mindsets

An excellent work of philosophy exploring our underlying anxiety caused by the ultimate freedom afforded to us by modern living, and our desire to escape that freedom for a more comfortable life.

In markets and life

The knowledge of a carpenter is in his hands. The apprentice must work with his own to discover it. Here is some terrible advice: “If you can't explain it to a 6-year-old, you don't understand it yourself.”

Our lives are full of decisions, and bad ones can lead to regret. New Scientist helps you make up your mind

“Character, like a photograph, develops in darkness.” — Yousuf Karsh

David shares a compilation of the best links from his newsletter Friday Finds. Read here.

Plus! The Carbon Rally; The Bridge; Housing and Rates; Full Stack Media; Buying Out Contracts; Diff Jobs

​ ​ ​ Wisdom for the end of the year Instead of a regular edition, here's a holiday special, featuring seven of the most powerful snippets I've added recently to my digital equi...

It's the great everything and the great nothing.

To fully embrace the joy of missing out and choose to do the things that make us happy, we need to better understand what’s driving our fear of missing out.

by Carrie Moyer A couple years ago I found myself drifting away from a close friend because I realized that he always made me feel weirdly… judged. Not in the sense that I did anything to upset him, but because it felt like he was always assessing everything around him to see if it conformed to his standard of good taste

Thiel defines secrets as important truths about the world that other people don’t yet realize.

If you open a roadside motel, expect that tired and demanding budget travelers will arrive. If you run a fancy restaurant, don’t be surprised if people will angle and cajole and lie to get a …

Listen now (10 min) | Abstraction & synthesis of the most transformative year of my life

The most liberating aspect for me of writing emails rather than tweets is the natural limit on topics I might be tempted to have a take on. When I was primarily writing tweets, I could easily involve myself in a dozen topics in a day. HERE'S A TAKE, THERE'S A TAKE, TAKE THAT! With email, it's a sliver of that. But it goes even deeper t...

The Paradox of Reading: The books you read will profoundly change you even though you’ll forget the vast majority of what you read. The Paradox of Writing: Great writing looks effortless. But because the ideas are so clear, casual readers don’t appreciate how much time it took to refine them. The Paradox of Creativity: Your

Watch on YouTube   Something that has always fascinated me is the concept of a Polymath or Renaissance Man, or a person who has many talents and knowledge in multiple domains. One of the modern day polymaths I’ve learned the most from is Josh Waitzkin. When it comes to touching excellence in multiple domains Josh... Read More

Six Spokes Theory shows that we can’t neglect important areas of life if we want to live optimally. This requires making tough choices

There’s a profound moment in Episode V of Star Wars in the midst of Luke Skywalker’s jedi training. After trying to get his ship out of the water with the force, Luke gives up (“I…

A summary of Paul Graham’s 200+ essays. This is an introduction to his ideas on startups, writing, society, decision-making and more.

After many years of writing for big companies, a few universal truths have emerged from hundreds of projects, no matter the budget: Having a clear audience is critical for creation, promotion, and sales. Having a clear goal is existential for the project and ultimately the company. It’s rar

Here are John Maeda’s ten laws of and three keys to simplicity. Ten laws Reduce The simplest way to achieve simplicity is through thoughtful reduction. Organize Organization makes a system of many appear fewer. Time Savings in time feel like simplicity.

Listen now (10 min) | 20+ powerful paradoxes on growth, business, investing, and life

Remove any ambiguity by eliminating 7 from the classic 10 point rating scale. Next time you ask someone to rate on a scale of 1 to 10...

Why you shouldn't guilt yourself for eating that donut.