The False Self

One of my favorite follows over the last year or so is a founder named Brent Beshore. We are in very different worlds, but he writes, shares and thinks with tremendous consideration, empathy and almost amusement that I am drawn to him, even from afar.

He recently published his firm’s annual letter where he talked about what deals they had invested in over the last year and what the future looked like. It was a more personal section about fear and love that I found to be the most compelling, though.

An under-appreciated offshoot of this mentality – of which I’m all too familiar – is to attempt heroics. Heroes act out of self-interest, not care for the other. They’re splashy and exciting, glory-seeking and unrelatable. Heroes crave praise, not justice, and ultimately control. Heroes take control from the object of their heroics, creating a victim and often more harm. The difference between heroics and meaningful help is a relationship. To truly help someone you have to really know them, including how they want to be helped.

And then every once in a while you come across someone operating from the other worldview — love.

I can distinctly remember times in my life when I was shocked by someone’s love. It carries with it an aroma so strong it’s impossible to forget. It’s sacrificial and abundant, and unconcerned with the self. It wants the best for you no matter what you offer in return. It comes from a place of relationship, connectivity, and care.
–Brent Beshore

The type of person I want to be.

Thrilling Current Customers

I’m stealing this from James Clear’s lightly read newsletter. It’s a great reminder when it comes to business.

“Never forget that absolutely everything you do is for your customers. Make every decision — even decisions about whether to expand the business, raise money, or promote someone — according to what’s best for your customers.

If you’re ever unsure what to prioritize, just ask your customers the open-ended question, “How can I best help you now?” Then focus on satisfying those requests…

It’s counterintuitive, but the way to grow your business is to focus entirely on your existing customers. Just thrill them, and they’ll tell everyone.”

Source: Anything You Want

Nobody does this. So few business try to thrill current customers. So many try to thrill new customers, which is expensive and tiring but also such an easy trap to fall into.

The beauty of work

I enjoyed this, which was part of a much longer thread, by Patrick O’Shaughnessy.

There’s nothing like someone immersed in a field they love, no matter what the field.

I have found this to be true both in my own life and in observing the lives of others.

The Shortcoming of Accomplishment

This mini-documentary on Nathan Barry and his journey at ConvertKit is worth all of your time, but this quote in particular stood out.

When you derive your self-worth from what you accomplish, if your ability to accomplish or create things ever goes away, you’ve actually built it all on a really shaky foundation.
Nathan Barry

Endurance

C.S. Lewis on endurance. He doesn’t call it that, but that’s what it is.

I read this quote at 30 and thought it seemed directionally correct.

At 40, I consider it to be one of the most insightful and accurate statements ever made. pic.twitter.com/LKYSrzb1fH
— Brent Beshore (@BrentBeshore) June 25, 2023

This is True

"Here's the number I used to win the lottery"

–Entrepreneurs giving advice
— Andrew Wilkinson (@awilkinson) September 30, 2022

Building Something to Love

This quote from AirBNB founder Brian Chesky is so good, conveys so much.

“Build something 100 people love, not something 1,000,000 people kind of like.”

–Marketing Plug Newsletter

On how we read

Loved this.

What you read can give you access to untold knowledge. But how you read changes the trajectory of your life.
Farnam Street

On Earnestness in the Modern World

I really loved this on earnestness.

The bright lives of a few, though, pierce through this spiritual fog, and sparkle with a reality that has grown dim for many. Their words, their priorities, their responses repeatedly reveal that Christ has captured their fuller devotion. They delight to sacrifice and serve when others would groan and make excuses. They seem stronger in the face of adversity, kinder in the midst of conflict, more joyful than others, even in suffering. They have a focus that eludes the stressed and distracted. We’re drawn to them (and perhaps sometimes intimidated by them), because their lives remind us of what really matters, of the world that exists below the surface of our senses, of the spiritual war for our souls. Time with them stimulates us to pray more, love more, and grow more.
These saints have many qualities in common, but one is that, in the words of 2 Corinthians 8:7, they excel in earnestness.
DG

Hypnosis in Writing

I have thought about different parts of this on David McCullough over the last few days.

“People often ask me if I’m working on a book,” he said in an interview with The New York Times in 1992. “That’s not how I feel. I feel like I work in a book. It’s like putting myself under a spell. And this spell, if you will, is so real to me that if I have to leave my work for a few days, I have to work myself back into the spell when I come back. It’s almost like hypnosis.”
NYT