's Rule #1 and lose money?

By answering these questions, you are eliminating a lot of actions that may have crept into your investing process and scuttled your performance goals. Through this process of elimination, you may find a cleaner, shorter list of behaviors and actions that will help you to craft a strategy for outperformance.

Inversion in Startups & Business

For most startups and businesses, defining and executing against a strategy to drive durable, long-term growth is the primary priority. Grow or die.

But in a high-stakes, competitive market, deciding on the "right" strategy can often be incredibly difficult. There are simply too many options, too many variables, and too many decisions to make along the way.

Inversion can help. Here’s how:

Conduct a pre-mortem analysis - your own version of the "premeditatio malorum" of the Stoic philosophers - of the different strategies and levers. For a given strategy, ask a few questions:

If this were to fail, why did it fail?

How might we have avoided this failure?

What are the consequences of this failure?

If you perform this exercise across the various considered strategies for your startup or business, the answer of which strategy to pursue will likely come into clear view. The pre-mortem analysis can be a very helpful exercise for cutting through the noise and making quick, effective decisions.

Inversion in Leadership

There are countless books on how to be an effective leader. But when you're dropped into a new context and asked to lead, these books can only take you so far. Leadership is not a one-size-fits-all endeavor. Every new situation requires a new approach to leadership. So how do you lead?

J...

Question: Do you need to empty your cup before you can grow?

Framework: Persian Messenger Syndrome

The Ship of Theseus is a thought experiment proposed by the Greek philosopher Plutarch in relation to a story about the Greek hero Theseus. If every single piece of Theseus' ship has been replaced gradually over time, is it still the original ship?

You are your own Ship of Theseus, constantly replacing your parts over the years (metaphorically and literally). But concerning yourself with the question of "who you are" at any point in time is inviting an identity struggle that is unnecessary.

The reality: There is no original version. You simply exist. You never become, you are in a constant state of becoming. This means that you simply need to embrace all change and not worry about clinging to some old version that may have existed.

Question: How am I creating the situation that I don’t want?

Framework: The Bricklayer Mentality

The world lost a beautiful soul over the weekend. My grandmother, Vimala Reddy ("Avva" to me), passed away peacefully in the early morning hours on October 1. She was 94-years-old.

Life is cyclical. When I was born, she was there to welcome me to this world. In the end, I had to bid her farewell from it.

10 short lessons from her that changed my life (and may change yours): (1) Don’t fear sadness, as it tends to sit right next to love, (2) Life isn't about avoiding chaos, but making the chaos beautiful, (3) Never lose the mischievous 10-year-old you have inside you, (4) Your relationships keep you healthy, (5) Get your 10,000 brain steps in daily, (6) If you can keep your head, the world is yours, (7) Dynamism is the most important human trait, (8) Take pride in the details, (9) Create stories your grandchildren will love to hear someday, and (10) Your heart will rarely lead you astray.

Question: If I repeated this day for 100 days, would my life be better or worse?

Framework: The 5 Second Rule.

Warren Buffett is a treasure trove of wisdom.

But contrary to what you have been told, most of it has nothing to do with investing.

10 powerful lessons for life from the Oracle of Omaha:

#1 - Wait For A Juicy Pitch

“You don't have to swing at everything - you can wait for your pitch."

Life doesn’t reward you for the number of swings you take.

Focus on identifying the juiciest pitch.

When it comes, swing hard and don’t miss it.

#2 - Just Stop Digging

“The most important thing to do if you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging."

When things aren’t working, change course and try something different.

Be nimble. Be agile.

When you find yourself at the bottom of a hole, stop digging and climb out of it.

#3 - Exploit Disconnects

“Price is what you pay. Value is what you get.”

Seek out situations where there is a clear disconnect between price and value.

This applies to investing, but it’s more broadly a mental model for life.

Identify disconnects. Exploit them to your advantage.

#4 - Be Contrarian

“Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful.”

Following the crowd is easy, but it can be a trap.

Learn to think independently. Come to your own decisions. Develop your own mental models.

Your unique perspectives are your superpower.

#5 - Optimize Value Capture

“Opportunities come infrequently. When it rains gold, put out the bucket, not the thimble."

Create structures that enable you to capture more of the value you create.

The most successful people have simply optimized their value capture mechanisms.

