My book Crypto Confidential is out in two months, but I think you should order it now.
First, I’m extremely proud of it. It’s truly some of my best writing.
If you’ve ever enjoyed something I’ve written, you’re going to love it.
But it’s not just me who likes it. It’s also…
This is a six figure meme making job at a legit company.
No matter how silly your kid’s interests seem... don’t ever tell them they should give them up for a “real job”
Honestly can’t stop thinking about this study.
Dancing is *dramatically* more effective than our best attempts at treating depression, pharmaceutical or not.
It clearly has *massive* psychological benefits.
But how often do you dance?
Do you ever do it sober?
Did your…
They buried the lede on this new study. It's not that exercise beats out SSRIs for depression treatment, but that *just* dancing has the largest effect of *any treatment* for depression.
That's kind of beautiful.
Prove you can do hard things
When a teenager asks why they need to learn calculus, what should you say?
You know they will never use it in adulthood, outside of certain career choices.
You could say, “It’ll help you get into college,” but then they’re left wondering why…
Pain isn’t over till everyone who bought houses in “all cash” borrowing against their FAANG stock get margin called and have to firesale half of Austin.
More parents who have the means should offer their kids a form of patronage.
E.g “hey I know you got that great starting offer from J.P. Morgan but you always dreamed of being a painter growing up.
I’ll match that salary for 2 years for you to go 100% on trying to break into…
Our 1 y/o hasn’t woken us up once in the middle of the night since ~3.5mo old.
She sleeps from 7pm to 7am every night. Falls asleep in minutes.
We didn’t get lucky, we just followed a methodology we picked up from a few friends.
Here it is.
Alright, you know what, I'm done with alcohol.
It's addictive, toxic, depressing, fattening, and a big negative in my life.
If anyone *ever* sees me drinking alcohol again, I want you to tell me you're disappointed in me.
Considering that once you graduate you have ~50 years to build a career, but only ~15-20 to start a family, you should spend way more time in college dating than going to class.
Zoom is not meant for social things with 8+ people.
You'd never stand in a circle of ten people with just one talking at a time.
We need some kind of chat tool that allows natural sidebars, maybe with the other people still talking but quieter?
Announcement! My new work focus is...
I'm building a town for creators.
Not from scratch, but by growing a historic town near Austin.
Year 1 projects include: New housing, a coworking cafe, boutique hotel & more.
I don't think I've ever been so excited to work on something 😃
Supposedly Athletic Greens pays influencers $25 per month for *life* for any customer they refer.
Refer 1,000 customers and you’re making $25k per month.
Makes you wonder how many influencers actually love the drink vs the money…
The dirty secret of influencer marketing: ~80%+ of influencers DO NOT CARE about anything but $
I see this happen 24/7 in my space. They don't care about product quality, brand (theirs or the brand they're repping), their audience, etc.
They just want $$$
I just tried an AI-powered writing app, and I am so so so hilariously out of a job.
It literally gave me goosebumps.
I'm not allowed to share it with you yet but I will when I can 👀
Please send me new career ideas.
“Dad can I have $100k to pursue my music career?”
“Absolutely not.”
“Okay what about $400k to get drunk for four years, get a piece of paper, and then make PowerPoints until I wanna KMS?”
“Now we’re talking.”
My $4,505 in Bedroom Tech 😱
I've been obsessed with improving my sleep quality for 9 years since I first realized how insanely important it was.
I've tinkered with tons of products, and now have over $4,505 worth of tools helping me sleep.
Here are my favorites 👇
With our first kid coming, what’re some clever ways we can help her out financially?
- Planning on putting her on a credit card so she has 18yr credit history.
- Aware of the $12,000 salary a year thing, can we invest that in an IRA for her?
- Not doing a college fund.
Others?
1. Convert ETH to stETH
2. Deposit into AAVE (4.5% APR)
3. Borrow USDC (2% APR)
4. Buy house
Your net interest rate is negative so your down payment is effectively self repaying.
My friend wants to borrow against his $ETH stack to buy an apartment.
What are the best places to do so?
AAVE, Compound, Liquity, Trader Joe, Benqi, Anchor. Other sites?
Yes, he will have a healthy LTV on the loan.
You don’t want a 4-Hour Workweek.
You don’t want Financial Independence to Retire Early.
You don’t want to strike it rich and chill on a beach.
You want to find work that excites you, pays the bills, and can compound over time.
What book created the biggest mental shift in your life?
Where you can look back and there’s a distinct shift in your thinking before and after reading it?
Writers making $$$ on Substack
Teachers making $$$ on Teachable
Artists making $$$ on NFTs
Historians making $$$ on Podcasts
Gamers making $$$ on Twitch
Everything we were told “wouldn’t make money” growing up you can now make millions in.
Somewhere in Connecticut, a VP at Goldman approaches their artistic teen:
“Hey hon, remember how I stopped paying for Creative Suite and said you could never make a living from your art? 😅 I was wondering, have you heard of NFTs?”
Alright, I've been talking about
@Stepnofficial
a lot the last two weeks.
