What Would You Really Do To Succeed?

What would you really do to reach your full potential?

I’m actually asking you to think about this question right now. While you think I want to talk about something a little bit uncomfortable…

There is a South African thought experiment that we sometimes discuss because our country is pretty violent. The experiment involves a scenario in which your home has been invaded and there is a gun pointed at your head. The thought experiment is: What would you do?

Many people respond that there is nothing you can do. Your hands are literally tied and there is a gun pointed at your head. You wait.

Not me. Not a fuck. No waiting.

I always answer that I would fight, head but, wriggle around, kick or scream and do whatever it takes, even if it means I get shot in the process. I’d fight.

I’d fight because with my last breath I want to know that I did something more than wait for death.

Kinda like life, I want to know that I have lived and fought, not waited for death.

So, what would you do?

There is a species of sea slug that when faced with internal parasites that would certainly kill them, simply behead themselves and regrow their bodies without the parasites. I love this.

Now, of course, they understand intrinsically that this is something they are built to do. It’s not that much of a sacrifice in the grand scheme of their lives. But I can’t imagine it’s a lot of fun to remove your own body from your head. Even if it would save your life and even if your head is meant to do that.

Success and life are relatively similar to the self-beheading of the sea slug; we know what it takes to be successful. We know we have it in us to do the work. We know life is there for living. We’ve seen others do it before, but more often than not it’s easier to not do the work.

In the movie Saw, at one point the main character is faced with a decision: die in the room handcuffed to a pipe or saw off his own hand and escape.

What would you do to survive? What would you do to thrive?

Of course, I am being melodramatic. But dying slowly and unhappily at the hands of indecision, unhappiness and a lack of ambition might be worse than dying quickly at the hands of a psychotic serial killer.

You get to choose what you fight for. You get to choose what you cut out, cut off and cut loose. Nothing is sacred. Nothing deserves to remain simply because it has always been there. Nothing should hold you back from the life you want, the business you need, the side hustle you’ve been dreaming of or the career you were destined for.

You are programmed to move forward, to progress and to survive just like the sea slugs. Yet we insist on collecting things that we know are slowly killing us.

Start cutting.

Why “It’s Just Business” Is Bullshit

For those of us who pour everything we are into our passions, it’s personal.

I am done with people excusing a lack of ethics, moral mishaps and blatantly questionable business practices with the phrase “it’s just business.” It’s not just business. It’s personal.

It’s All Personal

I pour everything I have into everything I do.I work on the things that define me. I work on the things that I am passionate about. I work on the things that I want the world to use, discover and buy.

I work on things that tell the world who I am, how I am and what I am.

My work is the output of my thoughts, my actions and my vulnerabilities. My work is me and that makes it personal.

We’re Not All Hustling By The Same Rules

I don’t have to respect people who choose to build things by different rules. Sure, your rules (or lack thereof) may get you further, faster but that doesn’t mean that I have to like or respect you for it.

I’m going to continue to create by the rules that I believe in.

I’m not saying that I’m going to be soft. I’m not saying that I’m going to lie down and die when someone pushes me too far but I am saying that there are rules that define what is acceptable to me and what isn’t.

Those rules may be different for everyone and in truth, that’s probably what separates the greatest of us from the mediocre.

The Hustle

I have said for ages that every entrepreneur needs to hustle. But the hustle is not an excuse to fuck people over. I believe that it is possible to sincerely to do business in the best possible way for all parties involved.

It’s not always possible, sure, but you can do your best to try to avoid blatantly destroying the livelihood, existence, ego or business of the person you are working with, hustling for or in the face of. There are limits to the hustle.

Also - hustling is not synonymous with questionable ethics. Not to me. Hustling means doing everything you can do, within the scope of what you believe is acceptable, to make your ideas work and to make your work known.

I Don’t Have To Respect You

I’m tired of the back-slapping, hand-shaking farce that is involved in business a lot of the time. I think it’s OK to show an active and healthy disrespect for the way some people conduct themselves.

Taking a stand is imperative.

Draw your lines. Know your rules. Build accordingly.

You Don’t Have To Like Everyone

There is a massive difference between liking and respecting someone. I like a lot of people that I have very little respect for in the world of business and success.

There are also a lot of people that I have immense respect for who I could not bare to have a meal with. I actively dislike them but I can acknowledge that what they have accomplished is respectable.

But then there are some people who I do not like or respect and refuse to lie about it. I think that’s OK. I think it’s OK to not like people or respect the way they conduct themselves and run their businesses.

We all have different rules that we live by and we don’t have to agree.

“It’s Just Business”

I refuse to acknowledge this justification any longer.

I don’t want to hear these words uttered in sequence any more.

It’s not just business to me.

It shouldn’t be just business to you.

If you are building something of value, it’s personal.

Becoming an upcycled human - The Curious Cult Podcast

Jasper Eales is the founder of Sealand and considers himself to be an upcycled human being through a liver transplant.

In this episode Nic and Jasper discuss building a truly purpose-driven lifestyle brand, becoming an aspirational brand with an educational voice, how initially, all curiosity needs to be explored but then you need to follow the excitement and how a mistake is only a mistake if you repeat it.

You Are Not a Perfectionist

I’m not sure where our obsession with perfection started but I’m over it.

Striving for perfection is exhausting. I’m tired of trying to have the perfect beard, the perfectly shaved head, the perfect outfit, the perfect spelling and grammar, the perfect relationship, the perfect idea, the perfect product, the perfect idea, the perfect business, launch strategy, pr strategy, corporate culture and on and on and fucking on with the perfection.

It’s exhausting.

I’m exhausted.

I am also to blame.

I tell myself that this article isn’t perfect… yet. My self-talk leans towards perfection all the time and I quietly berate myself if I am not pushing for perfection constantly.

