paul graham – Page 2

Personal Bible: recent additions on procrastination, life metaphors, Buddhism, and the Power of Now

So I keep a personal bible, a word document to collect and organize my favorite writings and wisdom across just about every topic of interest, from world history to self improvement to tech startups. Just some of the authors included in it: Warren Buffett, Jack Ma, JK Rowling, Rainer Rilke, even a passage from the Bible itself.

Every few months, I add new stuff to the personal bible and remove or prune old stuff. Below is a collection of what I’ve added in this most recent update.

Here’s more on the concept.

Here’s a past update.

Everyone can create such a document for themselves. Like the Christian Bible, it can become a reliable source of strength and support for you, serving as a crutch through hard times, or as a simple daily reminder of what’s wonderful and wise in life.

You can modify or improve on mine if you like. Here’s the PDF download.

All notes below are copied verbatim from the original text, unless otherwise noted.

Howard Stevenson on why juggling is a better metaphor for life than balancing

I think it’s about juggling. The juggling metaphor is a lot more apt. One of the things about juggling is that you’ve got to keep your eye on all the balls. A second thing about juggling is each time you touch something you have to give it energy. You’ve got to throw it up in the air so that it takes care of itself while you’re working on the others. You’ve also got to throw the balls thoughtfully and carefully. That requires a lot of practice. The third thing about juggling, though, is you’ve got to catch the falling ball. The most important ball is the one that’s about to hit the ground.

PG’s Life is Short

Relentlessly prune bullshit, don’t wait to do things that matter, and savor the time you have. That’s what you do when life is short.

Your instinct when attacked is to defend yourself. But like a lot of instincts, this one wasn’t designed for the world we now live in. Counterintuitive as it feels, it’s better most of the time not to defend yourself. Otherwise these people are literally taking your life.

PG on Procrastination

That’s the sense in which the most impressive people I know are all procrastinators. They’re type-C procrastinators: they put off working on small stuff to work on big stuff.

Richard Hamming suggests that you ask yourself three questions: What are the most important problems in your field? Are you working on one of them? Why not?

I think the way to “solve” the problem of procrastination is to let delight pull you instead of making a to-do list push you.

Highlights from The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson

the most important causes of change are…in the hidden factors that alter the boundaries where power is exercised.

Most democracies run chronic deficits. This is a fiscal policy characteristic of control by employees. Governments seem notably resistant to reducing the costs of their operations.

Governments have never established stable monopolies of coercion over the open sea…This is a matter of the utmost importance in understanding how the organization of violence and protection will evolve as the economy migrates into cyberspace, which has no physical existence at all.

Bethke Elshtain observed, nationstates indoctrinate citizens more for sacrifice than aggression: “The young man goes to war not so much to kill as to die, to forfeit his particular body for that of the large body, the body politic.”

The average psychotherapist probably gives the patient less good moral advice on how to lead his life than the average Jew would have received from his teacher in the period of Moses.

Highlights from What the Buddha Taught by Walpola Rahula

What we call a ‘being’, or an ‘individual’, is only a convenient name or a label given to the combination of [the Five Aggregates]. They are all impermanent, all constantly changing. ‘Whatever is impermanent is dukkha’

According to Buddhism for a man to be perfect there are two qualities that he should develop equally: compassion on one side, and wisdom on the other.

The moment you think ‘I am doing this’, you become self-conscious, and then you do not live in the action, but you live in the idea ‘I am’

It may be agreeable for certain people to live a retired life in a quiet place away from noise and disturbance. But it is certainly more praiseworthy and courageous to practise Buddhism living among your fellow beings, helping them and being of service to them.

‘Ever mindful he breathes in, and ever mindful he breathes out. Breathing in a long breath, he knows “I am breathing in a long breath”; breathing out a long breath, he knows “I am breathing out a long breath”; breathing in a short breath, he knows “I am breathing in a short breath”; breathing out a short breath, he knows “I am breathing out a short breath”.

He whose senses are mastered like horses well under the charioteer’s control, he who is purged of pride, free from passions, such a steadfast one even the gods envy.

