A Reminder To Live – Sunday Reads And Listens
Good morning…
I am on my way back home to Phoenix after an awesome week with my friends cycling in Spain (I added some pictures of the week to the end of this post).
I have way too many ideas to write about at the moment which rarely happens. It is the opposite of writer’s block.
Today, I planned on writing about AI, China and the markets but Ben Carlson’s post about losing his brother hit me hard (do read it quickly), which makes me appreciate – even more – the lucky, mostly happy and fragile life I am living.
The one thing I harp on with Ellen and the kids is to live.
There was no way home yesterday from Spain (Canary Isalnds) so I spent the night in the London countryside before catching a flight home from Heathrow. I stayed at The Coworth Park in Berkshire, which is a fantastic place.
This morning I had breakfast and a long conversation with my friend JP Rangaswami who lives out here in the London countryside. I never miss a chance to see him when I am in London. He is so wise. Back in 2019, Max and I went to the British Open with JP and they stay in touch as well.
I met JP about 15 years ago on a fintech tour of Sydney and Melbourne. We were both speakers. Ellen was with me and we all had a great time.
One of my favorite pieces of wisdom came from JP when he told me …‘there is no such thing as information overload, only filter failure’! It is right up there with ‘Serenity Now’!
Fifteen years later, JP’s filter failure wisdom holds true more than ever. Today he was helping me think through a seven to ten year roadmap for Stocktwits and further how we are thinking about markets, investing and information at our investing firm Social Leverage. I am thrilled that he and I are seeing this world the same at the moment.
While I spent the week mostly off the grid cycling, I was always connected (text, camera, Whatsapp, Strava, Gmail for the most part, but evenings were Spotify, YouTube and Netflix).
I also read my first book in ten plus years because my daughter Rachel loves to read and we are doing a monthly book club. Rachel picked ‘Bad Blood – Secrets and Lies in a Silicon Valley Startup‘. It is a dark story of lies, greed, grift and negligence. Elizabeth is a dark lady.
It was a timely read because today, everyone can be Elizabeth Holmes in our mobile, social networked world now powered by crypto/memecoins. As horrifying as the greed and grifts are becoming, I am confident it will pass as we near the ‘the thing before the thing’ with digital assets. I should say …it better be!
I am choosing to be optimistic and curate more religiously than ever because we are living in an age of miracles. To make the most of it I am constantly filtering my feeds to keep the noise down and my mood up. It is pretty much a full time job as a full time investor and now CEO.
My reading list is as small as it has been in years – almost exclusively tech and markets.
For people that have long followed me you will know the names (in no order of importance and further curated to people writing regularly):
Podcast – Conan – the king of silly.
Podcast – Gurley and Gerstner – Bleeding edge of nerdy tech and nerdy markets.
Before you jump all over me for how little I read, remember that I follow the prices of hundreds of securities/markets all day and have been doing it for decades. I believe price discovery is news and information! Price discovery from stocks to real estate (Zillow) to memecoins to private companies is only getting better as well.
As for the ‘thing before the thing’…I just have that gut feeling.
Jerry Seinfeld had this short riff about money that really captures this era…
We are in this runaway moment of greed, money as everything, networked bullies and misinformation. Elon is President, Trump is King, Zuckerberg is a ghoul and evil is in the open (Qatar, Iran and Hamas).
I have no idea how this trend ends, but at the same time, unless you are in their orbit of money and greed and misery, or just plain unlucky, there has never been a better time to tune them out and go deeper, narrower and weirder than ever before. Focus on the cheap internet, the cheap ai, the abundant mentorship at your fingertips, your longevity, fitness and health and the thousands of modern tools for creativity.
PS – some pictures from the week in Tenerife, Spain
That’s me and the volcano…a long way up
We caught a Yellowfin Tuna
Team Bahrain passed us all easily but we caught uyp with them when they stoppef to fuel with coffee and cake
60 year-old kids Karting