It’s exhausting.

Did I mention how exhausted I am from striving for perfection? No? Well, I’m exhausted and I am sure you are too.

So let’s get over it.

Perfection is perlillous. It’s time for us to reframe our self-talk.

I hate hearing someone tell me that they are a perfectionist because my inner voice pushes back immediately with: “No you’re not.”

You are not a perfectionist and nor am I. If you are triggered reading that sentence, good. Get over your self-righteous self. Perfect sucks. Perfect means it’s over and there is nothing left to do and that’s boring. If you were a perfectionist you wouldn’t be able to leave the house because your clothes will never be perfectly aligned all the time. Your car will never be perfectly clean all the time. Your hair will never stay perfectly styled throughout the day. Your skin won’t remain blemish-free and perfect. Your approach to life is incomplete and imperfect but that’s where beauty lives.

We use the idea of perfection as an excuse to avoid hard things. You think you have the best business idea but you don’t want to talk about it because it’s not perfect yet. You have the perfect video to push out to your community but you’re not ready to publish because it’s just not perfect yet. You want to release a podcast but you haven’t found the perfect guest to kick things off.

I have been coaching a lot of business owners and founders recently and this is one of the most infuriating excuses I come across from all kinds of talented people. Perfection is a roadblock we erect so that we can delay the potentially harmful public humiliation we are scared of.

And therein lies the flywheel of perfect destruction:

→ Have an idea

→ Work on said idea for a little bit and make some progress

→ Sink enough time into the idea that you are protective of it

→ Obsess over the nuances of said idea

→ Refine, refine, refine, refine

→ Delay launch and build up anticipation in your mind

→ Wait longer, refine more, create overwhelming anticipation

→ Never launch

And so the cycle perpetuates because we are more obsessed with perfection than we are with feedback.

Replace your desire for perfection with a ruthless desire for constructive feedback and you will never delay launching something again.

The idea of a Minimum Viable Product (MVP) was pioneered by Erik Ries in his book, The Lean Startup. The lean startup methodology and an MVP promotes the concept of launching. Launch your idea, product, service, thought, video, article or anything into the world quickly and iterate. Don’t spend years building something that nobody will want.

The key concept here that I think has been overlooked over the years is that of data. You launch a minimum viable product so that you can receive constructive data from your customers and users. You are then able to use the data to gather insights about the product or idea they are testing for you so that you can iterate and create a better version of the idea, or, a more perfect version if you will.

Your self-assigned label as a “perfectionist” is killing your soul, destroying your ideas and making you unbearable to be around.

YOU. ARE. NOT. A. PERFECTIONIST.

How do you expect to iterate if you are too afraid to launch?

How can you refine something that has never been used or tested out in the wild? Whether it’s an idea, a thought, an opinion, an outfit, a product, a service or anything else you can only test it and refine it if you launch it.

Stop holding yourself back, stop calling yourself a perfectionist and just launch already.

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Over the past 20 years as a founder and founder coach I have encountered five major roadblocks holding most people back from building their business.

I want to help you get over yourself and overcome these five roadblocks so I have created a FREE workbook and five-day email accountability course. Download the workbook and let’s build your imperfect idea!

TV is a Trauma Response - Leana de Beer

Leana de Beer is a social entrepreneur and the CEO of Feenix.org.

In this episode we discuss hiring for diversity, taking a step back and letting other people speak first, the trauma response that is watching television how the pursuit of excellence can be exhausting. 

Comparison DESTRUCTION

Sometimes I suffer from envy.

I'm not proud of this part of my personality but it's unavoidable. I am human, after all.

The envy quickly turns to severe comparison destruction (destruction of one’s own life due to excessive comparison to another’s).

I look around at people in similar situations to me and wonder how they manage to do what they do so successfully while I toil away at my business and life. These are depressive points in my weeks and months. I know these moments are fleeting but I often can't help but feel like I'm down the rabbit hole so I should settle in and get comfy.

Eventually, I take a hard look at what I think I see vs what I can really see.

How well is this person really doing?

Why do they show off their “wealth” on social media?

How happy does their partner really make them?

What hole are they trying to fill?

After a few minutes or days or sometimes weeks of comparison destruction, I manage to pull my head out of the social media ass that it’s trapped within and realise that everyone only ever presents the best version of themselves to the world. No one is honest about everything all the time. Nor am I.

In one of my depressive comparison destruction episodes, a friend said to me that if you are envious of someone’s life and believe it’s better than yours, remember that you have to take it all if you were to swap. You can’t only have the good parts.

This statement hit me in the back of the head like a revolving door when you stop abruptly. Everyone has bad parts to their lives no matter their success, no matter their social media updates, follower count or how many likes they have. Everyone dislikes parts of their lives. Said another way; everyone is human.

This is a recurring revelation that I need to re-experience to bring myself out of the occasional contempt that I have towards my friends, colleagues or competitors.

Once I'm out of this disdainful daze I take a look at the things that really bother me and quickly figure out (again and again) that I am frustrated with myself. I am frustrated with something very specific in my own business or life or choices and decision. My frustration never has anything to do with someone else’s business or success or life or happiness. It’s always all about my own.

The goodest girl

It’s like my frustration with my fantastically life-affirming dog, Mango. She is the mango of my eye, truly. But holy shit do I get frustrated when we go for walks sometimes. She is a big dog and she likes to pull on the lead. So recently I’ve started re-training her to walk on a loose lead and to heel. On the walks, I can become frustrated with her. We battle it out and when we return home I quickly realise that I am frustrated with myself because I cannot communicate effectively or I am struggling to get the commands out and I am not leading her well. It’s not her fault. It’s never her fault. She’s just being the best dog she can be.

