1. STEVEN PRESSFIELD IS A PERSON YOU SHOULD KNOW
“The counterfeit innovator is wildly self-confident. The real one is scared to death.”
Steven’s an author, but he may be best known for the ideas he’s put into the world about doing creative work.
2. HOW TO GET WHAT YOU WANT IN LIFE
“Think about the resources you don’t have, the advantages you weren’t given, and the reasons you’re not the kind of person who gets what they want.”
You know those people who get the things they want in life? This is how they do it. At least, according to me.
3. THE FIRST TV SITCOM ADVERTISER
Here’s a thing I never thought about before. The first sponsor of an American TV sitcom was Anacin, who sponsored an episode of the 1948 show “Mary Kay and Johnny.”
But what’s interesting is that at the time they did it, nobody had any idea how many people watched TV or would watch a sitcom. They had no way to know or measure what they would get for their sponsorship dollars because it was a new and untested medium.
(Arguably, TV advertisers still have no idea, but that’s a story for another day.)
In an attempt to measure the size of the audience, Anacin offered viewers the chance to get a free mirror if they wrote in a letter after seeing the show. The company guessed that 200 people might send in letters, so they bought 400 mirrors just to be safe.
They wound up getting more than 8,000 letters from viewers.
4. EMMA SEPPALA IS A PERSON YOU SHOULD KNOW
“Happiness is not the outcome of success but its precursor.”
Emma studies the science of happiness at Stanford so if she can’t help you figure out how get yourself in a better mood, then nobody can.
She has found that most people misunderstand how happiness works in a fundamental way and suggests that sacrificing happiness now in the hopes of getting it later is a big mistake.
She also gives an interesting talk about the power of breathing and points out that it’s the only thing we can control that physically impacts (and can override) the stress and fear symptoms our body may experience in a given moment.
5. A REVIEW OF MY FIRST COLLEGE MIXTAPE
“I didn’t really have a drug phase in college. I did, however, have a ‘hang out with lots of people who were knee deep in their drug phase’ phase in college.”
I recently found the first mixtape I ever made in college, listened to it, and wrote up a song-by-song review of how tunes I liked at 18 sound to me at 41.
6. RON FRIEDMAN IS A PERSON YOU SHOULD KNOW
“When your attempt rate is high, each individual failure becomes a lot less significant.”
Ron wrote a book about what it takes to create a great workplace. But in addition to those observations, he points out that you should WANT work to get a little HARDER each day – or else you’ll lose interest.
7. THE THING YOU DON’T UNDERSTAND ABOUT LOS ANGELES
“Life is not fair, but Los Angeles is.”
It’s been interesting to see people’s reactions to this thing I wrote about why I love LA and what people who don’t live here don’t understand about it.
8. I COULD LISTEN TO BOB LEFSETZ FOR HOURS
“Anybody that’s successful has been fired at some point in their life.”
Bob Lefsetz is a music industry journalist/observer/expert/guru who writes an insanely good newsletter about not only music, media, and life. He’s amazing. He’s also incredibly entertaining and likely a little bit insane.
That combination makes for a great podcast guest and I highly recommend you check out this appearance he makes on Barry Katz’s Industry Standard podcast (which is also worth subscribing to by the way).
9. WHO ARE THE VOICES IN YOUR HEAD?
“Have you ever thought about the sources of the information you consume?”
Don’t worry, this isn’t about the political machinations of Facebook’s news feed. It’s a piece I wrote to give you a little something to think about.
10. LOUIS CK SAID SOMETHING SMART – AGAIN
“It’s very dangerous to be liked by more people than should like you.”
That’s a pretty interesting concept, don’t you think?