Category: Expectations
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Three quotes on ordinariness
“We think that if only we get the big things right, everything will magically fall into place. If we choose to marry the right person, it’ll all be okay. If we choose the right career, we’ll be happy. If we pick the right investment, we’ll be rich. This wisdom is, at best, partially true. You…
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Positioning and patience
Maybe your positioning isn’t setting you up to be patient. There is a lot of power in focusing on the long-term. Jeff Bezos says to Wired: If everything you do needs to work on a three-year time horizon, then you’re competing against a lot of people. But if you’re willing to invest on a seven-year…
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Seth Godin, on expectations
In my research process for the next book, I’ve put together a long list of people who write about expectations. Seth stands out; he’s written several posts on the topic this year.
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Endurance
The ability to stick it out is criminally underrated. Not only will you outlast the competition, you will also gain an experience that demonstrates your ability—and bring it to the next thing you do.
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Practice as perpetuation
A couple of days ago, someone told me that they saw me using a portable monitor and decided to buy one for themselves. It’s just another reminder that people learn from each other and get energy and inspiration from each other. If you wish something was more widespread, the best thing you can do is…
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Never take offense that you have to negotiate
Here’s something I wish I knew a decade ago (or even just five years ago): This is the other huge mistake people make when they start negotiating. They take offense at what’s being offered because they feel it’s an unfair representation of what they’ve put in. Please understand this: negotiations are not personal. Again, I…
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To balance out overthinking, ask yourself, “How hard can it be?”
Recently, Acquired.fm asked Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang what company he would start today. Jensen says: “I wouldn’t do it, and the reason for that is really quite simple (ignoring the company that we would start—first of all, I’m not exactly sure). The reason why I wouldn’t do it—and it goes back to why it’s so…
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Keep faith in the end, accept inconvenient facts
I recently came across Admiral Jim Stockdale, who Jim Collins describes as, “the highest-ranking United States military officer in the “Hanoi Hilton” prisoner-of-war camp during the height of the Vietnam War. Tortured over twenty times during his eight-year imprisonment from 1965 to 1973, Stockdale lived out the war without any prisoner’s rights, no set release…
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The little poster that Steve Jobs made famous
Millions of people—including me—found out about the Whole Earth Catalog when Steve Jobs closed off his Stanford commencement speech with it. A new archive of it just went online, along with this ad that Steve quotes: Making memorable things. Share it with people. It’ll all be worth it somehow.
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The aspiration capability gap
When you’re one person, practicing creative work, and you’re constantly choosing between a creative factor and a commercial factor (that provides your livelihood), it can feel extremely unfair, and even downright torturous (see Costica Bradatan). One reminder: whether you are one person, or a thousand-person company, at any given point, there will always be a…