Every person on social media (and broadly in life) is just trying to be the best dog they can be and my frustration with their success has to do with me, not them.

I am sure there are people who envy my life and my choices and I like to think about these people occasionally. Thinking about them helps me realise that the grass is always greener on the other side until it becomes your grass and you peek around the corner and see that their dog has taken a steaming crap on what is now your grass.

Comparison isn’t always bad. Sometimes it drives you forward, sometimes it helps you to look back while other times it provides much needed perspective which allows you to appreciate what you’ve got and work a little harder to be content.

I'm So Damn Busy

“This world is a place of business. What an infinite bustle! I am awaked almost every night by the panting of the locomotive. It interrupts my dreams. ​There is no sabbath. It would be glorious to see mankind at leisure for once. It is nothing but work, work, work.”

158 years ago a man named Henry David Thoreau wrote an essay called Life Without Principle. The words above are lifted straight from this essay and absolutely blew me away when I read them.

In 1863, this philosopher was complaining about the bustle of life and the busy-ness that people were obsessed with. All people did back in 1863 was “work, work, work,”. That’s 158 years ago!!

Sound familiar?

I bet that’s how you feel too, right? Work, work work.

If that’s how humans felt back in 1863 and that’s how we feel today, what on Earth makes us think that all of a sudden we’re going to figure out how to stop working so damn hard?

Here’s the unfortunate contradiction that I think we’re faced with: To figure out how to work less, we have to put more work into our lives.

You have two choices, as I see it:

You can do the same things day in and day out and hope things magically improve or you can put in a little bit of work every day that will contribute to your ability to work less tomorrow.

Now don’t get me wrong, hard work is necessary sometimes but as a default, I think that hard work is unsustainable.

There has to be more to life than finding your living and simply existing. Or as Thoreau puts it in his essay, "There is no more fatal blunderer than he who consumes the greater part of his life getting his living." This is not a new challenge. This is not unique to our tumultuous times. This is a human problem that requires proactive work to get right. You will not simply stumble through life without agency and one day wake up to riches, personal fulfilment and ample time to spend in whichever way you want.

That’s utopian thinking. That’s lalaland living. That’s naive and dangerous to a full and contented life.

To unlock your time, your freedom and your enjoyment of life, we must do a little bit of proactive work every day. We must make conscious choices. We must actively get rid of things that subtractive to our lives and do more of the things that are additive. These are choices we can make.

I get the feeling that if Henry David Thoreau were to time travel to 2021 he would be shocked and saddened that we haven’t figured out how to slow down and enjoy life a bit more than back in 1863.

Adults Break Rules, Rules Break Adults

It’s been a tough few weeks. Back in February I decided to remove as much sugar from my diet as possible.

I have a sugar problem.

OK, it’s not so much a problem as it is an addiction. A real and visceral addiction. I watch food YouTube obsessively and my mouth salivates. I bake trays of brownies and eat the entire tray in one day. I’ll bake cookies and eat half a dozen in one sitting just before I go to bed.

So in February I stopped eating processed sugar. I did it with relative ease (and a lot of fruit) and it made the most massive difference to my life. I was sleeping better than I had in years. I had the energy to exercise every day. I was able to work more effectively and focus for longer. My skin cleared up. My short temper disappeared almost entirely. I was more tolerant in general and loving life.

But there is one massive problem with this incredible outcome: I feel like I’m being punished because I am denied the one thing I love in the world, my one vice. See, I don’t drink, I don’t smoke and now I don’t eat sugar. I exercise every day. I feel like a fucking saint and I hate it.

After two months of feeling amazing but “suffering” through this magnificent change in productivity, I decide I deserve a reward. I go out and have a brownie and ice cream. Then I’m good for a week. Then I need another reward for being good so I buy a treat from the store. Then my partner brings home a treat from the store because I beg her to and I was having a tough day. I don’t sleep very well that night and wake up really tired. I don’t exercise the next day and find myself in a distracted and bad mood so I reward myself with something sugary. I just can’t figure out why I’m so damn tired and so fucking irritated. Then I have another bad night of sleep and wake up more irritable and confused about my mood so I buy a bucket of mini dark chocolate brownies from the store and eat them in one sitting that night. Can you guess how well I slept?

Repeat this for two weeks and I am a disaster zone.

At the end of last week it was pointed out to me that my spiral kicked off with a brownie followed by enough chocolate for a family of four to consume over a few months all eaten by me in 10 days.

Here’s the thing: I am an adult so I get to break rules. I lay down the law and instruct myself not to eat processed sugar. Then I realise that I am all grown up and don’t have parents (or kids) so I can do whatever the hell I want, even if it makes me feel like shit.

Because I am addicted to sugar I will never attribute the downward spiral to my drug of choice and just keep going until someone else helps me see the candy coating from M&Ms.

This matters because often the hard things are the good things. The difficult things are the ones that make the biggest change.

What’s your addiction? What’s the thing keeping you in the death spiral that you loath? Is it sugar? A bad relationship? An addiction to being busy? Screen time? Anxiety? Stress? Coffee?

What’s your trigger? How do you remove it from your life?

I am in no way saying that I now don’t consume processed sugar, that would be naive of me to believe. But I am telling you that I am building habits to avoid the spiral, not rules that I can break.

Adults can break rules and rules can break adults. Set yourself habitual goals that make your life better consistently, not worse. Eating all of the available chocolate known to humankind is not a long term habit that I can sustain. Sleeping properly, exercising, working well and enjoying my life are all things that are sustainable if I can keep sugar in check.

It’s been a week with no sugar, daily exercise, meditation, dog walks and fruit and I feel great. Long may it continue.