There are many reasons, like earning $300-400 a day walking around the neighborhood, but here's the big one:
It's the first time many of my friends (and wife!) have been personally interested in crypto.
I regret not taking meditation seriously sooner.
I think the problem is its branding.
It’s not a way to increase focus, it’s not about “changing your brain,” it’s not about what successful people do it…
All you need to know is that it’s the oldest, most widely replicated,…
My life got a lot better when I gave up on being a well-rounded responsible adult and just focused on the things I was good at and hired people who were good at the other things.
I used to be a hardcore productivity nerd, but I’ve abandoned most of it and don’t miss it.
- Random tasks in Things
- Take most notes in Apple Notes
- Try to get a few satisfying things done per day
Productivity obsession is often a symptom of deeper dissatisfaction.
If your daily routine is to wake up, roll out of bed, and spend 8 hours inside alone alternating between doing work you don’t care about and doom-scrolling the news and social media…
Caffeine is not the source of your anxiety issues.
You'd probably get pretty far only eating and drinking things you've never seen advertised.
Advertising: junk food, fast food, fake meat, packaged food, alcohol.
No advertising: vegetables, fruits, rice, steak, nuts, water, spices.
The concerning parts of therapy normalization to me is how many people have abandoned:
1. Developing deeper relationships where they could comfortably talk through their problems with peers / elders.
2. Developing a spiritual practice to help manage negative emotions / thought…
Suuuuper hot take: the normalization of therapy is becoming a bad thing for society.
I’m seeing more and more people:
1) use the fact they are in therapy as a “get out of jail free card” for awful behavior
2) believe everything their therapist says as Gospel Truth, with no…
How to make $$$$ in crypto.
I’ve seen a lot of people enter crypto this year and make 5, 6, 7 figures.
NFTs, coding, DeFi, community management, marketing, whatever.
There are some common themes among those who have done really well.
Might start a crypto coffee spot in Austin with a fellow degen.
Membership only (NFTs ofc).
Friends welcome w/ $10+ crypto payments.
Highest quality coffee & machinery possible.
DAO owned & maintained.
Not sure if insane or brilliant.
If you’re at a FAANG considering making a move into Web3.
1. You should do it.
2. You’re gonna have way more fun.
3. You’re gonna make way more money.
4. If you know React you can pick up web3js in like a week. Congrats you’re a Web3 developer now!
This isn’t the thing I’m necessarily most proud of accomplishing this year, but I don’t think I’ll ever have a year where I turn an article about a niche note taking app into a house ever again.
Please keep tech & crypto people away from anything health-related.
"If we just replace birth with artificial wombs, everyone can spend 100% of their time making more money."
"If we replace food with a seed oil slushy, we can work all day and drink that instead of eating."
JFC
By far the project I’ve been most wrong about this year is
@OlympusDAO
.
Looked at it briefly a few months ago and wrote it off as too inflationary/ ponzinomic.
Wish I’d tried to understand the underlying mechanics better, it’s actually such a smart idea. Especially Pro.
Has anyone made a good AI tool yet where I can load in everything I've ever written, every podcast I've recorded, every note I've taken from a book, and then have a ChatGPT-esque interface where I can query my past self?
I'd probably pay hundreds of dollars a month for this.
Testing potential careers at high speeds and shameless quitting bad fits should be encouraged.
In the last 9 months I tried being a YouTuber, real estate developer, normal software engineer, then found a home in crypto.
Took a few tries, but so happy where I ended up.
Alright, so, time for a VERY painful story about how in my excitement about learning solidity yesterday I made a mistake that let someone steal $30,000 from me.
🤦♂️🤦♂️🤦♂️
I think the best solution to this whole women’s swimming nonsense is we just introduce a third sports league where you can do whatever you want to your body to try to win.
Drugs, surgery, hormones, let’s see what our bodies and science are really capable of
Most of the people I knew with rich parents in high school / college ended up going after typical high-paying careers.
Which is kinda sad when you think about it.
I doubt most of them were super duper passionate about banking or consulting or law. Tech maybe.
If your friend makes something you're legitimately excited about or interested in, buy it.
Don't ask for it for free.
They'll give it to you, but resent you.
And even if they offer to give it to you for free, insist on paying. That's how you show true support.
If someone is curious to learn more about crypto, telling them to read the Bitcoin/Ethereum white paper isn’t a great recommendation.
It’s boring. They’re very unlikely to care about it.
Get them set up earning 7-10% on stablecoins. The technical curiosity will follow.
This is an incredible ad for two reasons:
1. It perfectly encapsulates what the people who get crypto already believe and want, which gets them excited to share and spread it.
2. It’s confusing to non-crypto people, it makes them ask “what does this have to do with Coinbase?…
I think most kids who become obsessed with video games (myself included) do so because they're completely powerless and creatively stifled IRL.
They're forced to study things they don't care about, perform in ways they don't care about, even "play" like soccer gets turned into…
at some point circa 2017? I said "what am I doing" and mostly stopped playing any video games. I don't really miss them, though I miss competing.