Highlights from The Power of Now by Eckhart Tolle

Give your fullest attention to whatever the moment presents. This implies that you also completely accept what is, because you cannot give your full attention to something and at the same time resist it.

Your outer journey may contain a million steps; your inner journey only has one: the step you are taking right now. As you become more deeply aware of this one step, you realize that it already contains within itself all the other steps as well as the destination.

You see time as the means to salvation, whereas in truth it is the greatest obstacle to salvation.

The greatest catalyst for change in a relationship is complete acceptance of your partner as he or she is, without needing to judge or change them in any way.

God is Being itself, not a being.

What’s your ministry?

Jim Carrey’s commencement address at Maharishi University is quintessential Carrey: mostly hilarious, sometimes awkward, and very deep. Among the many parts that stayed with me, this was one of my favorites:

I realized one night in LA that the purpose of my life had always been to free people from concern, like my dad. When I realized this, I dubbed my new devotion, “The Church of Freedom From Concern” — “The Church of FFC”— and I dedicated myself to that ministry. What’s yours?

To a young Carrey, his purpose wasn’t just to tell jokes onstage and get paid. It was greater: He wanted to free people from their everyday concerns, from the worries of their workaday lives. The Church of FFC. And over his almost 4-decade Hollywood career, he has preached his message to countless acolytes.

His use of the word “ministry” is particularly interesting. He doesn’t use the words mission or passion, not once in the speech. He specifically calls his life purpose a ministry, and he uses the Church metaphor to hammer his point.

Wikipedia defines Christian ministry in the following way:

Ministry is an activity carried out by Christians to express or spread their faith, the prototype being the Great Commission. [It is] “carrying forth Christ’s mission in the world”, indicating that it is “conferred on each Christian in baptism.”

Religious wisdom is a big interest of mine. I try to spend some time each day learning from and practicing different religious traditions. Even if it is a few minutes reading from my Personal Bible, or ten minutes of quiet morning meditation. I don’t consider myself a dyed in the wool member of any labelled tradition (here is more about my approach to faith, inspired by Sri Ramakrishna). I find uplift and community in going to Church on Sundays (and like to sing the songs). I receive calm and clarity from long meditation sessions. Feel a sense of discipline and rigor in learning about zakat and salat in Islam, wisdom in reading excerpts of the Talmud and Midrashim. So Carrey’s anecdote got me thinking: What is my ministry? What is yours?

Within the realm of self help and productivity, we are often taught the value of having a life mission, a personal mission statement. To me, the concept of a personal ministry differs from a mission in at least two important ways:

A ministry is evangelical. The root of “evangelism” is good news. As an evangelist, your job is to spread the good word, the good book, the good news. If you have a ministry, a core part of your job – if not the entire job – is to spread your message, because it is the right thing to do. A mission, on the other hand, could be something you keep to yourself
A ministry is about changing others first. A minister’s job isn’t to transform herself but to serve and lead others. Your mission could be to visit every country in the world. But you wouldn’t call that a ministry unless the main reason you were doing all this travel was to inspire others to follow you. To help others, it helps to be clear about your potential community, your hoped for target audience. Pastors call this their flock. A mission, meanwhile, could start and end with yourself, and doesn’t require an audience

Put differently, you can think of a personal ministry as an outward focused, people first mission. Seen this way, it becomes clear that many of today’s most successful people are essentially such ministers:

NYT columnist David Brooks’s ministry is to teach his educated audience how to think deeply about the moral and spiritual dimensions of life. To live more conscientiously and purposefully amidst all the new technology, the fomo, the hyper speed distraction. Brooks uses the term “moral geniuses” to describe behavioral exemplars like Atul Gawande and Dorothy Day. They are saints in his ministerial canon
Startup investor Paul Graham preaches the value of starting a company, and the power of writing software. His flock is some combination of everyone who can write code and everyone who wants to start a company to control their career destiny. His good news is captured in 100s of essays. His church is the Y Combinator school and his many thousands of dedicated essay readers.
Tim Ferriss has a very dedicated flock who will follow him anywhere: These people want to achieve the dream of a 4 hour workweek, want to optimize every aspect of their lives from their bodies to their relationships to their morning routines. He ministers through his podcast, his blog, and his books

What’s your ministry? I’m slowly discovering mine. Some themes on this blog include the power of habits to give your life structure and meaning, the value of studying all religious traditions for their life advice, and the need to free yourself from outdated and perhaps even harmful social structures — whether the corporate ladder, the addiction to prestige, or the college admissions mouse trap (I prefer “mouse trap” over “rat race”).

