Random Thoughts

There’s that quote: if you’re not in over your head, how will you ever find out how tall you are?

Random Thoughts

Some people hold a burning fire within them from a young age. Some don’t. Whatever your level of willpower and expectations, time is your friend. Just like more time leads to greater compounding of money, the same happens in life. The earlier you start hustling, the more your successes build upon themselves. Don’t waste time. Start now.

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As Alberto Savoia sees it, your brilliant idea for a new product or service is like a baby sea turtle. Early in his new book, The Right It: Why So Many Ideas Fail and How to Make Sure Yours Succeed, Google’s former engineering director and “innovation agitator” writes that “the gauntlet that awaits most new ideas might remind you of one of those hard-to-watch scenes in nature documentaries [where] hundreds of newly hatched sea turtles race from the beach to the surf, while all sorts of predators pick them off one by one, like mini-quiches at a buffet.” Eeek. “Mother Nature is brutal, and so is the market.”

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Business is the art of what works and what brings desired outcomes.

Random Thoughts

Plenty of men do good things, and plenty of women do bad. It's the structures that allow people in power to oppress others based on race, gender or economic status that are at the core of the problem. Those structures, however, are very slow to change.

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With the extreme weather that we’re seeing over the last couple of years, we’re all beginning to relearn the fact that we live within nature, and in fact all of our lives are governed by its forces. None of us, no matter where we live, will be able to escape the consequences of this.

Random Thoughts

There is one God for everybody and all the religions are shops.

Random Thoughts

For those with plenty of discretionary income, what is the No.1 luxury item that’s taking money away from diamond jewelry? 

I would guess it’s not a tangible item, like a handbag or a pair of shoes, but rather experiences, particularly travel. Is there a way to compete with that?

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If you combine your passion (art, diamonds, colored stones, watches, jewelry, cars, real estate, wine, books, etc) with an informed decision, you’ll have something you love every day and maybe the value goes up one day.

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I think art is something you purchase without an exit strategy. My idea of liquidity is in other investments. Having those other buckets to draw from is important — otherwise, you could be forced to sell a prized work for less than you would want to when the economy sours.

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Tigers leave only their skins when they die, but through his achievements a man's name lives on.

Billionaire David Harding Donates $130 Million To Cambridge University

A good role model.

Useful link:
https://www.cnbc.com/2019/02/06/david-and-claudia-harding-foundation-donation-to-cambridge-university.html

Random Thoughts

Automation will split the labor force into two worlds. There will be a small island of highly educated professionals making good wages at big corporations, which reap hundreds of thousands of dollars in profit per employee. That island sits in the middle of a sea of less educated workers who are stuck at businesses like hotels, restaurants and nursing homes that generate much smaller profits per employee and stay viable primarily by keeping wages low. Take note.

Random Thoughts

The vital tool in your work is people’s willingness to trust you with their stories and to patiently explain to you what you don’t understand. That’s what you need to do your job. Everything is a means to that end. Talking to people face to face is still the best. 

Random Thoughts

The Innovator’s Dilemma is about the trap that successful companies fall into time and time again. They’re well managed, they’re responsive to their customers, and they’re market leaders. And yet, despite doing everything right, they fail to see the next wave of innovation coming, they get disrupted, and they ultimately fail.

Random Thoughts

But what exactly is stupidity? David Krakauer, the President of the Santa Fe Institute, told interviewer Steve Paulson, for Nautilus, stupidity is not simply the opposite of intelligence. “Stupidity is using a rule where adding more data doesn’t improve your chances of getting [a problem] right,” Krakauer said. “In fact, it makes it more likely you’ll get it wrong.” Intelligence, on the other hand, is using a rule that allows you to solve complex problems with simple, elegant solutions. “Stupidity is a very interesting class of phenomena in human history, and it has to do with rule systems that have made it harder for us to arrive at the truth,” he said. “It’s an interesting fact that, whilst there are numerous individuals who study intelligence—there are whole departments that are interested in it—if you were to ask yourself what’s the greatest problem facing the world today, I would say it would be stupidity. So we should have professors of stupidity—it would just be embarrassing to be called the stupid professor.”

How can anyone disagree?

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Hagfish produce slime the way humans produce opinions—readily, swiftly, defensively, and prodigiously. They slime when attacked or simply when stressed. 

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Tell me, what is it you plan to do with your one wild and precious life?

Random Thoughts

They’ll never admit it in public, but many of your bosses want machines to replace you as soon as possible.

Random Thoughts

Cake art has the ability to capture the imaginations of the most hardened and serious of adult souls and briefly transport them back to the magic of childhood.