Some thoughts on life and entrepreneurship:

Less misery and failure
​Curate who and what you spend time on/with

Happiness ​
Step 1 - ask: do I live in the past or the future?

Alternative: am I driven by fear of loss or hope of opportunity?

Fearful: extrapolating past failures
Hopeful: iterating on past failures

My observation and reading: generally the former are unhappy, the latter happy.

Step 2 - realize that every moment and encounter is a once-in-a-lifetime occurrence.

Mindset
​Nothing NEEDS to be done. Every moment is opportunity cost.

Focused, sustained effort is most valuable. Do what energy and curiosity allow, then maximize intensity and duration.

Empty schedules best enable progress.

Productivity
​A clear calendar creates a clear mind. A task list is a substitute for working memory.

Meaning: there’s more to remember than the mind is designed for and a sign that switching costs have entered your life.

When you don’t have to write down anything, you have clarity of mind and purpose. There’s 1 (or very few) things to focus on.

Focus enables speed. Speed accelerates progress.

Protect your calendar and ditch your notebook. Pursue single-mindedness.

Entrepreneurship
​Think like a co-owner. Treat prospects like soulmates. If unable, don’t approach.

Don’t follow hype. Instead, be an early adopter or a late mover (when sustainability is proven and best practices established).

Anything in the middle is dangerous: it’s unproven (fad or trend?) and you let the market, instead of your crusade and evangelists’ wishes, dictate your actions.

Long-term thinking beats short-term trends.

Startup start
1. What’s my crusade?
2. What’s the transformation?
3. Who are the A+ rebels?
4. Where’s the attention arbitrage?

Startup mentality
​Solve what others find too difficult, but has insane value.
Focus on the why/outcome, less on the what/how.
Best practices give average results. Use them as a benchmark, but do what’s cutting-edge, then employ extreme leverage.
Move quickly: narrow the scope and tackle the constraint.
Set an hourly rate and outsource/partner the rest.

Insight
​Speed pays.

And it enables everything else: quality (feedback), trust and reputation, lower costs and prices (margins & moat).

Always be looking to increase speed.

Question
​Does this (1) add value to my clients or (2) my ability to add value to clients?

If not, it’s a distraction and should be minimized. If yes, pick the most difficult and ship in 1 day ~ 1 week. (Speed and feedback create quality. Difficulty creates a moat.)

Reading
“How do you read 12+ books/month?” someone asked.

1. Make time for it
2. I’ve been reading for many years. Every year I read more. I’m not a faster reader, just a better one. I skim-read LQ; I deep-read HQ.

Introspection
​I love being alone, I dislike working alone.
Peace fuels my learning, others’ energy fuels my labour.

Day 68 (almost) finished. 472 to go.

Love,

Jim