Who are the flock you want to attract, inspire, and support? What is the insight bigger than yourself that motivates you to get up every morning and spread across the world?

I leave you with a favorite Indian proverb:

Every morning you wake up and ask yourself, what good things am I going to do today, remember that when the sun goes down at sunset, it will take a part of your life with it

A brief snippet of Paul Graham’s brief writing advice

His original essay is here.

A few favorites (all quoted):

Write a bad version 1 as fast as you can
Expect 80% of the ideas in an essay to happen after you start writing it, and 50% of those you start with to be wrong
…just say the most important sentence first
Read your essays out loud to see…which bits are boring (the paragraphs you dread reading)
Write for a reader who won’t read the essay as carefully as you do

A summary of Paul Graham’s 18 mistakes that kill startups

Those of you that subscribe to my startup newsletter are familiar with my habit of summarizing the best long-form startup articles.

PG has arguably the most comprehensive, well-written set of essays for inexperienced entrepreneurs. Many of his lessons will naturally be acquired when you start companies, because in starting companies you will make mistakes and from mistakes you will learn these lessons, but if you want to avoid at least some of those mistakes, or make different ones instead, you should be reading his essays.

This essay, The 18 Mistakes That Kill Startups, is one of the best and it’s included in the startup newsletter. (subscribe here)

Like most of my blog posts, I write it in part to share advice with readers and in part to remind myself of what’s important.

This sums up the essay:

In a sense there’s just one mistake that kills startups: not making something users want. If you make something users want, you’ll probably be fine, whatever else you do or don’t do. […] So really this is a list of 18 things that cause startups not to make something users want. Nearly all failure funnels through that.

Here are the 18 mistakes:

1. Single Founder – all of the great technology companies had 2 founders (Apple, Microsoft, Google). Although I would argue Mark Zuckerberg and Jeff Bezos have come closest to breaking this rule

2. Bad Location – if you’re serious, be in the Valley (this includes SF)

3. Marginal Niche – avoid small markets, and focus on big problems in big markets

4. Derivative Idea – don’t take an existing success and tweak it in a small way. I think a lot of the “Airbnb for X” or “Heroku for Y” have this problem, too

5. Obstinacy – your original business plan is probably wrong, but it’s important not to change too quickly, either

6. Hiring Bad Programmers – self-explanatory; implied: starting a company as a business founder, without a strong technical cofounder

7. Choosing the Wrong Platform – platforms include Windows, Apple’s App Store, and Facebook; choose carefully since they’re your partner, whether you like it or not

8. Slowness in Launching – get your product into users’ hands as soon as you have a “quantum of utility”, then iterate quickly

9. Launching Too Early – less important than #8, but if you launch too early, you risk hurting your reputation

10. Having No Specific User in Mind – can you envision EXACTLY what your ideal user looks like, how she behaves, and what she wears?

11. Raising Too Little Money – raise enough to get to the next step, and then 50-100% more for buffer

12. Spending Too Much – happens when you hire too many people, and/or pay too much salary (give equity instead)

13. Raising Too Much Money – when this happens, you’re expected to spend it quickly, and your company becomes less nimble

14. Poor Investor Management – ignore them, and they’ll be upset; heavily involve them, and they may wind up calling the shots

15. Sacrificing Users to (Supposed) Profit – we were guilty of this: too much emphasis on finding a business model and earning revenue, before we had a product that users wanted

16. Not Wanting to Get Your Hands Dirty – the best founders do whatever’s necessary to grow the company, in particular understanding their users and acquiring more of them

17. Fights Between Founders – most unresolvable disputes are due to differences between people, not due to the particulars of a situation, so choose your cofounder(s) carefully

18. A Half-Hearted Effort – quit your day job, and be obsessed with your startup

Amazing Media – 10 recommended readings

Recently I’ve begun saving and annotating my favorite blog posts, articles, videos, etc. Here’s the page where I’ll add new stuff (and old stuff, re-discovered).

