Question to reframe your situation:

Does your situation need to change, or just your outlook on it?

I recently came across a story that I love:

Two salesmen were sent by a shoe manufacturer to a rural part of India to investigate and report back on market potential.​

The first salesman reported back, "There is no potential here. Nobody wears shoes."

The second salesman reported back, "There is massive potential here. Nobody wears shoes."

Same situation, very different outlook.

This story is a simple reminder that we can rarely control the situations we are placed in, but we can always control our outlook on those situations.

From time to time, you'll be thrown into the chaos:

• The death of a family member or dear friend
• A job loss that takes our financial situation from good to bad
• Health problems that impact those closest to us
• Relationship struggles with someone who once felt like our rock
• A critical decision that starts to go awry

These situations are impossible to avoid—a harsh reality of life.

But you are always in control of your outlook, your response to these situations.

If you pause, breathe, and create space, a fresh outlook may be all you need.

Quote on the judgment of others:

“And those who were seen dancing were thought to be insane by those who could not hear the music.” ― Friedrich Nietzsche

You need not concern yourself with how others perceive your actions.

You get to dance to your own music.

(​Share this on Twitter!​)

Framework on the dangers of incentives:

The Cobra Effect

Here's a famous story on the power (or danger) of incentives:

There were too many cobras in India.

The British colonists, worried about the dangers of these venomous creatures, devised a plan to reduce the cobra population:

They offered bounties for cobra heads.

Some savvy locals developed a business model: Breed cobras, chop of their heads, turn in cobra heads and collect bounties.

The British realized what was happening and ended the policy.

In response, many of the breeders simply released their now-worthless cobras onto the streets, increasing the population of cobras.

The British viewed cobra heads as a simple measure of cobra elimination, so attached an incentive to turn in cobra heads.

The result? An incentive designed to reduce the cobra population actually increased it.

The Cobra Effect is an example of Goodhart’s Law, which says that when a measure becomes a target, it ceases to be a good measure.

Simply put, if a measure of performance becomes a stated goal, humans tend to optimize for it, regardless of any associated consequences. The measure often loses its value as a measure.

Note: This is a critical issue I cover in my first book as it relates to the cultural pressure to use money as your sole measure of success. For more on the solution, preorder your copy now on Amazon or anywhere books are sold!

Once you internalize this framework, you see it all around you (particularly in the business world).

For example, senior leadership at Wells Fargo viewed new account openings as an easy way to track business growth, so it gave its junior employees target account opening goals. The result? Employees ​opened millions of fake accounts​ to hit their targets and Wells Fargo was fined billions for the fraud.

What other examples of the Cobra Effect can you think of?

Story that hit me hard:

The Pencil’s Tale

This was a really ​neat video​ with five principles for life (my notes in italics):

1. You will be able to do many great things, but only if you put yourself in someone else’s hands. Collaboration and teamwork are an essential part of growth (personally and professionally).
2. You have to endure painful sharpening to become a better version of you. Hard now, easy later. Do hard things.
3. You will be able to correct any mistakes you make along the way. Very few decisions in life are permanent. Most are two-way doors. ​Don't overthink​. Act and react.
4. The most important part of you is what’s on the inside. Let that part of you shine into your interactions with the world.
5. Leave your mark on every surface you touch. Create positive ripples in the world. Every single interaction is a chance to leave someone a little better off than they were before meeting you.

Worth two minutes of your time.

A poem on taking risk in life:

This is a stunningly beautiful poem by Kahlil Gibran:

It is said that before entering the sea
a river trembles with fear.
​
She looks back at the path she has traveled,
from the peaks of the mountains,
the long winding road crossing forests and villages.
​
And in front of her,
she sees an ocean so vast,
that to enter
there seems nothing more than to disappear forever.
​
But there is no other way.
The river cannot go back.
​
Nobody can go back.
To go back is impossible in existence.
​
The river needs to take the risk
of entering the ocean
because only then will fear disappear,
because that's where the river will know
it's not about disappearing into the ocean,
but of becoming the ocean.

You are the river entering the ocean. You need to take the risk.

You will not disappear, but become.