Complexity and jargon are used to mask a lack of deep 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, they probably don’t understand it.
A “razor” is a rule of thumb that simplifies decision making.
The most powerful razors I’ve found:
Complexity and jargon are used to mask a lack of deep 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, they probably don’t understand it.
When choosing between two paths, choose the path that has a larger luck surface area.
Your actions put you in a position where luck is more likely to strike.
It’s hard to get lucky watching TV at home—it’s easy to get lucky when you’re engaging and learning.
When faced with two paths, choose the path that puts you in the arena.
It's easy to throw rocks from the sidelines.
It's scary and lonely in the arena—but it's where growth happens.
Once you're in the arena, never take advice from people on the sidelines.
When choosing who to spend time with, prioritize spending more time with optimists.
Pessimists see closed doors. Optimists see open doors—and probably kick down the closed doors along the way.
Remember: Pessimists sound smart, optimists get rich.
When in doubt, choose to show MORE gratitude to the people who have mentored or supported you.
Say thank you more. Tell someone you appreciate them.
Not just on special occasions—every single day.
Lean into gratitude daily and your life will improve.
When deciding whether to take on a new project:
First, ask yourself if it's a "hell yes!" opportunity.
If not, say no.
If it is, imagine that it's going to take 2x as long and be 1/2 as profitable as you expect.
If you still want to do it, say yes.
When faced with two options, choose the one that’s more difficult in the short-term.
@naval calls this making "uphill decisions”—a forced override of your pain avoidance instinct.
It's worth it—short-term pain creates compounding long-term gain.
Time is either *invested* or *spent*.
Invested time—actions that compound:
• Reading
• Physical activity
• Mindfulness
• Relationship building
Spent time—actions that don’t.
When choosing what to do, prioritize investing time, not spending it.
If you have a choice between entering two rooms, choose the room where you're more likely to be the dumbest one in the room.
Once you're in the room, talk less and listen more.
Bad for your ego—great for your growth.
When you're weighing alternative explanations for something, the one with the fewest necessary assumptions should be chosen.
Put simply, the simplest explanation is often the best one.
Simple Assumptions > Complex Assumptions.
Simple is beautiful.
If you encounter someone with opinions or perspectives very different from your own, listen twice as much as you speak.
Our natural tendency when we hear a view we disagree with is to respond and refute it.
Default to Listen Mode. You'll learn way more that way.
If you have the choice, always choose to sprint and then rest.
Most people are not wired to work 9-5—long periods of steady, monotonous work.
If your goal is to do inspired, creative work, you have to work like a lion.
Sprint when inspired. Rest. Repeat.
If your smartest friends are all interested in something, it’s worth paying attention to.
If that something seems crazy, it's worth paying a lot of attention to.
The passions of the smartest people in your circles are a looking glass into the future.
Make decisions that your 80-year old self and 10-year-old self would be proud of.
Your 80-year-old self cares about the long-term compounding of the decisions of today.
Your 10-year-old self reminds you to stay foolish and have some fun along the way.
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 observing their habitual actions and characteristics.
When someone tells you who they are, believe them the first time.
Never attribute to malice that which can be adequately explained by stupidity.
In assessing someone's actions, we shouldn't assume negative intent if there's a viable alternative explanation—different beliefs, lack of intelligence, incompetence, or ignorance.
Anything asserted without evidence can be dismissed without evidence.
Newton’s Flaming Laser Sword
If something cannot be settled by reasonable experiment or observation, it's not worth debating.
*These will save you from wasting time on pointless arguments!*
"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 are earned—not owed.
If you can't state state the opposition's argument clearly, you haven't earned an opinion.
If you're struggling to understand something, try writing it out.
When you write, you expose the gaps that exist in your logic and thinking.
Study to fill the gaps.
Writing is the ultimate tool to sharpen thinking--use it as a "knife block" for life.
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.
Truly successful people rarely feel the need to brag about their success.
If someone regularly brags about their wealth or success, it's fair to assume the reality is likely a small fraction of what they claim.
When deciding what to read, just read whatever grabs you.
When it stops grabbing you, put it down.
Avoid the trap of only reading “impressive" books that bore you to death.
Never establish reading vanity metrics as goals.
Too many people take on stress that has no upside.
