All Episodes
Displaying 1 - 20 of 482 in total
30 Hours in a Massive Earthquake
Last Wednesday, I flew to Panama to deliver two keynotes. I was excited for the trip. I’d been once before as a kid and remembered the beautiful country. I completed ...
The Loud Liker Theory
Confession: I’ve never been someone who was a natural in social settings. As something of an introvert, I struggled to build new adult relationships. I often felt othe...
The Stories You Tell Yourself
When I was 13 years old, a single story changed the course of my life. But to understand it, I need to take you back in time to a strange experiment from decades ago. ...
My 90 -10 Rule for Routines
Confession: I'm a routine guy. I thrive on structure. I think of routines as a way to ensure execution against the daily action that contributes to long-term, compoun...
The Middle Path to Happiness
In the 3rd century BCE, King Pyrrhus was preparing for an aggressive military campaign in Italy when a trusted advisor named Cineas asked him a simple question: After ...
The Protégé Effect: A Powerful Model for the AI Era
AI is quite clearly the biggest buzzword of the year. But one thing I don't see anyone talking about is just how much AI is shifting how rewards are earned. Things a...
7 Lessons From My 2:49 Marathon (That Have Nothing To Do With Running)
Last week I wrote about failing a marathon. Six days later, at 5am, I drove back to the course alone and ran 26.25 miles in 2:48:47. Not because I needed the official ...
Jevons Paradox: The Perils of Efficiency
In 1865, English economist William Stanley Jevons studied the impact of the increased efficiency of coal use. The common economic intuition said that as efficiency imp...
I Think I Need to Talk About Failure
Last Sunday, I was scheduled to run a marathon with a goal of completing the race in 2:49:59. I trained all summer for the race, building up to 70+ mile weeks. I taper...
Be a Ford, Then a Sloan
The engineer took out an axe and slammed it into the brick wall. It was June 1896. The young man had spent months working in a small brick shed behind his rented house...
It Was Just a Game of Catch
Last weekend, my family and I made our annual pilgrimage to a small community in northwest Connecticut. When I was 18 months old, my parents had rented a house there f...
A Lesson From a Mentor I'll Never Forget
I first met Tim Cook in 2014. I was just starting my career in finance and had signed up for a local gym that opened at 5:00am. I started arriving at 4:45am so I coul...
9 Harsh Truths Nobody Told You About Success
I'm convinced that the market for telling people what they want to hear is much larger than the market for telling people what they need to hear. That one fact explai...
The Focusing Illusion: A Science-Backed Life Trap
Imagine two different people on the same mid-January day. One lives in California. He walks outside in shorts and a t-shirt. The warm sun beams down on his face. He pu...
The Hidden Debt of Convenience
A few weeks ago, I came across a podcast clip of Conan O'Brien talking about why he doesn't pay to fly private. He likes going through the airport, chatting with peopl...
Why You Need to Subtract: The Vasa Effect
In 1628, Sweden's mightiest warship sank less than a mile into its maiden voyage -- not because of an enemy attack, but because a king couldn't stop adding to it. I ca...
Why You Need a Side Quest in Life
The seat you randomly chose on day one is the seat you'll sit in for the rest of the term. My college professor said that, and he was right -- not just about lecture h...
The Scarlet Robe Effect
A fancy robe nearly destroyed a philosopher's life. In 1765, Denis Diderot's financial means went from meager to extravagant. Soon thereafter, he came to own a fancy ...
The Traffic Jam Theory of Success
Everyone's asking: how do I stand out in the AI era? A 1968 German mathematician's traffic paradox holds the answer. When everyone floods the new shortcut, the fast la...
A Japanese Ritual to Improve Your Habits
In the early 1900s, an aging Japanese steam train engineer named Yasoichi Hori was growing increasingly concerned about his deteriorating eyesight. Hori's job relied ...