Funding For 2739 Years

Hey folks,

I was being interviewed on a radio show recently (listen to the podcast here) and just before I went on air I was listening to their news segment. One of the stories was about a bailout that the South African government is handing down to South African Airways.

This most recent “donation” is more than R10bn (±$680m).

So before I was brought on air I did some quick calculations that looked as follows:

SAA will receive R10bn. R10 000 000 000.

Let's put it into clearer context...

The Slow Fund that I launched is giving away R1000 every day to start a side hustle.

If I increased that to R10 000 every day I could fund 1 000 000 businesses! ONE MILLION!

I could fund one business every day with R10 000 for 2739 years with the SAA Bailout. It's disgusting and heartbreaking.

2739 years!

Let’s go back in time to put 2739 years into perspective.

2739 years ago it was the year 718 BCE. Some highlights from 8th century BCE:

• 753 BC: Rome founded by Romulus

• Greece is on a colonization drive

• The first historic solar eclipse is recorded in China

• 747 BC: Nabonassar becomes king of Babylon (yes, Babylon, that’s how far back we are)

It was a long time ago.

I want to put these insanely big numbers that we think we understand into further perspective so let’s do some fun calculations:

• One million seconds is about 11 and a half days.

• One billion seconds is about 32 years.

• One million pennies stacked on top of each other would make a tower 1.6km high.

• One billion pennies stacked on top of each other would make a tower almost 1 400km high.

• A premier league football match is 90 minutes long.

  • You could play ±11 000 football matches in one million minutes.

  • You could play ±11 000 000 football matches in one billion minutes.

• If we gave every person in South Africa an equal share of R1 000 000 they would receive a one-time payment of R0.017.

  If we gave every person in South Africa an equal share of the R10bn SAA bailout, each person would receive a one-time payment of R170.

• If you would like more visualization of $1bn, click here.

We are not programmed to understand the context of these insane numbers. We normalise them and act as if owning $1bn is normal, possible and expected in the world. It’s not. It’s a staggering amount of money. Perhaps it’s because the words “million”, “billion” and “trillion” are so similar that our brains think that they’re close to one another. They are not as you’ve seen above.

Maybe we should rename the word billion to “fucktonillion” and trillion to “holyshitrillion” so we understand the vast gap between the three figures.

We cannot fall prey to normalising what we read and see in the media. Hearing about Elon Musk’s wealth of $185bn makes us believe that this is normal. It is not. Elon Musk could give everyone (EVERYONE!) in the world $10 and still have $107bn left.

I honestly don’t know what the point of this particular newsletter is but I have been so overwhelmed with anger about the SAA bailout that I had to put these numbers into perspective for myself.

It’s important that we question what we hear and understand about the world around us. Don’t just accept that companies receive bailouts without putting the bailouts into perspective. Don’t accept facts that you don’t understand fully and can’t verify.

Force your brain to make sense of the world around you.

That’s it. That’s all I have this week.

Why You Should Need a License To Nap - Dale Rae on the Curious Cult Podcast

In this episode of the Curious Cult, Dale Rae and I chat about the science of sleep, how certain things in society (like working hours) are built around some, but not everyone, and about the power of consistency. This is a fascinating conversation and is worthwhile listening to even if you’re exceptional at sleep.

Dale is the founder of Sleep Science, a former senior researcher at the University of Cape Town. She’s obsessed with the science of sleep and is also the mother of two little kids and is passionate about mountain biking. 

Key takeaways from the episode

Sleep deprivation is a dangerous badge of honour

Many people, especially startup founders and entrepreneurs, glamorise a lack of sleep and seem proud of living on 3-4 hours a night. But it’s not sustainable and the body’s ability to take abuse in the short to medium-term can lead to long-term problems and a severe lack of sleep will catch up years down the line.

Choose your preference: Work in the way that works for you

“Night owls” and “larks” speaks to a sleep pattern and habit, but it goes much deeper than that. According to Dale’s research, the way you are biologically inclined to sleep affects everything in your day, like your exercise routines, your creative efficiency, and your eating habits. So whether you are a night owl or a lark, do your best to build your day around your most productive and efficient times instead of trying to force habit against your biological preference. 

Data is important, but over-tracking can be inefficient

Tracking data can be helpful if there’s a problem and you’re looking to solve it or improve it. But if the data is overanalysed, you might end up trying to solve a problem that isn’t there. For example, if you start tracking your sleep, it can give you interesting data which you might be able to use to better your habits. But if the information contradicts how you are feeling on the day-to-day, measuring it and over-interpreting it might not actually be helpful. 

The golden rule: Consistency is key

With all things in life - from sleep to exercise, work to food - developing routines around consistency is the best way to establish sustainable habits. It’s important to recognise that flexibility is important too. Instead of forcing a bedtime at a certain time, having a range of about an hour or so leads to routines that are far more likely to last. In the same way in work, remember to include flexibility in your regime and take breaks to maximise your efficiency. 

To keep updated on Dale and Sleep Science, you can find out more information here, on Instagram and on Facebook. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it far and wide and let’s start changing the world with curiosity.

One-Trick Pony

I’m a curious person.

I’m also an obsessive person.

This combination can be magical but also infuriating.

Magical because I explore everything and anything that interests me. I mean it when I say that. I can’t turn my brain off. The other day, for no good reason, I investigated the history of peanut butter. Turns out that peanut butter has a reasonably interesting history tied to the Incas and Dr Kellogg, yes the cereal guy. Outside of being interesting the peanut butter research was pretty useless. I abandoned the article and wasted about 2 hours of my day.

Which brings me to the infuriating part of my curiosity. Sometimes I go wide and then I go a bit wider and then after a few hours I’ve found myself on an obscure Reddit page in the depths of the Internet about a psychedelic trip report focused on hallucinations that people share across locations and time. It can get weird.

