Abhilash Rao

Great thinkers don’t harbor doubts because they’re impostors. They maintain doubts because they know we’re all partially blind and they’re committed to improving their sight.

Develop Your Communication Skills One often‐neglected skill set that can boost your career is your ability to communicate well, in both speaking and writing. How many rambling, poorly composed emails do you see these days? How many take you through the confusion and hell of the writer's mind? How many announcements do you read that bury the real

The only way for me to capture all of it—good ideas, priorities, roadblocks, the dates that people promised to deliver, and the major internal and external heartbeats ahead—was to take notes in every meeting. Longhand. Not on a computer. [See also: Figure 3.5.1, in Chapter 3.5.] Writing by hand was important for me. I wasn’t staring at a screen,

The roots of the word “compete” are the Latin con petire, which meant “to seek together.” What each person seeks is to actualize her potential, and this task is made easier when others force us to do our best. Of course, competition improves experience only as long as attention is focused primarily on the activity itself. If extrinsic goals—such as

but we have at least a shot at getting what we strive, work, and fight for. Pick a field where you have a realistic chance of rising, and turn your less realistic passions—such as playing basketball, sailing, performing music, or painting—into hobbies for your free time.

First, tackle them when we’re in a good mood. A 2016 study found that when people are upset, they’re less likely to try to do hard things. When they’re feeling upbeat, however, they’re more likely to take on the hard-but-essential tasks that ultimately make life better. One way we can get ourselves in the right mindset is to do what’s called