#6 - Make Time Your Friend

“Time is the friend of the wonderful business, the enemy of the mediocre.”

Don’t be in a rush.

Set up your life to compound value over the long-term.

Play long-term games with long-term people.

Make time work for - not against - you.

#7 - Protect Your Circle of Competence

“Risk comes from not knowing what you're doing.”

Be ruthlessly honest about what you know (your circle of competence) and what you don’t.

Focus on playing games within your circle - otherwise, you’re just gambling.

#8 - Never Get Caught Naked

“It's only when the tide goes out that you discover who's been swimming naked.”

Find a balance between pushing yourself for growth and being completely out of your depth.

Never put yourself in a high-stakes position to get caught swimming naked.

#9 - Reputation Matters

“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.”

In every interaction - big or small - always act in accordance with strong principles and values.

Your character is your fate.

#10 - Invest In Yourself

“The most important investment you can make is in yourself."

There is no better investment than an investment in yourself.

Find time to read, to think, to learn.

Surround yourself with amazing people who push you to become better.

Invest in you.

These are 10 powerful lessons for life from Warren Buffett, but there are so many more.

What are your favorite lessons from the Oracle of Omaha?

I have to admit, I am still shaking from this moment at the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting in 2019...

Enjoy this and want to share it with family and friends? You can find the original thread below. Subscribe now and follow me on Twitter so you never miss a thread.

Until next time, stay curious, friends!

This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit sahilbloom.substack.com

This weekend, I was flipping through a few of my old journals when I came across this quote:

"When jarred, unavoidably, by circumstances, revert at once to yourself, and don’t lose the rhythm more than you can help. You’ll have a better grasp of the harmony if you keep on going back to it." — Marcus Aurelius, Meditations

A perfect blend of ancient wisdom for these uncertain times.

•••

My book has sold 200,000+ copies around the world and is a 7x NYT Bestseller.

If you've been wanting a copy (or are looking to gift copies to family or friends), there's a big 30% sale. Now’s a great time to get it.

Order The Book Now!

My wife and I celebrated our 7th wedding anniversary on December 17th. To create something unique and memorable, I decided I would explore a bit of the relationship wisdom that time provides.

I asked couples who have been married 40, 50, and 60+ years a simple question: What relationship advice would you give to your younger selves?

The advice captured 500+ years of earned relationship wisdom.

Question: Are you allowing a missing nail to destroy your kingdom?

Framework: The Zone 2 Practice Session

***

My book, The 5 Types of Wealth, is a 6x NYT bestseller! If you haven't grabbed your copy yet, there's no better time.

It's 30% off right now. Get it HERE

The Boot Up Sequence is a fixed set of actions and environmental cues that mentally and physically mark the start of your work session. While it can be used for any work session, I find it particularly impactful and valuable in priming for a deep work session (daily focused work on the "most important thing").

The Boot Up Sequence is built around the five senses: Touch, Taste, Sight, Sound, and Smell. Engaging each of these allows you to quickly and consistently enter your flow.

If you aren't able to execute your full, ideal Boot Up Sequence, simply aim to nail 3 out of the 5 senses of the sequence. My experience suggests that 3 out of 5 is achievable under a variety of circumstances, and it's enough to create the mental and physical entryway into your flow.

Question: If you woke up three years from now and were living your ideal life, what were the three things you did to get you there?

Framework: The Pyrrhic Victory.

Question: When was the last time you allowed yourself to celebrate good enough?

Framework: The Click Test

A Stanford business professor split her class into groups and gave each group $5 and 2 hours to generate as high of a return as possible. The losing groups bartered with the $5 or used the time to generate income. The winning group sold the ad space of the presentation time at the end of the challenge and generated a 12,000% return.

When faced with a challenge with the potential for outsized rewards, we need to think differently. Three steps to think differently: (1) Avoid the distraction, (2) Ask foundational questions, and (3) Select the leveraged approach.

Remember: Creative, non-linear, asymmetric thinking generates creative, non-linear, asymmetric outcomes.

Welcome to the final Wednesday issue of 2024. For the third year in a row, I sent out over 100 newsletters to my subscribers—two per week, every single week. In fact, I haven't missed an issue since I started this newsletter in May 2021.

