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How to work, be wise, and more...
3 Concept, 2 Frameworks, 1 Proverb Pic - Newsletter #1
Erick Vargas
February 12, 2023
3 Growth concepts from others.
Concept #1
“Never explain with malice that which is adequately explained by ignorance” - Hanlon's razor
My Takeaway: It's easier to think of ourselves as the victim and build a bogeyman in our minds. The reality is that people are not out to get you, they are simply not considering you. They are mostly thinking about themselves, their agenda, and their needs while not considering their effect on you. You should not get mad at them, because you are doing the same thing. If you do get mad at them, then, you're proving my point.
Concept #2
Your feelings come from where you find your hope. Where is your happiness and your significance? -Tim Keller
My Takeaway: Feeling good? Notice where it came from. Feeling bad? Notice where it came from. We mostly blame our feelings for our behavior. But it actually just shows us where our hope is. If our hope is in money, we are feeling good when the market is up and feel bad when the market is down. Change what your hope is in and watch your feelings change.
Concept #3
Being busy is a form of laziness—lazy thinking and indiscriminate action. -Tim Ferriss
My Takeaway: How are you doing? Busy. That is the typical response that we give people today. Now, I get angry at busyness because it shows me that I'm being lazy in my thinking about what is important. The anger helps me take action on low-value things and distractions. Get rid of busyness and counterintuitively you will be more productive.
2 Personal frameworks
Procrastination vs. Fake Work vs. Productive work
Procrastination is not only avoiding work but also doing the wrong work to avoid real work. I've learned not to procrastinate. It's very difficult to take action immediately. Fake work is my term describing work that feels good, but not actually making steps toward your goal. One classic example is working on your logo and website to start a business. You don't need those things to start a business. How did people start a business without computers just 20 years ago? They built a product or service and sold it and sold it. That's all you have to do, Everything else is fake work. Yes, yes, yes you need to do these things eventually. But even when you finish a website or logo, you still don't have a business. You have a business when you have sold a product or service. So just start on that.
Short cuts take longer than the "long route"
Most people don't want to spend 5% extra effort on the front end of an issue and wind up chasing a problem. When we avoid that 5% it magically turns into 2x the work on the backend. Applied to cooking, this is the french culinary concept of mise en place. It refers to the setup required before cooking. As someone who likes to cook, I hate this concept. But the professionals love it because everything is in its place and readily available. If you don't do this, then the entire kitchen is a mess and nothing can be cooked and the kitchen comes to a screeching halt. For me, cleaning up takes twice as long because I did not put the work upfront to make sure everything was set up and organized in the right way. From now on, I will do the 5% to save the 2x.
1 Proverb Pic
Proverbs 9: 8-9: Do not rebuke mockers or they will hate you; rebuke the wise and they will love you. Instruct the wise and they will be wiser still; teach the righteous and they will add to their learning.
My Takeaway: Mockers hate rebukes and lash out because of their insecurity. Even if you rebuke with the best intentions. A Rebuke and instruction are actually the same things. A corrective word. The difference depends on the listener. To go from a mocker to a wise person, you must learn to love the rebuke, even if the rebuke is 99% incorrect. The wise will love the 1%. The wise love instruction because they are secure in their God-given identity. They are free to learn and grow by admitting they don't know everything and add that 1% to their wisdom.
Genesis 1:1- “In the beginning, God created the heavens and the earth”. The word "created" (ex nihilo) emphasizes a crucial point that God created out of nothing.
Similarly, entrepreneurship is creating as God creates. Thanks for being a part of this community of entrepreneurs and creating something out of nothing.
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