I’ve been having several conversations recently about purpose and meaning, so I thought it was time for me to write a blog post to try to sort out my own fuzzy thoughts on the subject. What does it mean to have a purpose? Do we all have to have a purpose? Do people with a […]
Give and Take, by Adam Grant
Amazon link Book website Adam Grant’s TED talk on the subject Vince Lombardi, the famous football coach for whom the Super Bowl trophy is named, once said that “Nice guys finish last”. Adam Grant did a study to see how successful people were who habitually sacrificed themselves for others…and confirmed that a disproportionate number of […]
Overlap!
I’ve mentioned Overlap several times in this blog over the last five years, and I’ve always meant to do a more in-depth post about it, and it’s finally time to do that. The occasion of this post is that I attended my fifth Overlap retreat over Memorial Day weekend, and not only did I attend, […]
Abandoning The Island
In the first weekend of my coaching class, they discussed three meta-narratives that permeate Western society, and yet are toxic and corrosive. They were: Performativity: something has value only if it can measurably achieve a desired result The Inner Critic: the feeling that “there’s something deeply wrong with me”, which I’ve mentioned a couple times […]
Small steps lead to big change
Continuing along the theme of the doubt tax, I’ve talked with several people over the past year who are looking for the secret to effectively change their lives. One example is people who want to change careers, and are looking for the secret to writing the right resume or learning the interview secrets that will […]
What problem is your product solving?
I’ve given the same advice to a few different people over the past year, which generally means it’s time for me to write up that advice as a blog post. In this case, what I have been telling entrepreneurs is that they don’t have a business until they are addressing a problem that people will […]
Personal Operating System
Building on my post yesterday about deliberate practice, I’ve been using a technique over the past year to practice certain behaviors, which is called a “personal operating system”. I learned of this technique from Maria Andersen last year, and she later wrote it up as a blog post. The idea is to come up with […]
Peak, by Anders Ericsson
Amazon link Deliberate practice is an ongoing theme for me these days, as that growth mindset drives much of my belief in my ability to improve at things I used to think were genetic and unchangeable. Deliberate practice is mentioned in several books I have read, like The Talent Code and So Good They Can’t […]
The doubt tax
Once or twice a year, somebody posts to the biking list I follow asking how one learns to do long climbs such as Page Mill Road, the 2,000 foot vertical climb up to Skyline Blvd. And they are always disappointed to hear the answer is “You just do it.” There isn’t a secret or a […]
So Good They Can’t Ignore You, by Cal Newport
Amazon link “Follow your passion!” is common career advice. Cal Newport thinks that is a terrible idea, and explains why in this book. He observes that following your passion will not succeed as a career move unless you have something that will differentiate you from everybody else following their passion. As he puts it, The […]
