“The right words can paint a thousand pictures.” — Morley
Don’t do everything in this newsletter.
Because while each week’s issue is packed with ideas to improve your life in all sorts of ways, trying to do them all will have the opposite effect.
It’s easy to get overwhelmed these days with the infinite information at our fingertips and feel like we have to do it all.
We don’t.
And we can’t.
So pick one idea — from this newsletter, a friend, a book, or anywhere else you find a good one — and try it this week.
Ignore the rest.
Do something, not everything.
Now, on to this week’s ideas…
1. HOW TO BETTER HANDLE FAILURE
“If it fails, it means it wasn’t good enough. But it doesn’t mean you’re not good enough.”
This isn’t another post about how failure is good for you. Because failure is only good for if you learn how to handle it.
To help you do that, I share five ways to better handle failure including to determine whether it was a failure of expectations or execution, find the successes within your failure, and ensure you fail at the right things.
2. THE TECHNIQUE AMBITIOUS PEOPLE USE TO GET WHAT THEY WANT
“We are often afraid of putting ourselves out there and being rejected, so we think, ‘Well, I’ll just go and see what happens, but I won’t really try. I’ll wait until they hire me.’”
Most people prepare for job interviews or opportunities the wrong way.
In this Thought Catalog article, Ryan Holiday breaks down the technique ambitious people use to get what they want and points out the difference between going after an opportunity and passively hoping it breaks your way.
He emphasizes the importance of proactively presenting exactly what you would do with an opportunity as opposed to letting other people guide the interaction.
3. 10 WRITING TIPS FOR VISUAL THINKERS
“The creative process translates across disciplines, so the real challenge to a visual artist who wants to write is learning to operate with words the way you do with pictures.”
You may think of yourself as being more creative with visuals than you are with words, but that doesn’t mean you can’t become a great writer.
Austin Kleon shares 10 writing tips for visual thinkers including to write something every day, recognize writing and drawing aren’t that different, and to read way more than you write.
4. HOW TO OVERCOME YOUR LIMITING CREATIVE BELIEFS
“What if your definition of creativity was limiting your creativity?”
Be careful how you define creativity, because your definition may hold you back from doing your best work.
Burak Bilgin suggests people often misunderstand how creativity works and explains how to overcome your limiting creative beliefs.
He defines creativity as the ability to discover new relationships between already existing concepts and recommends you break from the intimidating idea that it’s about coming up with something out of nothing.
5. 22 WAYS TO ENHANCE YOUR LINKEDIN PROFILE
“One of the biggest mistakes people make on LinkedIn is failing to reach out to connect with people you want to know but don’t yet. That’s the whole point of networking — getting to know new people, not just established connections.”
Want to step up your LinkedIn game? Start here.
Larry Kim shares 22 tips to enhance your LinkedIn profile including to write a ridiculously good summary, personalize invitations to connect, and use keywords with intent.
One of these days I’ll get around to “enhancing” my own LinkedIn profile, but in the meantime I’d still love to connect you with there.
6. THE BEST TIME TO BOOK FLIGHTS
“One interesting finding is that the lowest fare for any one trip changed an average of 62 times during the period that that trip was offered for sale. That’s roughly once every 5–6 days. Furthermore, each change represented an increase or drop of $36, on average.”
When’s the best time to book a flight? Based on the 917 million data points (not a typo) used in this CheapAir.com study, you’re about to find out.
The study breaks down the best time to buy flights based on six different booking zones to account for if you’re the kind of person who books early, late, or somewhere in between.
7. WHAT THE FUTURE OF ONLINE PUBLISHING WILL LOOK LIKE
“The only thing that went wrong was the inevitable. Business always optimizes for where the money comes from, and advertisers weren’t in it for the public good. Which means they eventually got the better end of the deal, with the rest of us suffering through an experience that was necessarily compromised.”
I’m a fan of Medium (you can follow me on Medium here) and an even bigger fan of Medium CEO Ev Williams, who’s one of the smartest guys in the world when it comes to media.
In this post he breaks down what he calls the rationalization of publishing — it’s a great read about how the idea of advertising-supported publishing online has failed and why he’s optimistic about what may replace it as we move forward.
8. FIVE QUESTIONS YOU SHOULD ASK AT YOUR NEXT JOB INTERVIEW
“What are some of the challenges you expect the person in this position to face?”
The questions you ask at a job interview are every bit as important as the questions the employer asks you.
The Cut shares five questions to ask at your next job interview that will impress the interviewer and give you valuable information to help you decide if it’s a job you actually want.
The questions include, “How will you measure the success of the person in this position?,” “What’s your timeline for next steps?,” and “What differentiated people who were really good at this job from those who were not?”
9. AMERICANS ARE HOOKED ON VITAMINS AND THERE’S NO PROOF THEY WORK
“Preliminary studies fuel irrational exuberance about a promising dietary supplement, leading millions of people to buy in to the trend. Many never stop. They continue even though more rigorous studies — which can take many years to complete — almost never find that vitamins prevent disease, and in some cases cause harm.”
Read this before you pop your next batch of vitamins or dietary supplements.
The New York Times examines why Americans are hooked on vitamins and points out there’s no conclusive evidence they help anybody — and in some cases it’s likely they cause damage.
The article points out the National Institutes of Health has spent $2.4 billion studying vitamins since 1999 and yet they “don’t have much to show for it” in terms of proof of effectiveness.
10. SCREW YOUR TO DO LIST. YOU NEED A DONE LIST.
“To Do Lists make you feel bad. A Done List has the opposite effect — it makes you feel good.”
Here’s a counterintuitive way to be more productive.
In this post I explain why a Done List will help you more than a To Do List and how it can help you focus on action as opposed to intention.
WHERE I FOUND THIS STUFF
I discovered some of this week’s ideas from the newsletters of Jocelyn K. Glei, Next Draft, and Austin Kleon — they’re awesome and worth your time.