10 Years

There are these two young fish swimming along, and they happen to meet an older fish swimming the other way, who nods at them and says, "Morning, boys, how's the water?" And the two young fish swim on for a bit, and then eventually one of them looks over at the other and goes, "What the hell is water?"

So, to summarize, don't ask "Any Java experts around?", but rather ask "How do I do [problem] with Java and [other relevant info]?"

I say, why shouldn't you set out to do something significant. You don't have to tell other people, but shouldn't you say to yourself, "Yes, I would like to do something significant.''

That scene changed my life. I'd program my alarm clock to play it for me every morning if I knew how. Alec Baldwin was nominated for an Oscar for that movie and that's the only scene he's in.

If you could travel back in a time machine, one thing would be true no matter where you went: you'd have to watch what you said. Opinions we consider harmless could have gotten you in big trouble.

We are a culture that glorifies ideas. In tech circles, everyone wants to discuss the latest tech trends (live-streaming! Drones!) In the movie or publishing industry, thousands of e-mails are exchanged about which genres are hot (fantasy!) and which are not (vampires!)

Akrasia is the state of acting against your better judgment. It is when you do one thing even though you know you should do something else. Loosely translated, you could say that akrasia is procrastination or a lack of self-control. Akrasia is what prevents you from following through on what you set out to do.

Mere-Exposure Effect- an observation that humans tend to develop a preference for things, people, and processes merely because they are familiar with them. This effect is much stronger than it initially seems.

Your personal experiences make up maybe 0.00000001% of what’s happened in the world but maybe 80% of how you think the world works.

The philosophy underlying the essay is based on a famous quote attributed to Aristotle: “We are what we repeatedly do. Excellence, then, is not an act but a habit.”

Glaser designed over 400 posters in his lifetime, was a founder of New York magazine, a strong believer in the power of drawing, and in the obligation to pass on your experience through teaching.

Those broad lessons are important because we know they’ll be relevant in the future. They’ll apply to nearly everyone, and in many fields. The same rule of thumb works in the other direction: the broader the lesson, the more useful it is for the future.

Select from a list of 441 works of classical literature by 59 different authors, including Lao Tzu, Plato and Aristotle

It turns out that when I graduated from high school, I had already used up 93% of my in-person parent time. I’m now enjoying the last 5% of that time. We’re in the tail end.

Using a true multidisciplinary understanding of things, Peter identifies two often overlooked, parabolic “Big Ideas”: 1) Mirrored Reciprocation (go positive and go first) and 2) Compound Interest (being constant).