GOOD, Stories in Business, Micro-workouts, Jim Loehr
GOOD, Stories in Business, Micro-workouts, Jim Loehr
Avthar's Weekly Wisdom #41 (02/7/2021)
Welcome to edition #41 of Avthar's Weekly Wisdom!
š„ This newsletter is where I share practical wisdom about self-mastery, startups, health and happiness, all to help you live better. My goal is for you to discover one thing that can change your life, in a big or small way, every week.
To celebrate 41 newsletters in a row, hereās a pic of my favorite #41 (if you know you know)
Life-changing Links
Here's what I want to share with you this week:
š On Self-Mastery āĀ
GOOD: How do you deal with failure and bad situations? Enter the Jocko Willink and the philosophy of GOOD.
Itās a 2 minute video that helps me ground and reset during difficult moments.
š On Investing ā
The Value of Stories in Business: Aswath Damodaran, affectionately known as the āDean of Valuationā, is a Professor of Finance at New York University Stern School of Business. Heās one of the most clear, entertaining and engaging lecturers Iāve ever heard on topics that can be so dry and opaque: finance and investing.
The talk is one of his most accessible and most popular. In it he introduces us to the battle between two camps of investors: the number crunchers vs. the storytellers. Number-crunchers believe that the only things that matter are the numbers and that imagination and creativity are dangerous distractions. Storytellers build on the stories they tell about companies and how these stories will bring untold wealth. Each side believes it has a monopoly on the truth and looks with contempt at the other.Ā
Damodaran argues that stories matter, but only if they are connected with numbers.
And numbers are empty, unless they are connected with narratives.
Using the examples of Uber and Ferrari, he looks at the process by which one might build narratives, check them against reality and convert them into valuations.Ā
If youāre on the fence about watching this, see what a youtuber commented on the video:
Damodaran is a brilliant eloquent speaker. This talk was a joy to watch. It was like watching a stand-up comedy show plus a gripping documentary all at the same time!
š PS If you like the video, check Damodaranās Youtube channel.
It features free full courses and lectures from his NYU Business School MBA program on topics like valuation, corporate finance and investment philosophies. Itās amazing that knowledge like this is freely available online!
šŖ On Health ā
Micro workouts: Back in highschool in Costa Rica, my residence building had a pull up bar. Every time I walked past it, I got on and did 5 pull ups. Some days I would walk past it more than 10 times (especially when procrastinating studying). It was a great practice to add movement to days where I was too busy to go to the gym.
Fast forward to WFH during the COVID-19 pandemic and, in an effort to move more during the day, Iām returning to the same principle:
Rather than working out during one period of the day (e.g 1 hour), why not spread out the workout into small chunks, which are performed throughout the day?
A simple way you can implement this is āOn the hour workoutsā: On the hour, every hour, from 9 AM to 5 PM, you do some sort of exercise (e.g bodyweight squats, push ups, lunges, sit ups, kettlebell swings, walking up stairs, whatever exercise you can!). You can make it more fun by setting daily goals for yourself (e.g 100 squats a day) and by making it social by working out with friends via video call!
š On Happiness ā
Dr. Jim Loehr on the Tim Ferriss Show: Dr. Jim Loehr is a world-renowned performance psychologist and author of 17 books. Despite his focus on performance, Dr. Loehrās work is just as relevant to the art of fulfillment as it is to the science of achievement.Ā
In this interview with Tim Ferriss, Dr. Loehr talks about his most recent book, āLeading with Characterā. He delves into themes which are relevant to us all, in our quest to live happy and fulfilled lives, such as the power of private voice inside our head, how we are at our best when we feel connected to others and how the ultimate scorecard is how we treat others.
I also invite you to journal on the two prompts Dr Loehr mentions:
(1) What 6-8 words describe who you are when youāre most proud of yourself?
(2) What 6-8 words would you like inscribed on your tombstone, if they actually reflected who you were while on earth.
š PS. Long time readers of this newsletter will recognize Jim Loehr from my takeaways from his book, āThe Power of Full Engagementā, from Edition 19.Ā
šØš½āš» What I'm up to these days:
Iāve thrived through the first week of Seth Godinās podcast workshop, which has been a blast. In the daily assignments, we worked on refining podcast titles and descriptions, outlined 10 guests weād like to interview and thought about the most important question of them all: What change are we trying to make in the world?Ā
Iām a guest on Rawkode this Monday (2/8/2021) to talk live about time-series data and TimescaleDB. Checkout the link below if youād like to watch along:
š Thank you again for reading and for your support! Wishing you a week of happiness, success and peace!
AvtharĀ
š¦ @avthars
š avthar.com
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