My obsession with curiosity also extends to a podcast that I host called the Curious Cult. Recently one of my guests gifted me a phrase that I didn’t know I was looking for. She told me that sometimes you have to investigate your curiosity along a horizontal plane and sometimes you need to investigate along a vertical plane.

Sometimes you need to go wide and sometimes you need to go deep.

But therein lies an interesting conundrum; when do you choose to dive into a specific topic? This is one of the most interesting questions I ask on my podcast and the answer is almost universally the same. Most guests will tell me that they go deep when the absolutely can’t stop themselves. They become obsessed. They just can’t bring themselves to move on. The curiosity grips them and they must know more about the particular topic of interest.

Obsession and curiosity are intimately tied together but often we force ourselves to move on because we believe that our obsession verges on strange, odd or useless.

I don’t remember a world without the Internet. I was ten years old when I first connected to the web and since then I have learned and relearned one universal truth: There is something out there for everyone online.

Your strange curiosity about Italy and all things Italian might feel strange because you live in Djibouti. But it’s precisely this odd interest that sets you apart. Your wide curiosity which differs from the people around you makes you interesting. Embrace it, go deep and lose yourself in it and then emerge and apply the lessons you’ve learned to your own context.

The smashing together of unexpected things sets people apart.

My random deep-dive into the history of peanut butter may not have been practically useful but it really did engage me for a few hours.

What are you smashing together? Comment and tell me about your strangest curiosity and how it has changed your life. I’d LOVE to hear about them all!

Explore your curiosity horizontally and when something inspires or intrigues you don’t be shy to dive in vertically and spend time exploring. Sure, my peanut butter article didn’t amount to anything but I do know that it was invented more than 3500 years ago and that’s pretty cool.

Monte Carlo

On August 18, 1913, in the Monte Carlo Casino, something incredible happened.

At one of the roulette tables, the ball fell in black 26 times in a row.

That impossible streak of black destroyed many gamblers that day. The odds of hitting black 26 times in a row are a staggering 1 in 66.6 million. As the gamblers at the table continued to see black hit, they bet on the odds that a red streak would follow. It never did. So they kept losing money.

This event is the most famous example of the Gambler’s Fallacy. The Gambler’s Fallacy is the incorrect assumption that if a particular event occurs more frequently than normal during the past it is less likely to happen in the future (or vice versa). The ball lands in black 26 times, it has to land on red for a streak next, right? Wrong.

Humans look for patterns, streaks, signals and cues to help them make decisions. But here’s the thing, we are shit at recognising our own bias in relation to the streaks or patterns we see.

Do you remember taking your final year multiple-choice exams? Do you remember thinking to yourself: The last four answers were “A”, I know it. The next answer cannot be “A”. It can’t be. They’d never create a test that way. Never! So you chose “B” even though you kinda knew it was “A”. That’s the Gambler’s Fallacy at work. People believe that a short sequence of random events should be representative of longer ones when in fact this is not true.

Tossing a coin and seeing heads land 10 times in a row does not show that the next toss is more likely to be tails. It’s still a 50/50 shot that it’ll be either.

This fallacy exists everywhere. The more you think about it, the more you’ll realise how little control you have over your decisions. You’re gambling every day with every decision all the time and you don’t even know it. Your brain is hunting for patterns, sequences, cues and signals. We're hunting without even knowing it. These perceived patterns are screwing with your ability to make good decisions.

Life is not balanced. It is not fair. It is not sensible. It’s random but humans hate that. Humans hate to admit that life is random. We despise the idea that we have no ability to predict what is going to happen next. No real ability to give ourselves even the slightest of advantages.

Gambling is not fair but gamblers have a false belief that it is or they wouldn’t gamble. Chance itself is not fair or just or balanced. It’s chance. But we want it to be a fair process that balances out in the event of streaks. Life is the same. It’s not predictable, it’s not fair, it’s all over the place, random, fun, exciting, strange and intense. It can’t be any other way.

Pattern recognition is an important tool in your arsenal but it’s only one tool. You need more than patterns to make decisions or you’re gambling with your future.

Start looking for facts. Look for the cold hard truth about your situation. Look for the things you can control, not the probabilities of the things that may or may not arrive. It’s comforting to think that what worked for us in the past will work for us in the future but it’s naive. The world is different today, you are different today. Millions of variables are different today and need to be considered

Your life is more than a series of streaks, patterns and events that repeat themselves to give you an edge.

Nobody Gives a Shit About You

Here’s the cold, hard truth:

Nobody gives a shit about you.

You don’t care about me. Not really. Not deeply. Probably not at all if you had to think about it for a nanosecond.

And I don’t care about you. Not really. I'm not sitting here thinking about what you are about to do, say, think, believe or launch.

One of the most liberating realisations of my life was when I realised that nobody gives a shit about me. I am awake and free because I know people are egocentric and believe the spotlight is on themselves and not me.

Don't be scared of what other people might think.
Don't be scared to launch that business.
Don't be scared to speak your mind.
Don't be scared to talk about your big idea.

Nobody is waiting for your to fail or succeed.

How does this make you feel?

Shannon Esra - Flourish, follow-through and the power of words

In this episode of the Curious Cult, I chat with Shannon Esra about the reason and purpose of life, what success can be, choosing new roles in acting and becoming new people in the process and the danger ego has in the world of curiosity.

Shannon is an actor, a storyteller, vehemently curious and a firm believer in the power of words and action in the experience of life. She’s the star in the recently released thriller crime drama Lionness where she taps into inherent strength.

Key take aways from the episode

Having only one reason for being can be limiting 

“The meaning of life is discovering your gift and the purpose of life is sharing it.”

