Development

The value of a graduate student (not to mention, an assistant professor), I’ve come to realize, is directly proportional to the quantity and complexity of their technical tool kit. If you study algorithms, for example, the more corners of the literature you’ve mastered, and the more mathematical analysis techniques you’re comfortable with, the more

I’d say that perhaps 5-7 really good books on a subject would give you the sort of mastery I’m talking about. It would give you the sort of competence that, say, an advanced graduate student in the subject area might have before writing a dissertation. Choose the books wisely.

You can learn more about politics if you really study a few classics and case studies than almost everybody involved in it figures out in a lifetime.

Creating high performance teams is obviously hard but in what ways is it really hard? It is not hard in the same sense that some things are hard like discovering profound new mathematical knowledge. HPTs do not require profound new knowledge. We have been able to read the basic lessons in classics for over two thousand years. We can see relevant ex

The pianist whose fingers seem supernaturally nimble, the presenter whose message seems viscerally compelling, and the artist whose paintings seem impossibly realistic all wield the same magic: they’ve invested more time than you’d expect.

Monks have long been people with limited options, intentionally. They’re like people who ride on planes (without buying Internet) — they can read, write, pray, eat, clean, meditate (or commune with God, depending on their religion). All day, every day. And usually, they have spots in the day for each of these.

This makes pristine focus easy.

What if

Most people with a shred of creative integrity do not succeed right out of the gate. They persist, they work their asses off for decades, until one day it all finally pays off. In your 20s, don’t worry about being known for it, worry about being good at it.

Creation Cost Averaging

Study what you enjoy and what genuinely interests you. Pick something real that teaches you how to think in both a structured and creative way. My bachelor’s is in history (ancient Rome), and my master’s focused on classical art (Greek and Roman sculpture, mainly). I’ve always loved that stuff, still do, and always will. I personally think majors