Hi All,
Below is your weekly dose of a list of things I’m reading, watching, listening to, or thinking about from my Friday Five No. 237 July 5 2024 newsletter. If this message was forwarded to you, sign up for this newsletter using this link.
Quote of the Week
I take time to go for long walks on the beach so that I can listen to what is going on inside my head. If my work isn’t going well, I lie down in the middle of a workday and gaze at the ceiling while I listen and visualize what goes on in my imagination. — Albert Einstein
Video of the Week
Paris underpromised and overdelivered. We were truly blown away. Our time in Paris lasted only one week. I could have easily stayed another week. Throughout our time in Paris, I attempted to document all of the wonderful experiences we had. Here are my Paris Day One, Paris Day Two, Paris Day Three, Paris Day Four, and Paris Day Five videos. The goal here is to capture the magic that is Paris. Everything about this city and its people has me wanting to come back for more.
Article of the Week
Lazy Work, Good Work is chock-full of insightful concepts. The article starts with a poem John D. Rockefeller used to recite that I now love, “A wise old owl lived in an oak, The more he saw the less he spoke, The less he spoke, the more he heard, Why aren’t we all like that old bird?”
The article’s author Morgan Housel makes the case that knowledge workers today do not have time to think. In comparison, here’s a quote in the article from Albert Einstein about thinking, “I take time to go for long walks on the beach so that I can listen to what is going on inside my head. If my work isn’t going well, I lie down in the middle of a workday and gaze at the ceiling while I listen and visualize what goes on in my imagination.”
Housel also argues Mozart thought the same way as Einstein when Mozart said, “When I am traveling in a carriage or walking after a good meal or during the night when I cannot sleep–it is on such occasions that my ideas flow best and most abundantly.”
I love how Housel lays out the time required today to think when he says, “Good ideas rarely come in meetings, or even at your desk. They come to you in the shower. On a walk. On your commute, or hanging out on the weekend. I’m always amazed at the number of famous ideas that came to people in the bathtub.”
Book of the Week
The Old Man and The Sea by Ernest Hemingway was the first of two books I read over the past week. Hemingway is a once-in-a-generation author and this book proves it. The Old Man and the Sea is the story of an old Cuban fisherman, Santiago, who is likely depressed, and his relentless battle with a giant Marlin in the Gulf Stream. The story captures the classic themes of “courage in the face of defeat and of personal triumph won from loss.”
Art of Living: The Classical Manual on Virtue, Happiness, and Effectiveness by Epictetus is Sharon Lebell’s retelling of Epictetus’ “influential school of Stoic philosophy” that “stresses that human beings cannot control life, only their responses to it.” I appreciate how elementary, in a positive way, this book allows us to tackle whatever life throws at us. The simplicity of Epictetus’ writing is what I most appreciate about him as a philosopher. I clobbered this book in a couple of hours. It’s that good of a book.
Podcast of the Week
Invest Like the Best with Patrick O’Shaughnessy is my favorite investing podcast. Most of O’Shaughnessy’s guests come from the investing and finance world. However, he also mixes in top performers from all fields. Recent podcasts I enjoyed include Martin Casado – Entering Unchartered AI Territory, Modest Proposal – AI Commoditization and Capital Dynamics, Robert Greene – Optimizing Your Reality, Adam Sandow – The Power of Print Media, and Mark Groden – The Future of Flying.
