Friday, February 28, 2014

The Worst Interview Question

Where do you see yourself in 5-10 years?

And expecting a concrete answer.

If you are able to give a tangible answer to that question, chances are you aren't stretching yourself.

The only good answer to that question is doing something you're passionate about, making a legitimate impact on the world and absolutely crushing it. However, it is impossible to know what your passions will be that far down the road, and with the way things are going, chances are that it doesn't even exist today.

Just think about 10 years ago... what a funny idea this Mark Zuckerberg guy has with this little thing called The Facebook, Blackberry is crushing it but what the hell is this Android and iPhone thing you speak of, and this is me looking like someone who will never diet, pick up a weight or do cardio of any sorts.

So if you hear that question, go ahead and give them the old jedi hand wave and a "This is not the question you are looking for."

Thursday, February 27, 2014

Success: is it in the Middle or the Extremes?

What separates a great wait staff from a great menu?

A great wait staff should consistently execute at a very high level, but there should be no surprises. An amazing customer experience is defined more by the lack of things going wrong than by anything truly exceptional happening; get my order right, be knowledgable, be on top of the drinks, smile a little bit and don't spill on my lap and we will be all good.

While the execution of a great menu should be very consistent, the items themselves are an entirely different story. In order for a menu to be truly exceptional, you better accept the fact that some people will thoroughly hate it... everybody leaves McDonalds content with the food.

The secret to success in the weightroom? Get there consistently and make yourself a little bit better than you were last time... it's not about getting there once a month and destroying yourself that one time.

How do people look pretty damn good all year round? They have a great idea of how much they are eating and don't sweat a little chocolate or beer... they don't alternate super strict(depending on your goals, some periods of super strictness may be called for) and binging days.

The mark of a truly shitty live band? Everybody leaving saying it was pretty good. I want to see a band lay everything on the line, that means I should leave with my jaw on the floor... either because it is the most epic thing I have ever seen or because it was utterly attrocious.

In a presidential race among a unanimously liked candidate and 2 candidates despised by half the country and adored by the other half, the unanimously liked candidate will lose every time.

Finding where success exists in a situation doesn't guarantee success, but missing where it exists guarantees failure.

Wednesday, February 26, 2014

Hustle

The internet is a wonderful thing, particularly in its ability to lower the barrier of entry for many things, particularly retail and education.

Just over a decade ago,  if someone wanted to start a retail clothing business, they would need money for the physical space of the store, inventory, and potentially a warehouse. Now, they can get up and running with Shopify in a matter of minutes and start with minimal(if any) inventory.

Higher education is another thing that the internet is beginning to revolutionize(but still has an insane amount of room for growth). While I thoroughly enjoyed my time at the University of Illinois, I felt like most of the truly meaningful learning I did was done outside the classroom. Many online(some are physical as well, but the internet as allowed them to reach their potential students) micro-colleges and trade schools are popping up such as Designation(started by my good friend, Kevin), Bloc and G-school to remove all of the fluff from the university experience, at a greatly reduced cost.

However, now that money is removed as a barrier of entry, the winners in society are no longer going to come from affluent families... your ability to out-hustle is going to be the determining factor in success in life.

While I know it may sound hypocritical posting about ass-in-chair syndrome and then today posting about the hustlers coming out on top in life, what I am trying to point out is that it is not just the quantity of time put into hustling, but the quality; when I said I just put in 3-5 hours, that is just time put into uninterrupted development related tasks, that doesn't include time put into design work, reading(for the sake of intellectual stimulation, not for the facade of doing), writing, cooking and training, all of which are skills I am also working on bettering.

If you don't have the life you want, you can no longer blame it on your upbringing, as anyone has the ability to hustle.

Tuesday, February 25, 2014

Read Things You Disagree With

Many of us are guilty of reading things which only confirm biases that we previously held. It is very easy to do so because knowing that others agree with what you think is a rather uplifting experience.

However, just living in Boulder, Colorado is uplifting enough; so I expect (some of) the books I read to provide more than just a fuzzy feeling, I want them to push me intellectually.

The best way to do that is to start reading things that disagree with ideas that I currently believe to be true, both things I have good reason to believe as well as things I hold as dogma.

