Longtime readers might know I enjoy and recommend a blog on retirement and financial independence called Mr. Money Mustache. The author there wrote a post on people who evaluate him by their standards and claim he isn’t really retired. He created a definition, quoted below, and said he was. As I said, I recommend his blog, but I think his choice of how to define “retirement” missed the point of[…] Keep reading →

I saw Dustin Hoffman speak on persistence and dedication to one’s craft by quoting Pablo Picasso. I loved it. He quoted Picasso as saying if someone took away his paints he would use pastels. If someone took away his pastels he’d use crayons. If he didn’t have crayons he’d use pencil on paper. If he didn’t have pencil and paper he’d spit on his finger and draw with the wetness[…] Keep reading →

I heard an interesting perspective on living in the moment and when to act. On the face of it the statement is simple, but if you keep thinking about it it gets more meaningful. Whenever you decide to do something, if you ever ask when it is, it will always be now. Every moment of your life is always now. No moment is anything other than now. When do you[…] Keep reading →

I’ve written about my models for how to motivate doing things you aren’t good at. Such skills are important in many fields, but especially so in leadership. More than having to motivate yourself to do things for the first time, you often have to motivate many others to do things they haven’t done. One is my practice of having low standards the first time I do something, which motivates doing[…] Keep reading →

I just read a post by a young entrepreneur called “About not owning sh*t” with a similar theme to some posts I wrote. On another forum I posted what I intend as constructive criticism. I applaud his lifestyle, but the post reminded me of an insightful joke. Q: How do you know when someone doesn’t have a TV? A: They tell you. Again, I like his decisions. I hope I[…] Keep reading →

Check out the abstract to a paper posted last month where the researchers created false memories in people. They gave participants made-up stories and pictures and asked people if they remembered them. About half the people “remembered” events that never happened. About a quarter “remembered” seeing the story on the news. People remembered stories that fit their political orientation better than ones that challenged them. The stories in this study[…] Keep reading →

I write a lot about models on this page. By model I mean a simplified representation of something for a purpose. I promote recognizing what models work and using those, and not dwelling on if the model is right or wrong or accurate or not. Sometimes I like using models that work despite being very wrong. For example, sometimes thinking men are from Mars and women are from Venus helps[…] Keep reading →

I wrote the following to a client and thought it was worth sharing here. I’ve written similar things before, but it bears repeating. I think it speaks for itself, but let me know if it needs more explanation or context. —————————– I find with passions you get out what you put in, so I think the advice to find your passion only gets half of it. You need to find[…] Keep reading →

It’s obvious, but still fun to say. Try it. Point out to a friend that you Tour de France as many times as Lance Armstrong. Why point this out? Credibility and reputation count for a lot in business and relationships in general. It seems to me that the credibility and reputations of people who don’t cheat suffer if people who do cheat keep the same quality of credibility and reputation[…] Keep reading →