This newsletter is all about ideas—actionable ideas to help you build a high-performing, healthy, wealthy life.

I shared thousands of ideas here this year. Here were my 9 favorites: (1) The Main Character Question, (2) Taxes of Life, (3) 2 Pillars of Strong Relationships, (4) Winner's Game vs. Loser's Game, (5) The Stories You Tell Yourself, (6) Solomon's Paradox, (7) Seasons of Loneliness, (8) Make the Coffee, and (9) The Wealth Score.

"All the things which cause complaint or dread are like the taxes of life—things from which, my dear Lucilius, you should never hope for exemption or seek escape." - Seneca

This idea—that there are taxes of life that you should happily pay—resonates deeply. The reframe to view these negatives as a necessary part of my growth and progress has been tremendously helpful on my journey (and will be on yours).

In today's piece, I'd like to highlight 7 taxes of life you need to pay to live the life you want.

I just completed 100 straight days of doing a cold plunge every morning.

I pride myself on my consistency and discipline, but this 100-day streak pushed me to a new level. The journey included several frozen rivers, awkward interactions with hotel housekeeping departments, and one hotel requiring a lifeguard to monitor me during the plunge.

I learned a lot of important lessons on the journey that have nothing to do with cold plunging (and everything to do with life). This piece shares 10 lessons from 100 days in the cold.

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Today at a Glance

Cognitive biases are systemic errors in thinking that negatively impact decision-making quality and outcomes.

Combatting cognitive biases relies first and foremost on establishing a level of awareness of the biases.

Overview, examples, and combat tactics for common biases, including Dunning-Kruger Effect, Fundamental Attribution Error, Bandwagon Effect, Egocentric Bias, Naïve Realism, Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, Pygmalion Effect, Confirmation Bias, Backfire Effect, and Anchoring.

The Cognitive Bias Handbook - Part I

Cognitive biases are systemic errors in thinking that negatively impact decision-making quality and outcomes. I recently shared a Twitter thread covering the basics of 20 cognitive biases - but it was admittedly surface-level (280 characters only allows for so much depth and nuance on a topic!).

So here we are. It’s time to dive deeper on cognitive biases, including examples and specific ways to combat each one. To avoid a monstrous newsletter piece that no one has the time to read (or listen to), I will be splitting the coverage of the 20 cognitive biases across 2 newsletters over the coming weeks (with each covering 10 common biases).

This two-part newsletter series will be split as follows:

Part I: Fundamental Attribution Error, Bandwagon Effect, Egocentric Bias, Naïve Realism, Baader-Meinhof Phenomenon, Pygmalion Effect, Confirmation Bias, Backfire Effect, Anchoring, and Dunning-Kruger Effect.

Part II: Ben Franklin Effect, Loss Aversion, Endowment Effect, Availability Bias, Survivorship Bias, Ikea Effect, Hindsight Bias, Plan Continuation Bias, Gambler’s Fallacy, and Curse of Knowledge.

This handbook is designed to be a resource you can save and come back to whenever you need a refresher. Without further ado, let’s dive into Part I…

Dunning-Kruger Effect

What is it?

The Dunning-Kruger Effect says that people with a low objective ability at a task are prone to overestimate their ability at that task.

Humans are notoriously incapable of objective evaluation of themselves, including of their competency levels.

(Note: see below for a deep-dive thread I wrote on Dunning-Kruger!)

Examples

“Everyone is a genius in a bull market.”

This is a common phrase heard in the investment world during bull markets. When everyone is making money, everyone starts to fancy themselves expert investors. They fail to separate their objective skill at the task from the outcomes.

If you start hearing more and more people bragging about their stock market prowess, the market is entering the danger zone.

How do you combat it?

Several tactical strategies for combatting the Dunning-Kruger Effect:

Identify your circle of competence: Know what you know, and what you don’t.

Get comfortable with “I don’t know”: Most people are afraid of this phrase. Get comfortable with it.

Challenge yourself: Consistently challenge your belief on your own competency ratings. Do you actually know something as well as you think you do? What would an unbiased third-party say?

It will feel uncomfortable - you’ll be challenging your most basic instincts. If you persist, you’ll be less prone to falling victim to the Dunning-Kruger Effect.

Fundamental Attribution Error

What is it?

