Notes towards becoming a better investor
kaiton and
Notes towards becoming a better investor
In some sense, Albini’s contrition was the act of a premier hater realizing that the final frontier of hating is one’s own past. But it was also a welcome way for Albini to show that people can continue to grow at any age—and it set the stage for him to continue to grow as a producer as well.
Steve Albini Was a Hater to His Core. And We’re All Better for It.
Learning to lean into my weirdness has taken many shapes. Mostly it’s looked like embracing what comes to me naturally: I’ve always been much more interested in understanding people than ideas, get immense gratification from building lasting relationships, and consider it a lifelong goal to improve my discernment and refine my taste. This often shows up in how I spend my time: I rarely take pitch meetings (if a founder is fundraising already I probably didn’t get there early enough), always have a creative project I’m actively working on, and spend a significant amount of time striving to understand and translate myself to the page. Cultivating a view of the world that no one else has is an edge I consider critically important to Moth’s success, as well as something that requires continual cultivation and critical refinement.
There is a divine nature inherent to labor. The key to finding professional success and happiness is in seeking that sacred thing. Some people find that the divine comes from only devoting their labor to missions they care about. For me, I’ve found something spiritual in delighting in the minutia of my work.
Evan Armstrong • Searching for Signal
The idea of research as leisure activity has stayed with me because it seems to describe a kind of intellectual inquiry that comes from idiosyncratic passion and interest. It’s not about the formal credentials. It’s fundamentally about play . It seems to describe a life where it’s just fun to be reading, learning, writing, and collaborating on... See more
Celine Nguyen • research as leisure activity
What I found though is that making myself understandable all the time diluted the joy that lies instead in specificity — in concisely crafting a life that only needs to make sense to me.
Allowing yourself to be misunderstood teaches you who values you for your personhood alone and how much you actually need from other people to feel sufficiently... See more
Allowing yourself to be misunderstood teaches you who values you for your personhood alone and how much you actually need from other people to feel sufficiently... See more
Molly Mielke • misunderstood
what is so interesting about baking bread?
“I’m always thinking about... It reminds me of the first person I was. Kids going crazy about beetle catching, playing in the water, etc. There's no reason for that one. They're just absorbed in it. But as we grow up, we tend to look for reasons and logic for such behaviour.
No, it's not that. [It’s] that kind of obsessed, sensory, original self. When I'm kneading dough by myself in a place like this, that's what it reminds me of.
So my mental age is getting more and more childish. I'm becoming a social misfit. I'm getting further and further away from organizational people."
I was young, naive, and plagued by impostor syndrome. I held back instead of exploring more, engaging more deeply, and seeking out more challenges. I allowed myself to be carried along by the current, rather than actively charting my own course. Youth is wasted on the young.
Why pretend to be smart and play it safe? True understanding is rare and... See more
Why pretend to be smart and play it safe? True understanding is rare and... See more