Most of what I got out of them is the realization that I wanted to make real things in the real world. I wish I came to that sooner.
My VA and I have developed a good enough system now where she's able to handle 95% of my email and I only do email for maybe 5-10 minutes a day now.
Anyone interested in something on this process and how we set it up?
This is kinda conspiracy-y but bear with me.
Whenever I see a video like this going super viral on TT I do wonder to what extent the platform is being used by China to psyop young people in the US.
Occasionally when using it I’ll get a video about how bad life is in the US…
Omg, poor baby has her first job. Like..she has to commute?? Like...she has to cook dinner?? Like...no time or energy to work out?? Like..she's working in person not remote??? Like...She. Has. To. Work. 9. To. 5 ??? What????🙄
The idea that companies should discourage or prohibit side projects is so ridiculous.
You wouldn't prohibit your employees from having hobbies... But suddenly if those hobbies make money they're bad?
Come on.
Tbh the greatest life hack is to realize that life rarely gets harder, you just see your past as easier and easier.
So you can just keep loading up on responsibilities because you’ll figure it out as you go.
You can handle way more than you think.
I wrote a bit about the struggle between money and meaningful work.
How prudence can distract us from our long-term goals.
"Be careful what you do to pay the bills, you might just succeed at it."
Something I realized in the last year is that I never learned how to relax.
I learned how to sedate: to use television, games, apps, alcohol, etc to force my mind into a different “relaxed” state.
But that’s very different from actually relaxing.
I first got interested in going fully into crypto around this time last year.
- Didn’t know anything about DeFi
- Barely knew anything about coding
- No Crypto audience
You can do a lot in a year! 😄🥳
Lots of response to this!
So I wrote up what changed my mind about
@OlympusDAO
, and why I think it might be one of the most important DeFi protocols out there.
Check it out here:
By far the project I’ve been most wrong about this year is
@OlympusDAO
.
Looked at it briefly a few months ago and wrote it off as too inflationary/ ponzinomic.
Wish I’d tried to understand the underlying mechanics better, it’s actually such a smart idea. Especially Pro.
I’d say 90% of the smart people I’ve talked to in the last few days are very concerned about the Facebook, Twitter, and Apple bannings... but won’t talk about it publicly because it’s not worth the Internet fights.
Many people believe what I’ll call “The Startup Fallacy”
That it’s easier & better to start something from scratch than to fix something that already exists.
This manifests most painfully in relationships. Constantly searching for new ones instead of improving what they have.
Every male writer needs to have this chart seared into their brain.
Women DOMINATE the book-buying market.
If you only show your work to other guy friends, only have it edited by guys, and don't write something that's equally appealing to women, you will probably fail.
Someone smart recommends a book you've heard a dozen people mention:
Maybe buy it.
Someone smart recommends a book you've never heard of:
Buy it immediately.
Alright, it's alive!
3,000+ words on
@RoamResearch
, including why it's better than Evernote / Notion, and how I'm using it.
TOC includes:
1. Why Roam?
3. Roam as a Second Brain
4. Roam for Productivity
5. Limitations
6. Getting Started
cc
@Conaw
I discovered the book "How to Take Smart Notes" a couple weeks ago and fell in love with the methodology.
Here's how I've applied it, and how you can use it to get more out of what you read:
"Fuck you money" is a cool long term goal, but a more approachable short term one is "unfuckable money" -- income generated in a way that minimizes your risk of loss if the mob decides to cancel you for something you laughed about at a party in 1950.
I got one of the new MacBook Airs with the M1 and holy shit, this is the first time in... a decade? That there's been a noticeable jump in laptop speed.
And that's comparing it to a 2 y/o MacBook Pro!
Didn't believe it was as good as the hype. It is.
By far the most impactful / highest leverage goal I accomplished this year was quitting alcohol.
What’s another extremely high leverage self-improvements goal I could take on in 2022?
Hey friends, HUGE, exciting announcement I’ve been dreaming of sharing for 2 years.
My book “Crypto Confidential” is now available for preorder!
If you’ve ever enjoyed an article of mine, you’ll love this book.
Writing this has been the greatest creative challenge of my life,…
Not sure who I heard this from, but really the best way to frame financial goals is:
1. Never have to worry about money again
2. Make sure that once you achieve
#1
, you never have to achieve it again
It's helpful because...
Did my first in-depth net worth analysis in the last year or so.
Definitely overweight crypto. I’m fine with 50% but 70% feels excessive.
Gonna start rebalancing into some tradfi stuff, as painful as it is.
There’s a huge market opportunity for an ultra-high-end decaf or light-caf coffee subscription.
Most decaf coffee lacks flavor, has a really chemically wash process… not good.
I’d happily switch to lower caffeine if I could enjoy it as much.
For a long time I believed kids should never see their parents fight.
Then I realized it’s actually an incredibly harmful way to raise your kids.
If you never see your parents fight, then you adopt the belief that “people who love each other shouldn’t fight.”
You’ll grow up…