Fundamental Attribution Error (or “FAE” for short) is the human tendency to hold others accountable (while giving ourselves a break).

It says that humans will tend to:

Attribute the actions of others to their character (and not to their situation or context).

Attribute our own actions to situation and context (and not to our character).

Why do we do this? Well, as with many of the biases we will cover, it likely developed as a heuristic (a problem-solving or decision-making shortcut), in this case for simplifying the process and judgement around new human relationships.

From an evolutionary perspective, quickly attributing negative actions to character (rather than situation or context) may have kept you alive, as you’d be more likely to avoid that individual.

But in a modern context, being prone to FAE can create real problems.

Examples

The workplace is a common FAE breeding ground.

It is easy to form perspectives on the character of colleagues and bosses based on small pieces of information. If a colleague arrives late for work, they are lazy, right? This is clearly a flawed line of thinking, as there are numerous factors that could have contributed to your colleague’s lateness.

The reality is that, in these instances, you are using limited information to create an overall picture of an individual. This is the equivalent of seeing one square of a map and believing you know the map in its entirety.

How do you combat it?

The first step to combatting FAE (and all cognitive biases, for that matter!) is awareness. Keep it in mind as you build a body of experiences with new colleagues or acquaintances.

Beyond awareness, combatting FAE comes down to forcing yourself to slow down and evaluate the potential circumstances or situational factors that may be influencing an individual’s actions or behaviors. You won’t always have the time to do so (heuristics can be helpful!), but with more lasting relationships (friends, partners, colleagues, etc.), it is worth the extra effort.

You’ll build deeper, more trusting relationships (and naturally become a more compassionate person).

Bandwagon Effect

What is it?

Humans evolved as a social species. Our communities and collective behavior allowed us to thrive.

But our nature has a downside…

It creates a strong tendency to speak, act, or believe things simply because a lot of other people do. The Bandwagon Effect says that we prefer actions that many others are taking, irrespective of the logic or soundness of those actions.

Our social nature subconsciously pushes us towards fitting in, leading to mindless actions and dangerous groupthink.

Examples

The classic example of Bandwagon Effect is from a popular old TV show, Candid Camera, in which unknowing participants were caught on hidden cameras doing funny things.

In one episode, people entered an elevator to find several people (actors) standing facing the back wall. Rather than question the behavior, many of the elevator entrants simply mimicked the behavior, despite its absurdity.

The Bandwagon Effect is all around us - in investing (FOMO and meme stocks, anyone?!), politics (sigh…), business (companies blindly following the strategies of competitors), and more.

Once you learn it, you’ll start seeing it all around you.

How do you combat it?

There are two effective ways to combat the Bandwagon Effect:

Ground yo...

A "mental model" is a way to think about the world. The world is infinitely complex, so the aim of any good model is to provide a lens through which you can simplify, evaluate, and make decisions as you walk through life.

The Winner's Game vs. Loser's Game is a mental model with powerful applications for your career, business, investing, and life. A Winner's Game is won through incredible shots. A Loser's Game is won through avoiding unforced errors. Most games of life are Loser's Games.

Two lessons to apply: (1) Avoid the Complexity Trap and (2) Embrace Self-Awareness.

I recently got a message from a 22-year-old reader asking for career advice. Career advice is a topic area that I have always found interesting, probably because I feel it so often misses the mark. I take this as a challenge.

I sat down and synthesized the advice I would have wanted to receive early in my career (or what I would tell my own son if he were just starting out).

The 7 pieces of career advice everyone needs to hear: (1) Swallow the frog, (2) Do the old fashioned things well, (3) Work hard first and smart later, (4) Build storytelling skills, (5) Build a rep for figuring it out, (6) Show up early and stay late, and (7) Dive through cracked doors.

The Spotlight Effect is a common psychological phenomenon where we overestimate the degree to which other people are noticing or observing our actions, behaviors, appearance, or results.

Pre-conditioned fear of placing yourself in "spotlight situations" means you shrink yourself down from your true potential. This is a tremendous drag on growth.

To fight back: (1) Develop an awareness of the Spotlight Effect and when it may hit, (2) Focus on being interested rather than interesting, and (3) Ask "So what?" to confront your fears.

Last weekend, I ran my second marathon in 2:53:38. This was a 4-minute personal best.