The 4-Hour Workweek and Walden were the first 2 books I read that challenged the beliefs of what I held as societal dogma: buy insanely large homes and materialistic possessions that we don't really need, work insanely long hours to pay for those things, and then buy even more shit that we don't need to compensate for the depression of working long hours.

In contrast, Nassim Nicolas Taleb's The Black Swan is a very heavy read(well so is Walden) that challenges many deeply seated scientific beliefs, all of which have plenty of evidence in their favor, or,  in some cases, simply lack of evidence against(which Taleb repeatedly points out is not evidence for).

One argument in particular really challenged my beliefs(and one which I had plenty of evidence to support) is his disagreement with the globalization of economies, large size of banks and the internet. As an engineer, efficiency is usually what I am trying to optimize, and there is no arguing against the massive efficiency and price reduction that can be gained through globalization of the economy. However, Taleb points out that when it fails, the massive coupling will ripple through the entire system, as opposed to being isolated in the location that it originated.

Do I still think the internet and global economy are amazing? Yes.

I just hope they don't fail in my lifetime. 

Monday, February 24, 2014

Ass-In-Chair Syndrome

I hava a confession... I used to consider myself a workaholic, and wear it around like a badge of honor.

In college, you could frequently find me in the lab or the library on a Friday night.

The weirdest part was that I actually enjoyed being on my high horse of feeling like I was doing things that others weren't.

Slowly though, I started noticing a few people here and there were getting the same output as me, while spending significantly less time doing so.

So, I decided to fire myself.

Now, instead of pulling marathon working sessions. I typically put in a daily 3-5 hour sprint, or however long I feel like I can fully immerse myself in a topic without letting my mind wander off.

And I am getting just as much, if not more, accomplished.

Now that I think about it, I wasn't really a workaholic, I just suffered from a giant case of ass-in-chair-syndrome.

Friday, February 21, 2014

Dual Faces of Anonymity

"My idea, XYZ, would be so much more successful... I just need to figure out how to let everybody know about it." - Many, many, many people

Everybody and every idea starts out as anonymous to all but a handful of people, but, unfortunately many people want to rush through this phase.

I have always been slightly perplexed by that... seeing as the beginning is always wrought with failures and fuck-ups. Just as babies fall down over and over while they are beginning to walk, companies are bound to face analogous pitfalls in the beginning of their life. I would much rather face those growing pains in the comfort of my anonymous living room(which is why I am completely ok having all of 2 readers), than in the shining limelight of Hollywood Boulevard.

This face of anonymity brings out the best in people, it allows them to grow organically without fear of being eating alive.

The other face of anonymity consists of people and actions that are voluntarily anonymous... think of the many internet trolls on the faceless internet forums. Now think about the decrease in trolling, bad advice, malicious activity or even crooked politics, if those people couldn't hide behind a username and had to operate with complete transparency, if all of that dirt would follow them around for the world to see.

This face of anonymity brings out the worst in people, it allows people to manipulate others without fear of repercussion.





Thursday, February 20, 2014

First 500 Pound Bench Press

In the 1950s, Doug Hepburn became the first man to bench press 500 pounds. The bench press, in its current manifestation, had been around for about half a century up until that point, but up until Doug came around, nobody had even benched 400, let alone 500.

Nowadays, many people bench 500, and Eric Spoto now holds the raw bench press record at 722 pounds, but the trend remains the same... many people theorize that some milestone is not possible, until the first person breaks through that milestone, and in come the wave of people to follow.

Innovation occurs the same way, many people have ideas, but think it is impossible or too difficult to bring into fruition, but flood gates of copycats open up as soon as the original is released.

If you have an idea(or want to be the first 750 pound bencher), go for it, because even if you don't believe it can be done, you better believe someone else will.

Wednesday, February 19, 2014

Hubs

I am typing this in the Denver International Airport, while waiting for my bus back to Boulder, having just returned from San Francisco.

That was my first time in San Francisco, and, while there, I stayed in China Town. It literally felt like I had moved to China, everybody was Chinese, nobody spoke English(well), and the food was amazing(and probably full of MSG).

Weirder yet, a block away from China Town was Little Italy. It was possible to stand on one corner and simultaneously feel like you are in America, Italy and China.

Mind = blown.

