Our default setting is to treat the relationship between moods and actions as unidirectional. Moods, after all, affect actions.
A big part of growing up is realizing that the relationship is bi-directional. The actions we take can change our moods.
Hiding behind a bad mood or a lack of inspiration is just that.. hiding.
Someone we know in India received an job offer from an acquaintance in the Middle East to work at a Skyspring hotel in New York. They needed to front $600 for the visa and he’d received instructions via an email.
They come from a modest background (his mother is a cook) and she asked my mother to help check if this was a real job – $600 is a lot of money after all. The “pay upfront to get this job” rang all kinds of alarm bells. But, it was hard to dismiss it outright since it came from someone they knew.
And, it didn’t help that Google had a very convincing looking card show up on search.
Of course, it all unravels the moment you spend more than a minute investigating. The hotel has no trace on Tripadvisor or Booking.com and the phone number doesn’t work. The email has a few typos (why do scammers not get that right?), was sketchy on details of the work visa, and it came from a questionable looking “@consultant.com” email address.
All in all, it was more sophisticated than the traditional Nigerian prince scam and it could have fooled someone who wasn’t discerning. I think the Google card was the most convincing piece of the scam and I couldn’t find a way to flag it on my phone (I found it on my laptop and did so).
It did get me thinking about how important it is to design products with scam/bad actor use cases in mind. It isn’t enough to just think of the happy path.
An savvy investor colleague recommended “On My Radar” – a newsletter by a fund manager called Steve Blumenthal. It’s been a positive Friday read over the past 6 months for two reasons.
First, Steve shares a nice summary on his take on where we are at in the boom-bust cycle and what he’s taking away from analysis in his firm or elsewhere. That summary alone is educational.
Second, he shares a synthesis of 3-4 key pieces of analysis he’d like us to pay attention to. I only read this section from time to time. But, whenever I do, I’m not disappointed.
I don’t spend much time thinking or worrying about the markets. There was a brief period last year when I did as I was experimenting with some active stock investing. I realized quickly that I don’t enjoy it one bit and have automated the process. That said, I do like to have a pulse on what is going on. And, “On My Radar” does a great job helping me do that.
Here are the archives in case you are interested. If you do sign up, I hope you find it useful.
One of my favorite pieces of advice on writing is from a post by Seth that ended with – “Write like you talk. Often.”
In drawing parallels with speaking (we don’t get talker’s block), he makes the case that the best way to write better is to write more. Even if we start by writing poorly, the process of doing more of it will push us to become clearer and crisper over time.
I was mulling the flip side of this piece of advice recently. Just as internalizing the “Write like you talk. Often” idea might do us good, what if we also internalized “Talk like you write. Intentionally?”
There’s often a lot of wisdom in the middle path.
A friend shared a note about a former manager – “The best thing about him was that I never had to advocate for my work. He went out of his way to make sure my work was elevated and that I got the credit and recognition for it.”
That is a powerful testimonial.
The interesting thing about this note is that this needn’t be about managers at all.
For example, it made me reflect about the folks we work with cross-functionally. Do we go out of our way to make sure they get the credit and recognition for their work?
If not, what would it take for us to change that?
A few weeks ago, I’d shared a blog post/podcast series by investor Naval Ravikant on the topic of wealth. The final post of the series was on today and it was a keeper.
There were two powerful notes in the post. The first was – “A calm mind, a fit body and a house full of love. These things can not be bought. They must be earned.”
And, the second was – “To me, the ultimate purpose of money (is) so you do not have to be in a specific place at a specific time doing anything you don’t want to do.”
These notes were a fitting ending to a thought provoking series on creating wealth by understanding the concept of leverage, building valuable skills, and playing the long game. If you haven’t gotten to it yet, I’d highly recommend it.
A first step to delivering consistent good performance is understanding what good looks like.
Read the right book/post or ask folks who know for help.
All the effort in the world won’t save us if we skip that step.
The best thing we can do is to solve the problem.
Sometimes, however, solving the problem is outside our control. In these situations, the best thing we can do is find the problem – i.e., provide clarity on the nature of the problem and surface the issues that led to the problem in the first place.
Complaining, it turns out, is never the right answer.
That energy is always best redirected to one of the above.
I think of two paragraphs on Attention from Eric Weiner’s book – “The Geography of Bliss” – from time to time.
“Attention’ is an underrated word. It doesn’t get the… well, the attention it deserves. We pay homage to love, and happiness, and, God knows, productivity, but rarely do we have anything good to say about attention. We’re too busy, I suspect. Yet our lives are empty and meaningless without attention.
My two-year-old daughter fusses at my feet as I type these words. What does she want? My love? Yes, in a way, but what she really wants is my attention. Pure, undiluted attention. Children are expert at recognizing counterfeit attention. Perhaps love and attention are really the same thing. One can’t exist without the other.”
The quote “show me your schedule and I’ll show you your priorities” has the right idea. Our schedule is a reflection of what we pay attention to.
What are we paying attention to today?
“My wife made a crucial difference during those two years I spent teaching at Hampden (and washing sheets at New Franklin Laundry during the summer vacation). If she had suggested that the time I spent writing stories on the front porch of our rented house on Pond Street or in the laundry room of our rented trailer on Klatt Road in Hermon was wasted time, I think a lot of the heard would have gone out of me.
Tabby never voiced a single doubt, however. Her supposed was a constant, one of the few good things I could take as a given. And whenever I see a first novel dedicated to a wife (or a husband), I smile and think, There’s someone who knows. Writing is a lonely job. Having someone who believes in you makes a lot of difference. They don’t have to make speeches. Just believing is usually enough.” | Stephen King in “On Writing”
Solo pursuits like writing are undoubtedly lonely. But, so are most journeys when we come to think of it. We’re in it, for the most part, alone. And, people who believe in us through these journeys – parents, spouses, siblings, friends – make more of a difference than they often realize.
As King rightly says, “they don’t have to make speeches. Just believing is usually enough.”
We feel it when they believe in us.
Just as others feel it when we believe in them.
Here’s to celebrating both in our lives.
A Learning a Day 