During the suffering of miles 20-26 and the journey home after the race, I found myself reflecting on the key lessons from the experience. Interestingly, none of them have anything to do with running.

This piece shares 8 powerful lessons for life from running a marathon.

In the early 1970s, Stanford psychology researcher Dr. Mark Lepper conducted a study with a group of young children that found those who had received a reward for completing a task experienced lower intrinsic motivation to perform that task in the future.

The Passion Paradox: We have a deep desire to chase our passions, but by chasing them, we may actually reduce our passion for them.

Three strategies for escaping the paradox: (1) Keep play as play, (2) Let work be work, and (3) Make work more playful.

I've never been a fan of New Year's resolutions: They're too rigid and require a belief that you can choose the perfect set of resolutions that will be relevant throughout the entire year.

I prefer to set New Year's intentions: Big picture, open-ended ideas and mindsets that I want to focus on for the year ahead.

The 5 intentions I'm setting for 2025: (1) Recognize time as the most valuable asset, (2) Control the controllable, (3) Find joy in the small, (4) Let go of the things that no longer serve me, and (5) Go All In.

We're just over a month away from the launch of my first book, The 5 Types of Wealth.

Order today to Unlock Exclusive Bonuses

The 5 Types of Wealth provides the actionable tools to define, measure, and design your life around the pillars that truly create lasting happiness and fulfillment.

Order now and you'll unlock several exclusive bonuses, like a ticket to our virtual launch event, a companion video series, and more.

Order your copy today! 

I just turned 34. Every year, I use my birthday as a moment for reflection, an opportunity to zoom out and consider what I've learned along the way.

I hope you see yourself in one or more of these lessons, that they connect and spark a positive ripple in your life.

This piece shares 34 life lessons from my 34 years.

We're less than a month away from the launch of my first book, The 5 Types of Wealth.

Order today to Unlock Exclusive Bonuses

The 5 Types of Wealth provides the actionable tools to define, measure, and design your life around the pillars that truly create lasting happiness and fulfillment.

Order now and you'll unlock several exclusive bonuses, like a ticket to our virtual launch event, a companion video series, and more.

Order your copy today! 

In preparation for my first marathon, I spoke to a legendary American marathoner, who offered one piece of advice: "Make sure you have three goals: An A Goal, a B Goal, and a C Goal." Soon after the race, I realized that the core principle behind the system applied well-beyond running.

For any arena of life, you can create an A Goal, B Goal, and C Goal. On days when you feel great, you hit your A Goal. On days when you feel ok (most days!), you hit your B Goal. On days when you feel bad, you hit your C Goal.

The ABC Goal System removes any intimidation or guilt: As long as you hit your C Goal, you're making forward progress.

While we all want to live in a state of low stress, during certain moments, we need to learn to optimize our stress response—we need to learn to harness stress to our benefit rather than allowing it to derail us.

The Yerkes-Dodson Law says that stress and performance are positively correlated, but only up to a certain point, after which more stress reduces performance.

3 strategies for mastering stress: (1) Reframe threat into challenge; (2) Use science-backed breathing techniques to pull back from the edge; and (3) Place yourself in controlled stressful environments to train your stress response.

I just completed my first marathon in 2:57:31 just 6 months after I started running. By achieving the sub 3-hour marathon time, I had hit my Big Goal. It felt great, at first. But then came the rut, one which led to a fundamental change in how I'm going to think about goal setting and achievement in the future.

Big Goals create a perfect storm for unhappiness. If we miss them, we feel like a failure. If we hit them, we feel a temporary satisfaction, followed by an odd darkness brought about by the Arrival Fallacy, purpose dissipation, and their extrinsic focus.

Focus on Micro Goals is my new, favored approach. Micro Goals are intrinsic, avoid the Arrival Fallacy, and create daily purpose. I will continue to have Big Goals, but I will focus my daily energy around these Micro Goals to create a healthier balance.

Welcome to the 500+ new members of the curiosity tribe who have joined us since Friday. Join the 20,500+ others who are receiving high-signal, curiosity-inducing content every single week!

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Mental Razors

Razors are rules that simplify decisions.

20+ powerful razors (to help you cut through life’s noise):

The ELI5 Razor

Complexity and jargon are often used to mask a lack of true understanding.