If something is going to be stressful, consider whether the reward is sufficiently outsized to justify the stress.
If it isn't, don't take it on.
Follow me @SahilBloom for more writing on growth, decision making, and more.
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1/ Some initial thoughts on personal moats:
Like company moats, your personal moat should be a competitive advantage that is not only durable—it should also compound over time.
Characteristics of a personal moat below:
2/ Like a company moat, you want to build career capital while you sleep.
As Andrew Chen noted:
3/ You don’t want to build a competitive advantage that is fleeting or that will get commoditized
Things that might get commoditized over time (some longer than
4/ Before the arrival of recorded music, what used to be scarce was the actual music itself — required an in-person artist.
After recorded music, the music itself became abundant and what became scarce was curation, distribution, and self space.
5/ Similarly, in careers, what used to be (more) scarce were things like ideas, money, and exclusive relationships.
In the internet economy, what has become scarce are things like specific knowledge, rare & valuable skills, and great reputations.
Like company moats, your personal moat should be a competitive advantage that is not only durable—it should also compound over time.
Characteristics of a personal moat below:
I'm increasingly interested in the idea of "personal moats" in the context of careers.
— Erik Torenberg (@eriktorenberg) November 22, 2018
Moats should be:
- Hard to learn and hard to do (but perhaps easier for you)
- Skills that are rare and valuable
- Legible
- Compounding over time
- Unique to your own talents & interests https://t.co/bB3k1YcH5b
2/ Like a company moat, you want to build career capital while you sleep.
As Andrew Chen noted:
People talk about \u201cpassive income\u201d a lot but not about \u201cpassive social capital\u201d or \u201cpassive networking\u201d or \u201cpassive knowledge gaining\u201d but that\u2019s what you can architect if you have a thing and it grows over time without intensive constant effort to sustain it
— Andrew Chen (@andrewchen) November 22, 2018
3/ You don’t want to build a competitive advantage that is fleeting or that will get commoditized
Things that might get commoditized over time (some longer than
Things that look like moats but likely aren\u2019t or may fade:
— Erik Torenberg (@eriktorenberg) November 22, 2018
- Proprietary networks
- Being something other than one of the best at any tournament style-game
- Many "awards"
- Twitter followers or general reach without "respect"
- Anything that depends on information asymmetry https://t.co/abjxesVIh9
4/ Before the arrival of recorded music, what used to be scarce was the actual music itself — required an in-person artist.
After recorded music, the music itself became abundant and what became scarce was curation, distribution, and self space.
5/ Similarly, in careers, what used to be (more) scarce were things like ideas, money, and exclusive relationships.
In the internet economy, what has become scarce are things like specific knowledge, rare & valuable skills, and great reputations.
https://t.co/6cRR2B3jBE
Viruses and other pathogens are often studied as stand-alone entities, despite that, in nature, they mostly live in multispecies associations called biofilms—both externally and within the host.
https://t.co/FBfXhUrH5d
Microorganisms in biofilms are enclosed by an extracellular matrix that confers protection and improves survival. Previous studies have shown that viruses can secondarily colonize preexisting biofilms, and viral biofilms have also been described.
...we raise the perspective that CoVs can persistently infect bats due to their association with biofilm structures. This phenomenon potentially provides an optimal environment for nonpathogenic & well-adapted viruses to interact with the host, as well as for viral recombination.
Biofilms can also enhance virion viability in extracellular environments, such as on fomites and in aquatic sediments, allowing viral persistence and dissemination.
Viruses and other pathogens are often studied as stand-alone entities, despite that, in nature, they mostly live in multispecies associations called biofilms—both externally and within the host.
https://t.co/FBfXhUrH5d
Microorganisms in biofilms are enclosed by an extracellular matrix that confers protection and improves survival. Previous studies have shown that viruses can secondarily colonize preexisting biofilms, and viral biofilms have also been described.
...we raise the perspective that CoVs can persistently infect bats due to their association with biofilm structures. This phenomenon potentially provides an optimal environment for nonpathogenic & well-adapted viruses to interact with the host, as well as for viral recombination.
Biofilms can also enhance virion viability in extracellular environments, such as on fomites and in aquatic sediments, allowing viral persistence and dissemination.