Shannon believes that there is more to life than just one reason for being. When you find the thing that makes your soul sing, it’s important to work on it and see it grow, but that one thing doesn’t encompass every single facet of life. 

You can’t have the flourish without the follow-through

Words without action are meaningless. In business, relationships, habits and life, it’s crucial to follow up on something you say you’re going to do. 

To become something else, you need to know who you are

Beyond acting, the ability to step into a role (like a business owner, founder, creative), requires self-knowledge. It means you can let yourself explore new avenues without attaching your entire worth to it. It might influence you, but you can healthily adapt the elements of the new “you” to your life.

Ego cripples curiosity

The more you think you know, the less you’re interested in seeking knowledge. If you discard ego, you realise how much you don’t know and you’re more likely to invest time and curiosity into exploring and discovering new things.

You can choose what pain to bear (and cut misery out of your life)

Hardship in life is a given, there will always be struggles. But you can choose to cut out things - both external and internal - which make you unhappy. If it’s a relationship that leads to misery or an unreasonable pressure to do something, you can choose to let go of it and learn from it. 

Goals can be shifted and led to authentic success

It can be detrimental to your health (in all aspects) if you’re clinging on to something on which you’re pinning your success. Shannon found that she spent far too much time believing that she had to be a Hollywood actor to be successful. But letting go of that strongly held belief and finding success across her life has led to more authentic achievements. 

To keep updated on Shannon, find her on Instagram and Twitter. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it far and wide and let’s start changing the world with curiosity.

Stretching is Useless

Do you ever stretch?

I remember rugby practice at school, we used to stretch a lot. From grade 8 to first-team rugby, we would stand in a circle around the captain or coach and they would guide us through a 15-minute body stretch. We were taught that stretching is good for your muscles and prevents injury.

When we stretch before we exercise we think we’re loosening up the muscles to prepare them for what’s coming. We’re wrong. The science just doesn’t support the theory that stretching prevents injury.

A doctor recently told me that our muscles can only extend as far as they can extend. We think that we’re stretching our muscles before we start our exercise, but we’re not.

WE ARE STRETCHING OUR BRAINS!

When we stretch and then repeat the stretches day after day to increase how limber we are, what we’re actually doing is teaching our brains the existing limits of our muscles. We’re not increasing our muscles limberness. It’s our brains that are holding us back. Our brains think that our muscles are going to snap if we don’t consistently stretch them.

Of course, there are exceptions that prove the rule. If you are doing an activity like gymnastics or ballet that requires specific types of flexibility (like doing the splits) stretching probably won’t enhance your performance either

What else is my brain restricting? Was I actually like the main character in the film Limitless? Could it be possible that a single change could unlock my brain’s full potential?

Of course, I had to stop writing this newsletter immediately and watched Limitless for further research.

The main character takes a pill that unlocks his the full potential of his brain. It turns him into a genius in every aspect of his life with obvious Hollywood side effects.

I don’t think there is a pill that does this yet (cocaine users might claim this as a side effect of their drug use) but I do think that there is something that we can do to train our brains to embrace crazy limits.

Could it be self-belief? The love of a decent person? Parental guidance? None or all of these? Maybe.

But I think it all starts with curiosity.

Curiosity is your gateway drug to realising the impossible. The more curious you are about something the more you’re going to realise you don’t know and should know. If you believe something with all your might then you should be curious about it, you should challenge what you know about it and you should push the boundaries of what you accept as normal.

Stretching your muscles, stretching your acceptance of ideals and stretching your fundamental beliefs all involve pushing yourself to the limit of what you once held sacred. There is nothing sacred. There are no sacred cows in the world of the curious.

If you truly believe something then the only way to continue to believe it is to challenge it. You thought that stretching was helping you but it isn’t.

What else should you be challenging?

Nothing is Decided For You

When I was seven years old I decided that I wanted to be a war correspondent.

That idea stuck in my head for more than a decade. It stuck with me even when my father and uncle berated me because I would be poor (journalists don’t make a lot of money). It stuck with me even though I barely qualified to go to university to study journalism. It stuck with me all the way up until I started studying journalism.

At some point, while studying journalism I realised that I didn’t want to be a war correspondent any more. I completed my undergraduate degree in journalism and bolted out of the small town as soon as I could. I tried half-heartedly to follow the path set out before me but my heart just wasn’t in it.

It’s a funny thing having a dream and then watching it, letting it, fade away.

I have watched people with lofty dreams, insane goals and wild ambitions achieve the things they set out to do. I have watched as their dreams are realised and turn into nightmares. What the hell do you do at the age of 19 when your dreams have been realised? I have watched as their success destroyed them. I have watched as it dawned on them that money does not make you happy (it makes it easier to find happiness, but that’s a different newsletter).

Conversely, I have watched people dream of something and never realise it. I have watched as they shift their lives to try and accommodate a goal that will never be achieved. I have watched people turn into depressing mush because they believe they are mediocre and always will be. These people refuse to admit that their dreams are passed and that it’s OK to find new dreams, aspire to new things and want a different life.

These people don’t realise that nothing is decided.

There is no predetermined path.

There is always, always, ALWAYS a choice.

You will never be younger than you are today and you have agency. You are allowed to change direction if you choose to do so.

A dish from ONA restaurant

There is a vegan restaurant in south-west France that has been awarded a Michelin Star. This is noteworthy for many reasons, the least of which is that very few vegan restaurants have been awarded a Michelin star.

Claire Vallée is the chef at ONA and the most noteworthy part of this story to me is that she holds a doctorate in archaeology. The 41-year-old chef is self-taught and became vegan after a trip to Thailand. At some point, she decided that her archaeology doctorate wasn’t for her. She took a summer job at a restaurant and 8 years later hadn’t left. She then trained as a pastry chef and on a trip to Thailand became vegan. The rest, as they say, is food in your stomach.