If you can’t explain it to a 5-year-old, you don’t really understand it. If someone uses a lot of complexity and jargon to explain something to you, they probably don’t understand it.

Munger’s Rule of Opinions

“I never allow myself to have an opinion on anything that I don’t know the other side’s argument better than they do.” - Charlie Munger

Opinions aren’t free. You have to work to earn the right to have them.

The Taleb “Look the Part” Razor

If forced to choose between two options of seemingly equal merit, choose the one that doesn’t look the part. The one who doesn’t look the part has had to overcome much more to achieve its status than the one who fit in perfectly.

The Bezos Regret Minimization Framework

The goal is to minimize the number of regrets in life.

When faced with a difficult decision:

Project yourself into the future

Look back on the decision

Ask "Will I regret not doing this?"

Take action

The Boaster’s Razor

Truly successful people rarely feel the need to boast about their success.

If someone regularly boasts about their income, wealth, or success, it’s fair to assume the reality is a fraction of what they claim.

The Steve Jobs Quality Razor

“When you’re a carpenter making a beautiful chest of drawers, you’re not going to use a piece of plywood on the back, even though it faces the wall and nobody will ever see it. You’ll know it’s there, so you’re going to use a beautiful piece of wood on the back. For you to sleep well at night, the aesthetic, the quality, has to be carried all the way through.” - Steve Jobs

When building, take pride in carrying the quality all the way through. Would you be proud for your work to be seen from every angle and perspective? If not, keep working.

Buffett’s Rule of Holes

“The most important thing to do if you find yourself in a hole is to stop digging." - Warren Buffett

When things aren’t working, change course and try something different. When you find yourself at the bottom of a hole, stop digging and climb out of it.

The Paul Graham Crazy Idea Razor

If someone proposes a crazy idea, ask:

Are they a domain expert?

Do I know them to be reasonable?

If yes on (1) and (2), you should take the idea seriously, as it may be an asymmetric bet on the future.

The Circle of Competence

Be ruthless in identifying your circle of competence (and its boundaries). When faced with a big decision, ask yourself whether you are qualified to handle it given your circle. If yes, proceed. If no, outsource it to someone who is.

The Duck Test

If it looks like a duck, swims like a duck, and quacks like a duck, it’s probably a duck. You can determine a lot about a person by regularly observing their habitual characteristics.

Buffett’s Juicy Pitch

“You don't have to swing at everything - you can wait for your pitch." - Warren Buffett

Life doesn’t reward you for the number of swings you take. Slow down and focus on identifying the juiciest pitch. When it comes, swing hard and don’t miss it.

Occam’s Razor

The simplest explanation is often the best one. Simple assumptions > complex assumptions. Simple is beautiful.

The Buffett Reputation Razor

“It takes 20 years to build a reputation and five minutes to ruin it. If you think about that, you'll do things differently.” - Warren Buffett

Remember that quote and act accordingly. Your character is your fate.

Hanlon’s Razor

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.

In assessing someone's actions, we should not assume negative intent if there is a viable alternative explanation, such as different beliefs, incompetence, or ignorance.

Machiavelli’s Razor

A simple modification of Hanlon’s Razor:

Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by self-interest.

In assessing someone's actions, we should not assume negative intent if there is a viable alternative explanation that they are acting on rooted self-interest.

Newton’s Flaming Laser Sword

If something cannot be settled by experiment or observation, it is not worth debating. This will save you from wasting a lot of time on pointless arguments.

Hitchens’ Razor

What can be asserted without evidence can also be dismissed without evidence. The burden of proof regarding a claim lies with the one who makes the claim. If unmet, no argument is required to dismiss it.

Sagan’s Standard

“Extraordinary claims require extraordinary evidence.” - Carl Sagan

The more crazy and outrageous the claim, the more crazy and outrageous the body of evidence must be in order to prove it.

The Naval Reading Razor

“Read what you love until you love to read.” - Naval

When deciding what to read, just read whatever grabs you. Avoid the trap of only reading “impressive” or “smart” books that bore you to death. Never establish vanity metrics (e.g. # of books) as goals.

The Eisenhower Decision Matrix

When faced with a task, ask: “Is this urgent? Is this important?”

An "urgent" task is one that requires immediate attention. An "important" task is one that promotes or furthers your long-term goals.