Looking at the website for the San Francisco Chinatown, it started organically by having things that attracted Chinese people, which brought in more Chinese people and then one thing leads to another and you have a full blown Chinatown.

The same thing can be said for being successful... if you start doing things that other successful people(whatever you define successful as) do and surrounding yourself with those successful people, chances are good that you will become successful as well.


Tuesday, February 18, 2014

Doing

"The great pleasure in life is doing what people say you cannot do." - The fortune in my fortune cookie.

Note, my fortune cookie did not say:

"The great pleasure in life is reading about doing what people say you cannot do."

Or:

"The great pleasure in life is planning to do what people say you cannot do."

It's easy to mistake doing for things that seem like doing, planning and reading are 2 of the biggest culprits.

Want to get a top 1% physique? Reading about all the best diets and workout plans, and planning a meticulous meal plan for many months at a time sounds great... but the follow-through is where the real work is done. Even if you end up sticking with the meal plan as specified, it may be too few or too many calories, but those are all details that need to be flushed out after the doing begins.

Want to make the next Angry Birds, Snapchat or Words with Friends? Reading about building an application, and planning out an exact schedule sounds great... but it rarely ever follows the plan, because you don't know what you don't know. How should it react if the internet is down, the device is low on memory, the device has an incredibly small screen, or the user is visually impaired? Those aren't things that will crop up in your plans.

So listen to my fortune cookie, and start doing something that people say you cannot do.

Monday, February 17, 2014

The Drowned Entrepreneur

Last night, while reading Nicolas Nassim Taleb's The Black Swan, I came across his mentioning of the story of the drowned worshippers.

In case you are unfamiliar with the story, I will provide you the cliff notes. A man sees paintings/hears the gospel of people who prayed and then are saved from drowning, so those people go on to spread the word that praying saves you from drowning. Skeptically, this man responds along the lines of, it is impossible for those who prayed and drowned to let others know of their outcome.

What on earth does this have to do with entrepreneurship?

Well, I feel that the voices of the successes are heard much more often, and resonate much more clearly, than the voices of the failures. Think about it, we can put a story, face and voice to Steve Jobs, Bill Gates and Mark Zuckerberg, but would have to seriously stretch our mental capacity to vividly describe just one or two of their failed counterparts.

I am completely aware that chances are that my current endeavors will fail, it will be much safer for me to take my mom's advice to go work for big corporate america, that it will take the perfect mixture or skill, luck and market to succeed, some of which is out of my control and some of which is in it.

If you end up in the perfect storm, you're fucked from the get-go, but you still have to risk drowning in order to swim in the ocean.

Friday, February 14, 2014

Asymmetry

We have all been there... pulling on the push side of a door... plugging in a usb the wrong way.

It makes you feel dumb.

Really, really dumb.

I say it isn't your fault, though, the blame should be placed on bad industrial design.

Sometimes things need to be asymmetric, AC plugs and usb cables, for example. I am completely fine with that, just make the plugs look blatantly asymmetric, so it is impossible for someone to get it wrong.

Make the push and pull sides different, so I physically cannot push the pull side or pull the push side.

The world will be a much happier place.

(End rant)

Thursday, February 13, 2014

Multitasking and Killing Two Birds With One Stone

I have realized multitasking is bad for me.

However, that doesn't change the fact that there is still only 24 hours in a day, and far more than 24 hours a day worth of activities.

So I have been learning the subtle difference between multitasking and killing two birds with one stone.

Maybe you need to see my friends and want to be outside... go on a hike with them.

Maybe you want some alone time and want to get some exercise... go to the gym.

The difference is that you are only doing one thing, but reaping the benefits of doing multiple things, as opposed to trying(and often failing) to do multiple things.

Wednesday, February 12, 2014

No Plan B

"There's no reason to have a Plan B, because it distracts you from Plan A." - Will Smith

I couldn't agree more.

I touched on the necessity of being afraid of failure here, and that goes hand in hand with not having a Plan B.

If you have a Plan B, you are already planning on Plan A to fail.

Tuesday, February 11, 2014

Lessons in Multitasking

I have always known that I have been horrible at multi-tasking, yet, for some reason, I have always insisted on trying. 

However, last week, 2 things happened, one which positively reinforced doing only one thing at a time and another which negatively reinforced the pitfalls of multi-tasking, which were the final nails in my multi-tasking coffin.

