Category: Creator Confidential
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Grass is greener syndrome
I originally heard the phrase, “Grass is greener syndrome,” from my friend Peter Kang, when I talked to him about this tweet: It’s easy to want to pick something new to do—a different ladder to climb, a different game, a new project or venture—because it seems easier. Better. More rewarding. Smarter. That’s why we want…
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Recent discussions of my work
It’s been a busy time here, I’m sifting through a lot of comments and ideas from one recent discussion of my work, and a research question I asked: Don’t think to write, write to think at Hacker News “Has a corporate engineering blog made you want to join the company?” at r/experienceddevs It’s been exciting—starting…
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Treat promoting your work as its own craft
u/AyanoNova asks, “How to get more confident in showing my art?” There are some really great responses in the thread—depersonalizing a person’s artistic identity from their work (i.e., don’t overidentify with it), and getting less precious about the work—I want to propose a third aspect: You get confident in showing your art by practicing showing…
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Flexible habits are stickier habits
If you want to do something every day, you’ll need to be flexible about it. If you want to work out every day, do it all times of day—and in all time slots of the day. Have a workout plan for when you have just a few minutes, or even one minute. That’s not to…
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“Financials are your best marketing tools”
Ferrari and Lamborghini have Formula 1 racing. Chanel and Louis Vuitton have runway shows. Visual artists have solo and group shows. Adidas and Nike have their various sports. Experts have conferences and speeches. Technology companies, and independent creators, have business performance. “We talked about how your financials are your best marketing tools,” says Regis McKenna,…
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Knocking on doors
How people find out about you matters a lot. Your current physician probably didn’t cold call you. You find good products and services through recommendations, media, and searches. Anyone who is cold calling you is implicitly telling you, “Not enough people trust me to do business with me yet.” That’s why cold calling is difficult.…
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Seek truth
If you’re an expert, your job isn’t to convince people to buy or do something. Your job is to see patterns, acquire information, and provide it to people in a concise and clear way. Seek truth through facts, expert opinions, surveys, anecdotes, and data. This doesn’t have to be complicated or cost even a single…
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Build the team
If you’re an entrepreneur, one of the highest leverage activities you can do is find good people to work with, build a good relationship, and keep working with them. You don’t need to be hiring full-time to start doing this. People can be available in all capacities, for all sorts of roles. (In fact, many…
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Find a ladder
Structure is great for giving people things to focus on and to channel their creative energy through. Structure is bad for constraining people and sucking away their motivation. It’s easy to either become too rigid with your structure, or to embody a swirl of chaotic energy. You need to know when to do what. One…
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“What if grinding is bad?”
A coach asked me this question in my late 20s. It was mind-blowing. At the time, I’d already read Trying Not to Try, and I was still soaking things in and slowly shifting my worldview. This question really accelerated the process. Some questions that counter-grinding question provoked: Wasn’t everything supposed to be a grind? If…