Place it on a 2x2 matrix and act accordingly.

The Steve Jobs Settling Razor

“The only way to do great work is to love what you do. If you haven’t found it yet, keep looking. Don’t settle.” - Steve Jobs

It’s Monday morning. Did you wake up with energy or with dread? Your answer will tell you if you’re settling.

The Career Razor

When deciding on a new job, choose the one that will challenge you the most (intellectually, physically, or emotionally). Challenge and discomfort forces growth.

P.S. Check out The Bloomboard for challenging new roles!

Those are 20+ powerful razors to help you cut through life’s noise. What are your favorites? What razors am I missing?

Love this post? Share it with your family and friends and help grow the tribe!

The Bloomboard - Featured Opportunities

Pallet - Swiss Army Knife

Commonsto...

The greatest discoveries in life come not from finding the right answers, but from asking the right questions.

For the last several years, I've been adding to a list of questions that have changed the way I work, move, live, and love.

This piece shares 7 questions that have had a dramatic impact on my life.

Question: What does your perfect workday look like?

Framework: The 3-3-3 Method.

Special Announcement: The Bloomboard

I’m excited to announce the launch of my job board - The Bloomboard - where I will curate and share unique, exciting roles in finance and technology every single week.

The goal? To foster open access to jobs for candidates and spread awareness of amazing, high-growth companies and roles.

The board will be curated by me personally, meaning it will only include companies and roles I would recommend (i.e. roles I would be excited to take if I were qualified!).

We have some incredible companies and roles up for the launch, including:

Synthesis - EdTech for nurturing innovators - VP of Growth & Head of People

Faves - curation-focused social app - Head of Partnerships & Growth PM

Metafy - 1x1 e-sports coaching platform - Senior Product Designer

Vivian Health - healthcare job placement platform - Product Manager

Fundrise - real estate investment platform - Director of Product, Growth

M1 Finance - personal investment super app - Lifecycle Marketing Manager

Capchase - non-dilutive funding platform - Capital Markets Analyst

Pesto Tech - remote developer matching platform - Account Executive

Blockworks - crypto and macro media platform - Editor & Software Engineer

Titan - democratized investment platform - Crypto Investment Analyst

and more at IEQ Capital, First Round Capital, Gather, Athletic Greens, Avicado, ConvertKit, and many others!

If you are a company in finance or technology looking to gain direct access to a large, growing talent pool, post a job to the board or email me to add your roles.

20 Ways to Stand Out in a Hiring Process

The hiring process is ultra-competitive. But you’ve incorrectly been told that the only way to stand out is by having fancy degrees and credentials.

20 ways to stand out in a hiring process (that don’t involve your resume):

Do Your Research

Before an interview, spend a few hours researching the company and role. At a minimum, learn the company mission, read up on recent news on the company or its market, and study the backgrounds of the key leaders. Google is a powerful asset. Use it.

Embrace “I Don’t Know”

You can’t know the answer to every question. And you know what? That’s ok! Don’t be afraid to say “I don’t know” - but then follow it with a plan to acquire that information. “I don’t know, but I’ll dig in and follow up with an email.” Then follow up!

Stop Fearing Rejection

I’m not embarrassed to admit that I’ve been rejected for more jobs than I can count. It happens. You can’t be a fit for everything and everyone. Stop being afraid of rejection and put yourself out there. You miss 100% of the shots you don’t take.

Prepare for “Why Us?”

Interviewers inevitably ask, “Why us?” Make sure you are prepared for it. What attracted you to this company? The more specific, the better. Generic answers (“I love investing”) get minus points. Specific answers win.

Stalk (Non-Creepily!)

If you know who you will be interviewing with, spend time learning about their background and experience. Identify potential bonding areas (e.g. same alma mater, similar interests or hobbies, etc.). This prior knowledge may help you connect more deeply.

Seek Warm Intros

Warm intros and references are the holy grail of a competitive hiring process. Scan your networks for any connections to a company (yes, LinkedIn is actually useful for something!). If you find any that are close enough, use them. The smallest edge can help!

Blend Deference & Confidence

Show deference to your interviewer, but not at the expense of confidence. The power dynamics of an interview are nuanced. Blending deference and confidence is how you manage them effectively and leave the interviewer with a positive impression.

