Brendan Rice

Dr. Julie Gurner on beating the odds:

“It's a lot easier than you think to 'beat the odds' because the odds are based on average people. Show up and elevate.”

Author and philosopher Eric Hoffer on adapting to change:

“In times of change, learners inherit the earth, while the learned find themselves beautifully equipped to deal with a world that no longer exists.”

The three lenses of opportunity cost: (1) Compared with what? (2) And then what? (3) At the expense of what?

***

Keep your distance from people who've made being wronged their identity. They're not looking for solutions, they're recruiting.

**

All the energy we spend trying to fix what's broken comes at the expense of making what already works unstoppable.

*

Everyone knows what works. Few do it after it stops being exciting.

Outliers act despite their feelings, not because of them.

What separates good work from great isn't talent but persistence.

The most successful people aren't those who feel motivated all the time; they're the ones who work even when they don't feel like it. Too often, waiting to feel ready means never starting.

What you find interesting is a better predictor of success than what you're good at.

Curiosity isn't random; it's a compass.

The most valuable skill isn't inspiration but the ability to work without it.

Roger Federer on the kind of talent you can practice: “Yes, talent matters. I’m not going to stand here and tell you it doesn’t. But talent has a broad definition. Most of the time, it’s not about having a gift. It’s about having grit. In tennis, like in life, discipline is also a talent. And so is patience. Trusting yourself is a talent. Embracing the process—loving the process—is a talent. Managing your life, managing yourself. These can be talents, too. Some people are born with them. Everybody has to work at them.”

The quicker you want something, the easier it is to manipulate you.

Peter Cundhill on finding the right fit for talent:

“You can teach a donkey to climb a tree but it's easier to hire a squirrel.”

The clearer you are about your priorities, the easier it is to say no.

Life goal. Find someone who looks at you the way @juliedrybrough.bsky.social looks at @fionamcbride.bsky.social when she’s facilitating #T5S1 #LT25uk

Anaïs Nin on why your world grows or shrinks with your nerve:

“Life shrinks or expands according to one's courage.”

What you're taught isn’t always what matters.

"You want two things:

1. Simplicity, simplicity, simplicity. No wasted movement. No wasted effort.

2. Compounding. Every project should have a long runway and feed the others"

Remain playful as your responsibilities increase. It's easy to become serious when people and results depend on you, but nearly everyone's performance improves when they proceed lightly through the world

Banker and archaeologist John Lubbock on the value of downtime:

"Rest is not idleness, and to lie sometimes on the grass under trees on a summer's day, listening to the murmur of the water, or watching the clouds float across the sky, is by no means a waste of time."

There are no level playing fields, only better players

On balance: Spend a handful of hours a day going fast. Crush a gym session. Do deep work on a project you care about. Spend the rest of the day going slow. Take walks. Read books. Get a long dinner with friends. Either way, avoid the anxious middle where you never truly relax or truly move forward.

"To create, one must first question everything. Never adopt someone else's conclusion without putting it to the test of your own reasoning and imagination." - Eileen Gray

The end result of this is slowness, unthoughtful risk aversion, failure to experiment sufficiently, and consequently diminished invention. We’ll have to figure out how to fight that tendency.”

Source: Amazon Shareholder Letter, 2015

Type 2 decisions can and should be made quickly by high-judgment individuals or small groups. As organizations get larger, there seems to be a tendency to use the heavy-weight Type 1 decision-making process on most decisions, including many Type 2 decisions.

But most decisions aren’t like that – they are changeable, reversible – they’re two-way doors. If you’ve made a suboptimal Type 2 decision, you don’t have to live with the consequences for that long. You can reopen the door and go back through.

If you walk through and don’t like what you see on the other side, you can’t get back to where you were before. We can call these Type 1 decisions.

The simple framework Jeff Bezos used to make faster decisions at Amazon: 🔀🎯

“Some decisions are consequential and irreversible or nearly irreversible – one-way doors – and these decisions must be made methodically, carefully, slowly, with great deliberation and consultation.

"The world is big, but industries are small.

After a few years, everyone comes to know the quality of your work.

Reputation matters."

When accessing all information is common, paying attention to important information is rare.