Brain Food – No. 576 – May 12, 2024
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Welcome to Brain Food, a weekly newsletter full of timeless ideas and insights you can use in life and work. (Read the archives).
FS
“A break and time spent not working are very different. One fosters focus, and the other snaps it.”
Insights
“It’s not that we don’t have time. It’s that we don’t have time for the things that are really important. There’s always enough time to do what’s really important, but we get caught up doing things that aren’t important.”
— Larry Winget
“I prefer things that are better when bought used. There are some things that get worse when they get a little use, and others that get better, and I prefer the latter. Books, houses, furniture, paintings, pottery.”
— Paul Graham
“A mother’s arms are more comforting than anyone else’s.”
— Princess Diana
Tiny Thoughts
“Consistency is the reward.”
“It can be difficult to appreciate how much simply avoiding the standard ways of failing dramatically increases the odds of success.”
“Winning without luck requires doing ordinary things for an extraordinary amount of time.”
TKP Podcast
Kevin Kelly on the value of deadlines:
“It took me a long time to figure out that I needed deadlines. Deadlines were the difference between a dream and something that you complete. And what happens with deadlines is that you’ve got to ship, you have to abandon the project, and it’s not perfect. Because it’s not perfect, you kind of have to be ingenious about making it a little different. And I find that the deadlines force me to make decisions that you don’t have enough time [for]; you never have enough time. And so you think of something to—I wouldn’t say it’s a shortcut—you think of a way to finish it, and those little decisions are what make it a little different.”
— Listen to this episode on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or watch on YouTube.
Etc.
I’ve been reading Benjamin Roth’s The Great Depression: A Diary, and I was repeatedly struck by his timeless insights. The diary is a real-time account of the great depression. Here is one of my many highlights:
“People look upon the stock market as a place to gamble and not to invest. In times of rising market the average American becomes over-optimistic: he invests his whole capital in common stocks of the most speculative variety; often extends himself on margin. Then when a slump comes he finds himself over-extended; no cash reserve to fall back upon; he becomes unduly pessimistic and sells at a loss.”
+ Members can read the rest of my highlights in the learning community.
Thanks for reading,
— Shane
P.S. When two masters meet.
P.P.S. It’s almost summer. These are the best no-show socks.
P.P.P.S. Happy Mother’s Day to all the incredible moms out there. Including mine. (Hi Mom!!)