Play to Your Strengths

Don’t fight on an even playing field. If you have unique attributes or competitive advantages, use them. Played a team sport? Talk about it! Taught yourself to code? Hype that up! Humility is great, but make sure they know what makes you special!

Show Your Passion

Showing a genuine passion and excitement for the company and role is the easiest way to stand out from the crowd. People want to hire candidates that want to be there. So smile, express your excitement (calmly!), and let that passion shine through.

Carry a Notebook

When you go to an interview, always bring a notebook. It’s not just pageantry - use it. If something comes up that is interesting or requires a follow up, make a point of writing it down. It shows attentiveness. Interviewers notice these little things.

Personalized Thank Yous

After an interview, always send a thank you note to the interviewer. Make them punchy (so that...

Every year on my birthday (January 5), I like to conduct some interesting exercise that will push me to grow in a new way. This year, I asked a number of 90-year-olds a simple question: "If you could speak your 32-year-old self, what advice would you give?"

The responses were...incredible. They range from fun, playful, and witty to deeply moving. I'd encourage you to read through them with your loved ones and reflect on those that hit you the hardest.

The future feels wildly uncertain (and you don't need to look far to feel it). This is my open letter to anyone struggling to prepare for an uncertain future...

First, we need to scrap the old linear mindset (Plan, Execute) and replace it with an iterative mindset (Execute, Adapt).

In a 2012 interview, Amazon founder Jeff Bezos highlighted the importance of identifying what will stay the same in the future and building around that. Think of these timeless truths as your Lighthouse, and the skills that remain relevant are your Lighthouse Skills.

Focus on the lighthouse.

•••

My book has sold 200,000+ copies around the world and has been a NYT Bestseller for 7 consecutive weeks since launch.

If you've been wanting a copy (or are looking to gift copies to family or friends), there's a big 30% sale. Now’s a great time to get it.

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Charlie Munger, an American investor most well-known as vice chairman of Berkshire Hathaway and Warren Buffett's partner, passed away last week at 99, just one month shy of his 100th birthday.

He was a treasure trove of wisdom—which he shared lavishly with the world over the course of his life, and which will create lasting ripples long after he is gone.

10 of his insights that created a lasting impact on my life: (1) The most valuable riches take time, (2) Avoid the second arrow, (3) Develop real knowledge, (4) Success follows interest, (5) Invert, always invert, (6) Avoid the Ostrich Effect, (7) Never mimic the herd, (8) Create a "too hard" pile, (9) Live what you want to receive, and (10) Wisdom compounds.

Question: What is one positive decision you can make to improve yourself today?

Framework: Leaves, Branches, & Roots

Question: What lie have I repeated to myself so many times that it feels like the truth?

Framework: Laundry Cycle Theory.

Warren Buffett once said, "Be fearful when others are greedy and greedy when others are fearful."

Everyone loves to repeat it, but it's much easier to repeat the quote during calm seas than it is to live by the quote during storms.

This article is about how you operate in the storms—an open letter on the most important human trait: Courage.

Courage is defined at the testing point. The life you want is on the other side of the testing point you've been avoiding.

•••

My book has sold 200,000+ copies around the world and is a 7x NYT Bestseller.

If you've been wanting a copy (or are looking to gift copies to family or friends), there's a big 30% sale. Now’s a great time to get it.

Order The Book Now!

I just co-hosted a retreat for a small group of very successful entrepreneurs in Cabo, Mexico. The explicit goal of the retreat was to help work through a big challenge facing each attendee.

My goal is to “bring you into the room” so that you can feel the impact of the experience in your own careers and lives.

With that in mind, this piece shares my 9 non-obvious learnings from the retreat.

Question: What sacrifices are you willing to make to get the things you want?

Framework: Winston's Star

Harsh truth: Networking is dead...at least in the traditional sense of the word.\

I'm not a natural relationship builder. In fact, I am a bit introverted and socially-anxious, particularly in large group settings like conferences, cocktail parties, and events. And yet, I've built a depth and breadth of connections that has brought me great joy and value over the years.

This piece shares my four core "anti-networking" principles that anyone can use: (1) Find Value-Aligned Rooms, (2) Ask Engaging Questions, (3) Become a Level 2-3 Listener, and (4) Use Creative Follow-Ups.