FS | BRAIN FOOD
Welcome to Brain Food, a weekly newsletter full of timeless ideas to help you in life and business.
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You're Only As Good As Your Worst Day —
We tend to measure performance by what happens when things are going well. Yet how people, organizations, companies, leaders, and other things do on their best day isn't all that instructive. To find the truth, we need to look at what happens on the worst day.
The Great Mental Models —
Physical copies of The Great Mental Models are back on Amazon.com just in time for Christmas. While they still haven't turned on prime shipping there are 1000s of copies available in the warehouses. Check out volume one and volume two.
Learn about the Semiconductor Industry —
We released the members only episode we did on Semiconductors on Youtube. These are topic specific special episodes designed to get you up to speed on an industry or topic. The feedback has been off the charts. The next one on AI comes out in January. This one won't be public. You'll have to sign up if you want to hear it.
Your suggestions for the best books of 2020.
TKP #98 Sahil Lavingia — Observing the Present
Sahil Lavingia is the founder and CEO of Gumroad, an online marketplace for creators. In this conversation Sahil and I cover building a billion dollar business, the most critical skills for success, how he hires, his worst mistake, the patterns of success and failure and so much more.
(Apple | Spotify | FS | or get a transcript).
EXPLORE YOUR CURIOSITY
"There are some kinds of work that you can't do well without thinking differently from your peers. To be a successful scientist, for example, it's not enough just to be correct. Your ideas have to be both correct and novel. You can't publish papers saying things other people already know. You need to say things no one else has realized yet."
— How to Think for Yourself
"In the 20th century, scientists sought out the building blocks of reality: the molecules, atoms and elementary particles out of which all matter is made; the cells, proteins and genes that make life possible; the bits, algorithms and networks that form the foundation of information and intelligence, both human and artificial. This century, instead, we will begin to explore all there is to be made with these building blocks."
— The End of Physics
"Play has significant cognitive, emotional, and social benefits for elementary school children. Periods of play at school help students to focus, build friendships, improve mood, work cooperatively, and work through conflict without adult intervention"
— Advocating for Play (starts on page 229)
A brief explanation of protein folding.
A QUOTE TO THINK ABOUT
"Recognizing that people's reactions don't belong to you is the only sane way to create. If people enjoy what you've created, terrific. If people ignore what you've created, too bad. If people misunderstand what you've created, don't sweat it. And what if people absolutely hate what you've created? What if people attack you with savage vitriol, and insult your intelligence, and malign your motives, and drag your good name through the mud? Just smile sweetly and suggest – as politely as you possibly can – that they go make their own fucking art. Then stubbornly continue making yours."
— Elizabeth Gilbert
WHAT I'M READING
Beyond Entrepreneurship 2.0 — I'm a huge fan of Jim Collins. He writes with a rare clarity. We covered a lot of the concepts covered in our podcast but the insights we missed are perhaps more important. Jim wrote the first version of the book with Bill Lazier, who was the closest thing to a Father that Jim had. The first quarter of the book contains the moral lessons that Lazier taught Jim around relationships, generosity, trust, and why we often confuse living a long life with living a good life. These lessons changed Jim's trajectory. Occasionally as we're driving, we need to clean the windows. Not because we don't know what's outside but so we can see better. Books like this one offer the same benefits — cleaning off the gunk that inevitably gets in the way of clarity.
TINY THOUGHT
Reading speed is nothing more than signalling. Skim broadly to find something worth reading. Then dive in slowly and deeply.
It's not how fast you read but what you absorb that matters.
| Sponsored by MetaLab |
MetaLab has helped some of the world's top companies and entrepreneurs build products that millions of people use every day. You probably didn't realize it at the time, but odds are you've used an app that they've helped design or build. Apps like Slack, Uber Eats, Facebook Messenger, Coinbase, and many more. Let them take your product idea and turn it into the next big thing. Check them out at metalab.co
Stay safe and I'll see you next week,
Shane
P.S. You can easily gift a subscription to the podcast or the learning community.
P.S.S. As many of you know, I'm involved in another venture called Syrus Partners. One of our investments, 8020 beautifully simplified, rebranded, and rebuilt the whole Syrus site in just a few days. If you need to get a web project moving quickly, reach out and tell them Shane sent you. Or reply to this email and I'll directly intro you to Matt, their CEO.
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