Shiny Object Saturday - 03/25/2023
Discover more from Practical Wall Street
Shiny Object Saturday - 03/25/2023
Anxiety of Productivity, Flow State, Squirrels On Mics, & More
Hi friends.
Good morning from a mild, but rainy, Kentucky.
I’m getting ready for my first mountain biking race of the year tomorrow. Today will consist of writing for a bit and then getting ready for that.
Let’s get to today’s Shiny Object Saturday.
Welcome back to Shiny Object Saturday.
I dig through the mud of the internet and find shiny objects, so you don’t have to get your hands dirty.
Here are my favorite diamonds of the week:
1. Balaji’s 90-Day Bitcoin Bet
I think it’s important to start here.
Balaji Srinivasan, former CTO of Coinbase, has a history of predicting events that happen. He’s most known for the Covid-19 prediction in January 2020.
Anthony Pompliano, also known as Pomp, goes on My First Million and has a discussion with Shaan and Sam about the situation. Pomp’s description of how this all happened is worth the listen.
Adding Shaan to the mix of the discussion makes it even better.
I’m with Shaan. The 90-day window for the financial system crashing seems a bit aggressive. But 900 days doesn’t seem like a wild claim.
2. All Together Now - Morgan Housel
Morgan Housel is one of my favorite writers on the internet. The Psychology of Money is my next book to read on the shelf as well.
Morgan’s piece here coincides with the Pomp/Banking system shared above, but from a different perspective. He takes the psychology side and explores his curiosity of it.
“Controlling your behavior amid uncertainty can be hard enough. Controlling your reactions to other people’s behavior is way harder.”
Humans have a herd mentality, we know that. When people are scared, they run to their herd. This could be a good thing, but it can also be a bad thing.
When is it a bad thing?
SVB would argue it’s bad. SVB was the bank of a very niched social group. These people were all friends. They went to the same restaurants, the same gyms, and were in the same social circles. Those social circles were both digital and physical.
When one investor got spooked, the fear began to spread like cordyceps in The Last Of Us. Except in the digital world, a bank run isn’t a bank run. It’s a bank sprint.
“Bill Seidman, the former head of the FDIC, once said, “You never know what the American public is going to do, but you know that they will do it all at once.”
3. The Anxiety of Productivity
Andrew Wilkinson is a role model to me. I love what he’s doing by building a portfolio of companies in diverse niches. Andrew is about to take his holding company, Tiny, public.
But being this type of entrepreneur takes a toll on people. You see it every day. Andrew makes the case here that people are just afraid of failing.
You know you will fail at some point, but you are so paranoid about it happening, you end up finding success.
4. Flow State
Flow state is a general term, because it can be used in any part of your life.
I hopped in a Writing workshop this week with David Perell for his new Write of Passage cohort. Every time I hear David speak, I always go to his website and start diving into new essays of his.
I found one this week on Flow state and it hooked me.
I’ve been thinking about flow state in different aspects. For me, flow state happens when I’m:
Coding
Writing
Exercising
Playing a video game
Mountain biking
I could keep going.
But what is the flow state? David describes it as:
“When we enter a flow state, the rational mind goes dim. Awareness and uninhibited perception take over.”
Flow state is where you go on autopilot and things you were making a conscious effort to do, become subconscious. You do them without even thinking. When these actions become subconscious, your mind gets out of the way. There is no more resistance, you’ve beaten resistance.
Focus on getting in the flow state this week. It doesn’t matter where, just do it.
You won’t know you were in the flow state until after you come out. But it will be obvious when you look back.
5. Baby Red Squirrel
Let’s finish out this Saturday morning with a baby red squirrel on the mic.
What I’m doing:
I’ve been building my media company portfolio by putting small bets on websites and seeing how they grow. I will continue to double down on the one’s that work.
This is like a game for me. I love it.
Something to admit:
I have not finished my TODO list from last week, so it will stay the same.
On my TODO list is:
Finish Vagabonding Notes
Finish Derek Sivers' How To Live Notes
Continue reading "The War of Art”
I’ll keep you updated on these notes.
Have a productive week and we’ll talk next Saturday.