I’ve learned that the value of great media is not the first time you consume it, but re-absorbing and re-experiencing it over time (and doing so mindfully).

98% of what we consume is crap – shouldn’t we treasure the 2%? You don’t see tennis players practice a new forehand once and just walk away. And there’s a reason why organized religions have ONE TEXT that they read, re-read, and re-re-read.

Here are 10 of my favorites:

It’s Not About You: The Truth About Social Media Marketing by Tim O’Reilly (LinkedIn) – the most effective social media marketing is creating tools and content to help communities achieve their goals. Snippet: Your job, in short, is to uncover and activate latent social networks and interest groups by helping them to reach their own goals.
The Dividing Line (Max Cho) – simple yet profound. If anyone is curious what Jeff Bezos is thinking…
10 Charts About Sex (OkCupid blog) – people are fascinating. Sex is fascinating. People’s sex habits, man! Snippet: Curvy women pass skinny ones in self-confidence at age 29 and never look back. They also consistently have the highest sex drive among the groups. Curvy, as a word, has the strongest sensual overtones of all our self-descriptions. So we’re getting a little insight into the real-world implications of a label.
Applied Philosophy, a.k.a. “Hacking” by Paul Buchheit (Blogspot) – great and simple explanation of a valuable outlook on life and work. Although as important is WHAT you work on – problem choice is as important as the HOW. Snippet: Sometimes we catch a glimpse of the truth, and discover the actual rules of a system. Once the actual rules are known, it may be possible to perform “miracles” — things which violate the perceived rules.
The Puzzle by Christopher Michel (Explorers.com) – beautiful and profound piece by Chris Michel on travel and by extension, life. Snippet: But the answers can’t be found in accumulating more. You knew that already. Well, so did I, but I’m not sure I really believed it. I do now. Happiness is reality minus expectations. And Americans, in particular, have some pretty high expectations. You do the math.
That Which Does Not Kill Me Makes Me Stranger (NYT.com) – fascinating reporting on Jure Robic, one of the world’s greatest ultra-endurance athletes. Snippet: The craziness is methodical, however, and Robic and his crew know its pattern by heart. Around Day 2 of a typical weeklong race, his speech goes staccato. By Day 3, he is belligerent and sometimes paranoid. His short-term memory vanishes, and he weeps uncontrollably. The last days are marked by hallucinations: bears, wolves and aliens prowl the roadside; asphalt cracks rearrange themselves into coded messages. Occasionally, Robic leaps from his bike to square off with shadowy figures that turn out to be mailboxes. In a 2004 race, he turned to see himself pursued by a howling band of black-bearded men on horseback.
33 Animals Who Are Extremely Disappointed In You (Buzzfeed) – hilarious photos
What Is Your Biggest Secret Desire That You Are Ashamed Of Telling Anyone? Reddit – love reddit for precisely these sorts of half-crazy, half-brutally honest windows into human psychology. The top vote-getter: In the middle of the night, I would pack one bag and drive away from my life. Not look back for one second and drive clear across the country. Find a small, rural town and just rebuild where nobody has an idea of who I am.
Cities and Ambition by Paul Graham (PaulGraham.com) – a personal favorite among PG’s non-startup essays. Snippet: How much does it matter what message a city sends? Empirically, the answer seems to be: a lot. […] Most people who did great things were clumped together in a few places where that sort of thing was done at the time.
George Orwell: Why I Write (Orwell.ru) – Snippet: And looking back through my work, I see that it is invariably where I lacked a political purpose that I wrote lifeless books and was betrayed into purple passages, sentences without meaning, decorative adjectives and humbug generally.