Did you dream of being a painter? Then paint.

Did you dream of being a writer? Then write.

Did you dream of being a guitarist? Then learn to play.

Did you want to be a dentist but your family wanted you to be a lawyer? Then go back to school.

Nothing is decided. There is no predetermined path. There is always a choice and you have the time to be whomever or whatever you always wanted to be. Sure, the choice may be difficult, it may cause pain in the short term, it may leave a wake of destruction behind it, but you still have a choice.

Uncertainty is no longer an unfamiliar experience for the world

In this episode of the Curious Cult, I chat with Yossi Hasson about why connecting with “who” is more important than connecting with “what”, how uncertainty opens up opportunity and how limits can enhance curiosity.

Yossi is a tech entrepreneur born and raised in South Africa and started his first business at 21 years. He has a wealth of experience from building and scaling the tech-focused business and helping tech startups grow and develop through an accelerator while launching a non-profit coding school training Africa’s next coders over the next ten years. Now living in New York, he works in a venture capital field with a focus on the fintech sector, investing in interesting projects.

Key take aways from the episode

Before Covid, uncertainty was unfamiliar, but for entrepreneurs, uncertainty is as normal as a Tuesday

Identity is often linked to certainty - in business, in personality, in relationships. But accepting uncertainty opens up a dynamic world where things can change. Challenges still emerge and it’s not easy, but being open to adaptation makes change slightly easier to accept. 

Immediate thinking is not efficient, but looking down the line puts things into perspective

Zooming out and reflecting on how the day-to-day might impact years down the line is a helpful metric in life. You’ll find that the most important things are linked to connection and the “who”, rather than the “what”. Replacing questions like:

“What are you trying to do?”

“What do title do you want to have?”

“What do you see yourself doing?” 

with

“Who are you connecting with?” 

“Who do you see yourself as?” 

“Who do you want to be?”

can lead to building much more solid scaffolding in life.

Constraints cause creativity

Putting boundaries on creativity can force your mind to think to produce. Yossi puts an hour cap on his writing every day and has found his writing has been far more productive and the compressed timeline forces creativity to the forefront of one’s mind.

(Find Yossi’s writing by signing up to his newsletter.)

If you work with consistency, you’re bound to find some level of success

The more you do something, not only the better you get at it, but the more likely your chances are to find success. It goes hand-in-hand with the age-old adage, don’t try and you will fail. The more you try, the more your odds increase at succeeding. 

Trying something new either gives you a positive or negative result - it’s worthwhile finding out

Yossi dove into the blockchain and cryptocurrency space when it was still a novelty in the tech world. Curiosity drove him to the industry, conviction kept him there. Having the grit to keep ticking with excitement yields a positive outcome. 

Ego hinders progress and reputation risks growth

To be curious, you have to be brave. When you fail, you open yourself up to vulnerability. If you don’t care about ego, you’re more open to failure, which means you’re more open to learning and progress.

To keep updated on Yossi, find him on Twitter and subscribe to his daily-ish newsletter here. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it far and wide and let’s start changing the world with curiosity.

Trying to Be the Best Is Killing You

Very few people in the world become the best of the best of the best in any field.

Lebron James

Lewis Hamilton

Jay Z, Elon Musk

Serena Williams

Taylor Swift

Jeff Bezos

Bill Gates

Warren Buffet

Ariana Huffington

Angela Merkel

Oprah Winfrey

Kamala Harris

Susan Wojcicki

Sheryl Sandberg

Jacinda Ardern

Beyoncé Knowles

Sara Blakely

The above are all astounding exceptions to the very average human experience. Tabloids, the Internet and social media give us unprecedented access to these exceptional people. This access tricks us into thinking we know them and are like them.

We feel connected to them because we can “like” their Instagram photos. We feel like we know them because we can listen to their podcasts. We think they are like us because we see them in the tabloids. We think we can become them if we work a little harder, think a little bigger or do a little bit more. That’s what we’re told by clickbait headlines and listicles we’re fed all day every day. Work a little more and inch closer to billionaire status. Pffft.

Here’s the thing… We are not these people.

I’m not Jeff Bezos (in spite of rocking the same haircut) and likely never will be. There is a not-so-small part of us that believes we deserve to be a billionaire or famous or exceptional in some way. I am sorry if I am popping a make-believe bubble you have created for yourself but it’s the truth.

You are never going to become a billionaire.

I don’t believe that this is a sad realisation at all.

Aspiring to be in the top 1% is what is slowly and consistently driving so many people crazy. We spend our lives trying to be something that we don’t understand and don’t truly want. We don’t understand what it takes to become the best in any given field and we don’t understand what it’s like to be famous or a billionaire. Why? Because we only see the curated results of the most famous and exceptional people in the world.

We don’t see the lost relationships.

We don’t see the pain and suffering required to become great.

We don’t see the anguish, sacrifice and loss that accompanies generational excellence.

We don't see that at some point money stops making you happy.

We see the version that keeps us on the hamster wheel. We see the version that locks us into the doomscrolling. We see the outcome, not the work.

Elon Musk sleeps in his boardroom. One day in 2007, Arianna Huffington was at home on the phone and checking emails when she passed out, fell, and woke up in a pool of blood, with a broken cheekbone and a cut over her eye. She worked herself into collapse.

We don’t see these moments.

We don’t see the suffering but we still want the glory.

What if we stopped wanting the glory of being the world’s best or wealthiest or happiest or biggest? What if we aimed for enough?

Did you know that the ideal income for happiness is about $75 000 per annum? There's research to back this up. A new study takes this even further: "We found that the ideal income point is $95,000 for life evaluation and $60,000 to $75,000 for emotional well-being..." explained Andrew T. Jebb, a doctoral student at Purdue University.

