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David Perell

23 May, 9 tweets, 3 min read

What made Kobe Bryant so good?

5 championship rings. 7 trips to the NBA finals. Though fans were inspired by his excellence, others were offended by his personality. To learn about the nature of greatness, let's talk about his career.

Time for a thread.

The Lakers are famous for their roster of stars: Wilt Chamberlain, Magic Johnson, and Kareem Abdul-Jabaar.

Kobe wanted to add his name to the list but worried his legacy would be undermined by sharing the court with another great player who he didn’t always get along with: Shaq.

Kobe motivated himself through a combination of envy and desire.

For example, Kobe and Shaq had one of the most famous feuds in NBA history, due to the conflict of Shaq’s desire to be the team’s leader, and Kobe’s need to take the spotlight and outperform.

The duo’s streak finally ended with their NBA Finals loss to the Detroit Pistons in 2004. Kobe opted out of the final year of his contract, but instead of Kobe going elsewhere, the Lakers ended up parting ways with Shaq and coach Phil Jackson.

By the time he was 28 years old, Kobe had suffered a broken wrist, numerous ankle sprains, a surgically repaired shoulder, and two knee surgeries — and despite all that, he still won three championships.

Kobe's favorite movie was called Whiplash, which is about a success-obsessed drummer who breaks up with a girlfriend he loves and betrays people in his life just so he can be great.

Here's the most revealing scene.

That commitment to excellence inspired him to read the NBA Referee handbook, so he could identify "dead zones" on the court where he could get away with holds, travels, and other minor violations.

He reminds me of Michael Jordan.

After his final game, he was asked: "What sets you apart?"

Jordan said: "Every day, I demand more from myself than anybody else could humanly expect. I’m not competing with somebody else. I’m competing with what I’m capable of."

Kobe didn’t live his life for the normal things people live for: happiness, fulfillment, and relationships, which didn't compare to his love for basketball and his obsession with being the greatest of all time.

Here's my Kobe Bryant mini-documentary.

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More from @david_perell

David Perell

@david_perell

19 May

This paper explores the core personality traits of entrepreneurs:

∙ Capable
∙ Hubristic
∙ High self-esteem
∙ More likely to have done “illicit activities”

But here's the key line: "The number one predictor of entrepreneurship is asymmetric information about skill levels."

@wolfejosh

I discovered this paper when @wolfejosh shared it a few years ago.

He mentioned a quote from William Blake: "I must create a system or be enslaved by another man's; I will not reason and compare: my business is to create."

By asymmetric skill levels, the authors refer to people who are more talented than they are credentialed. They're the kinds of people who know how to build a business, even though they never went to college.

Being under-estimated makes them more likely to start a company.

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David Perell

@david_perell

18 May

Philosophers are the strongest thinkers I know.

They're trained to evaluate ideas from a kaleidoscope of perspectives. They think like intellectual boxers, who understand ideas by making them fight with each other.

Their thinking is bloody, but boy is it effective.

In particular, I admire their patience with ideas.

Most people jump to moral conclusions when they find a new idea. A good philosopher has none of that hubris. Through critique and dialogue, they simply try to understand it instead, knowing that understanding is a slow process.

While the rest of us judge ideas, philosophers critique them.

They think dispassionately because they welcome the idea of being corrected, and in turn, updating their worldview. Thus, they welcome self-criticism, so long as it's done with a posture of intellectual generosity.

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David Perell

@david_perell

6 May

For all the talk about progress, why are beautiful buildings like this so rare these days?

Modern architecture really makes you question the gospel of efficiency.

I mean, seriously.

Oh and while we’re at it, can we have some Art Nouveau wallpaper too?

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David Perell

@david_perell

3 May

The Simpsons secret to writing: Create an imperfect world, then improve it.

@MarketPowerYT

First, flood the page with ideas. Then, edit.

“Since writing is very hard and rewriting is comparatively easy and rather fun, I always write my scripts all the way through as fast as I can, the first day, if possible.”

(h/t @MarketPowerYT)

newyorker.com/culture/the-ne…

The writers for The Simpsons were completely independent.

Since not even executives received advanced copies of the scripts, all the writers had to do was please themselves.

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David Perell

@david_perell

30 Apr

New essay: A couple years ago, I realized that I knew embarrassingly little about Christianity.

So, I decided to change that. That search led me to history of human rights and the moral underpinnings of Western culture.

Here’s what I discovered.

perell.com/essay/why-your…

I didn’t think this piece would resonate.

But in terms of quality responses in the first 24 hours, it’s the most successful essay I’ve ever written.

Never have I experienced such a flood of responses — and I particularly love the personal stories of religious transformation.

Religious or not, every Westerner bathes in the waters of Christian ideology.

We are desensitized to Christianity’s influence on Western thought not because it’s irrelevant, but because it’s so all-consuming.

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David Perell

@david_perell

5 Apr

Some paradoxes of modern life:

1. The paradox of reading: The books you read will profoundly change you even though you’ll forget the vast majority of what you read.

2. The paradox of writing: Great writing looks effortless. But because the ideas are so clear, casual readers don't appreciate how much time it took to refine them.

3. The paradox of creativity: Your work is done when it looks so simple that the consumer thinks they could've done it, which means they won't appreciate how hard you worked.

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