Thread by @ruima

Highlight of this summer so far was yesterday (7 hours!) spent listening to Peter Kaufman, CEO of Glenair & editor of Poor Charlie's Almanac on life & business. Many of you are already very familiar with Uncle Peter's teachings, but I still want to share a few learnings.

Uncle Peter talked about the importance of hobbies. In fact it is the 7th rung of his Ladder of Balance:
1. health & fitness
2. family
3. friends
4. career
5. community
6. spirituality
7. hobbies

Paradoxically, being all in on balance gives you best results on any one rung.

I have found that to be true as I've become more balanced in my endeavors over time. There's no going back and making up for lost relationships, and a lot of valuable skills take patience to acquire.

PATIENCE, another Uncle Peter emphasis. I am definitely working on it 🙂

Circle of Competence: where you can accurately assess the odds. Specifically, if they are house odds or gambler odds. In conjunction with this though, you want to have a multi-disciplinary approach. I understood this to be using multiple lenses to look at the same focused thing.

Distinguish between fear, which is useful, and cowardice, which is useless. Don't beat yourself up when you're feeling fearful, it's a natural reaction and can be repurposed into motivation. But don't be a coward.

You can't understand a system you're a part of. It's much better to try to see things with an outsider's perspective. One of the worst biases we all have at all times is that we're limited by our age. Try to live life as if you're seeing it from your deathbed.

I'm not so enlightened just yet, but it helps a lot to spend time with older folks. I see my 88-yr-old grandparents 1-2x a week and just being with them helps me internalize so much about the fragility of life and what's truly important. Find yourself some elders to love!❤️

Anyway, I'll end with a final quote: Everything that's important can't be taught, but can be learned, if the student is ready.

IMO, the best Q to ask yourself then is, what am I doing to become more ready to learn what's truly important in life?

For me, being more humble, being more engaged are goals. And I'm also looking to broaden my hobbies, fitness and community work. For community, in addition to doing weekly Office Hours for startups, I'm happy to speak to even more student groups. So if you want to chat, DM me!

Also I can't forget to thank @DennisHong17 @RishiGosalia @honam @BillBrewsterSCG @10kdiver and everyone else whose presence, engagement and love made it great!!