There is even more research involving wealthy individuals that illustrates tiny marginal increases in happiness as you increase your wealth:

Results showed those with a net worth of $3-$7.9 million US were no more satisfied with their lives than those with a net worth of $1.5-$2.9 million US. It wasn’t until net worth climbed to $8-$14.9 million US that respondents reported higher life satisfaction. Lastly, those with a net worth of $15+ million US reported being marginally more satisfied than the lower tier millionaires.

There is a very clear point at which money stops buying you happiness. We aspire to have an insane amount of money because we think that money can buy us happiness but it can’t.

So what’s the point of all this?

Enough.

Having enough is the point.

If you are an unhappy person with enough money you will be an unhappy person with a billion dollars. If you are unhappily above average you will be unhappily excellent. Achieving things does not make us happy indefinitely. Buying things definitely doesn’t make us happy.

I am trying to find enough in life.

Enough time to do the things I love to do.

Enough money to not worry about money.

Enough pain to appreciate the joy.

Enough sadness to enjoy the happiness.

Enough work to enjoy the play.

Enough.

I understand that billionaire status is not for me and becoming a world leader in my field will not make me happier.

I want to do the work that I love and I want enough. If that combination one day helps me reach the pinnacle of my field then so be it.

So, if you’re looking for me, I’ll be right here doing the work.

Be More Like Blue Cheese

I love blue cheese.

That mouldy, funky, pungent smell smacks me in the face when I smell it and the creamy, earthy, luxurious flavour wakes up my tastebuds when I eat it.

I truly do love blue cheese and I know some of you will agree with me.

I also know that many of you violently disagree with me.

I can’t think of anyone who is indifferent to blue cheese. You either love it or you hate it with a passion. It makes you gag or you have dreams about blue cheese pizza.

That’s exactly why you need to be more like blue cheese in your life.

A guy called Derek Sivers wrote a book called Hell Yeah or No and I am in love with this basic concept. Here’s the short version from his original blog post:

“If you’re not saying “HELL YEAH!” about something, say “no”.”

Like blue cheese; “Hell Yeah!” or “No”.

I strive for this level of certainty with everything in my life (except what to order for takeout or what to watch on Netflix, obviously). My friends and family, my business acquaintances and partners, my weekend activities, books I read, shows I watch and everything in between. HELL YEAH or no.

Everyone in my life knows where they stand with me. We’re either friends or we’re not. You like me or you don’t. I spend time with you or I don’t. We talk often or we don’t. There is no ambiguity. Like blue cheese.

Seeking bland is daft.

Hunting for the middle-ground is a massive mistake.

I am not suggesting that if you aren’t stupidly successful or wealthy that you have failed and found the perilous middle, no. I am suggesting that we must always have strong opinions, we must always try to be motivated and moved by the things that we are doing.

Of course, there are parts of life that are never going to be hedonistic like taking a shit or a shower. But why hang around with people who bore you? Why work on things that don’t inspire you? Why live with people who make you worse?

If you love blue cheese, eat it. If you don’t then find the cheese that you do love and eat it.

Where do you stand on blue cheese? Where do you think you stand in life? Middle-ground?

Do plan on moving away from the middle?

Nik Rabinowitz - How to be a happy comedian and what to do about the ego

In this episode of the Curious Cult, I have a fantastic chat with Nik Rabinowitz about how he got into the world of comedy, his relationship with comparison and dealing with the ego. Nik is a full-time stand-up comedian, a part-time sit-down comedian (thanks to Zoom and online comedy shows), a parent of three, and an all-round fascinating human.

In this episode of the Curious Cult, I have a fantastic chat with Nik Rabinowitz about how he got into the world of comedy, his relationship with comparison to other comedians, and dealing with the ego.

Nik is a full-time stand-up comedian, a part-time sit-down comedian (thanks to Zoom and online comedy shows), a parent of three, and an all-round fascinating human.

Key take aways from the episode

Don’t write off unique skills - you don’t realise where they might lead you 

When doing something that interests you, you might not know how the skills you are picking up could go somewhere exciting. Nik never realised he could be an entertainer by trade, telling his stories to an audience. Only when someone suggested he took to the stage, his career blew up.

Support goes a long way, but going against expectations can be surprisingly fulfilling 

Even if those close to you don’t see the same vision as you, it’s still worth trying something that could change your life. Nik’s mother was “concerned” about his idea of moving into comedy after getting a degree in business. But he stuck with his vocation and is now ticking all the boxes of Ikigai.  

Don’t let life happen to you - take the lessons and run with them

Life throws drama at us, it’s inevitable. But if you interrogate scenarios and change your perspective in life, you’ll get a lot more out of the circumstances - and grow from them.

Work through mental roadblocks - they won’t disappear unless you move them or move around them

“Nobody’s ever got talker’s block.” If you’re a writer and struggle to write - train against that. Just write through the writer’s block. If you’re creative and hit a mental roadblock - work through it. If you’re in another industry where you can get stuck in a lack of motivation - work through it. Motivation is just discipline that gets worked on. 

Comparison is the thief of joy

If you constantly focus on getting to where someone else is, you’ll find yourself struggling for happiness. Self-work is far more important than trying to get someone else’s life. 

Treat the ego like a monster - give it lots of space

Ego often gets in the way of critical, clear thinking and taking feedback positively. We tend to take things personally or completely disengage. Instead of trying to let the ego go, respect it, give it the space it needs and learn lessons with it and not against it.

To keep updated on Nik’s movements, catch him on LinkedIn, on Twitter and on Instagram. If you enjoyed this episode, please share it far and wide and let’s start changing the world with curiosity.