Hurricane Sandy has been a pretty thought provoking experience. Some of things that have occupied my mind over the past 2 weeks:
I’m so incredibly fortunate that family, friends, and colleagues are safe.
We are not in control, no matter how hard we try to be.
Times of desperation bring out the best in some people. They also bring out the worst in others.
Amidst the power outages and abandonment of common conveniences, I was reminded of a rampant epidemic amongst our generation: many of us hate isolated, directive thinking. In this instance, I’m referring to dedicating time to just think about something without the presence of external stimuli like media, work, or the vortex of distraction commonly known as the Iphone.
We’re so incredibly …
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I’ve learned a lot from New York entrepreneur Vin Vacanti through his blog “How to Make it As A First Time Entrepreneur“. Recently he wrote a post on advice he would have given himself 5 years ago. It’s a great read that I suggest you check out.
Vin’s post inspired me to do some reflecting on my own journey. Here’s 10 things I wish I knew before entering the workforce 2 years ago:
Nothing is more valuable than a mentor. When anyone young approaches me for career advice, I tell them to find the person whose best at what they want to get good at and go work for them – assuming you’re simpatico of course. I’m all about baptism by fire – but …
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My belief is that most (not all) successful consumer web products do an excellent job of feeding your ego, saving you money, or saving you time. I was taking a look at some of my most popular posts and noticed a clear trend that is in alignment with this thesis; at a high level, the most popular blog posts are shortcuts. They save readers time.
Originally I noticed that many popular posts contained a personal anecdote as part of a non-obvious, overarching insight. Posts fashioned in this way are like cliffnotes to writers’ lives.
But even these posts can be encapsulated under the more ubiquitous theme of shortcuts:
Stories or Perscriptions that Contain a Personal Anecdote – a shortcut to wisdom forged over …
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Frequently I’ve felt my inability to code has hampered my ability to do many things. I’ve had so many ideas I’d love to test. IF ONLY I COULD CODE.
Fueled by frustration, 8 months ago I started teach myself PHP. I wanted to be able to rapidly prototype ideas and have a better grasp of what was going on underneath the hood of my project Sfter.
Bogged down by other obligations, I stopped after 2 months. Albeit short, my quest was not a total failure. I left with a better understanding of technology and high level development concepts. Still, I was bummed I never reached …
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Two things that I love are learning and businesses that create surplus from uncaptured value. A space that particularly intrigues me is the Knowledge Economy.
So much of the incredible knowledge that people have gained through experience lies dormant. People always want to improve, gather more data points, and find things faster so there is a continuous demand for this knowledge. The supply is equally abundant: Odds are someone else has done what you’re trying to do or found what you’re trying to find. Yet despite someone really smart inventing the internet, there is still a disconnect between knowledge supply and demand. I attribute this to the fact that the channels through which knowledge is exchanged are still not fully matured …
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Its been just over 2 months since I’ve started carrying a small moleskin notebook everywhere I go.
I have it on me at all times to record ideas, thoughts/themes I want to remember, and action items. This practice has been profoundly enriching and I’m proud to say I’ve devoured 2 1/2 full books over this time period. In the process, I’ve made a few observations about the practice that I’d like to share:
Creating Room to Think
One of the amazing things about using a moleskin to capture fleeting thoughts, is that you give yourself permission to stop focusing on something. Often we think of something that we don’t want to forget and spend an unnecessary amount of time focusing on remembering it. This …
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One thing I’ve become increasingly cognizant of is that the intake of information is only part of an effective learning process. The greatest learning occurs when we actively apply our knowledge. This notion has been popularized by the phrase “learning is doing.”
One of the challenges we face as a race is that only a small percentage of people are poised to actively apply their knowledge to solve the world’s greatest problems: problems such as curing cancer or creating sustainable solutions to address the diminishing oil supply. It seems kind of odd that their is not a greater concentration of talent focused here considering the scale at which innovation can make humanity better off. This is not a call out, just …
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