How about I start with the positive, because, well positive is good.

While employed at Qualcomm, I would constantly try to juggle development tasks, reading email, answering instant messages, checking facebook, doing code reviews and checking more email. Attempting to do all simultaneously, led to getting none of them done satisfactorily.

Now that I am "underemployed", I still have plenty of development, email, instant messages and facebook checking on my plate, but I have a little bit more luxury to schedule them as I so please... so I ran a little experiment with only doing one at a time... and the results were amazing. I probably got more done in a 3 hour block of 100% focused development, than I would have in 3 days of the not-so-focused variety. 

And that was all the development I did for the day.

Then I moved on to checking email, and just checking email. 

Then facebook, and just facebook.

Then eating some food, and just eating some food.

Then talking to my mom on the phone, and just talking to my mom on the phone.

And then, and then and then...

But eventually, I messed up.

I tried taking a dump, while eating oatmeal, while listening to Pandora, while texting, while charging my phone.

The cable got caught on the oatmeal bowl, and down goes the ceramic bowl full of oatmeal.

I wouldn't wish cleaning up oatmeal from the floor onto my worst enemy. 

It feels like cat vomit.

Learn from my lesson, don't multitask, or you too may find yourself cleaning up oatmeal with toilet paper.  

Monday, February 10, 2014

Readings of 2014, January Edition

Welp, I only read one book in January, but it sure was a doozy.

Without further ado...

Walden by Henry David Thoreau:

Henry David Thoreau builds a cabin in the forest, on the edge of Walden pond and lives there for 2 years, 2 months and 2 days. End of story.

Really that is the plot.

If you're reading this looking for wizards, kings or vampire/werewolf love stories this is definitely not it.

However, if you are looking to grow as an individual, to realize how truly little that you or I actually need, or how much more to life there is than obtaining money for money's sake, then this is the book for you.

While he is in the woods, he does a bit of farming, and a whole lot of ranting. I didn't comprehend some of the ranting the first time... or the second... or the third time. Some re-reading of sentences were definitely called for.

Among the various rants, there are gems of one-liners. Some people would suggest just reading the cliff notes or searching for those quotes elsewhere.

I am not one of those people.

I feel like the noisiness of the ranting just adds to the profoundness of the one-liners, just as the white space on a painting adds to the profoundness of the non-whitespace.

Friday, February 7, 2014

Money

I have always been confused by the concept of money.

It only has value because it is artificially scarce.

A nation that prints money can be bankrupt.

$100,000 in rural Illinois is not the same as $100,000 in Silicon Valley(at least in what you can buy with it).

We solve the problem of most people not having enough money, by raising minimum wage... which in turn just makes everything else more expensive, leaving them just as lacking as before.

Bartering makes sense to me.

I have something you want. You have something I want. Let's trade.

Now, I understand that bartering is definitely not scalable in the global economy... so money is what we have.

Thursday, February 6, 2014

Get Comfortable With Being Uncomfortable


“If we wait until we're ready, we'll be waiting for the rest of our lives.” - Lemony Snicket


Squatting heavy ass weight is not comfortable.

Attempting to jump into a goliath code base is not comfortable.

Putting yourself on the line, completely vulnerable, is not comfortable.

They all pretty much feel like jumping into a pool, that has no visible bottom... but that's the best way to learn to swim.

Maybe, the first time you attempt a weight, you get stapled.

Maybe, the first time changing a code base, you break the build.

Maybe, when you ask that VC for funding, you get turned-down.

Eventually, though, that weight won't be so heavy, that code base won't be so daunting and that VC won't be so intimidating.

That's when we have grown... and after that it is just time to move on to the next uncomfortable event.

Wednesday, February 5, 2014

The Top of the Roller Coaster

So... today is my first day of unemployment.

It is also be first day renewing my vows to be fucking awesome and to do cool shit.

Not going to lie, though, it pretty much feels like being at the top of a roller coaster, with infinitely many tracks that it could go.

I am essentially in a superposition of infinite possibilities, each with almost 0 percent chance of being the one I end up on.

I guess you could think of me like Schrodinger's cat, minus the poison part.

The thing is, each route is insanely exciting... maybe I will do some freelance stuff for a while with intermittent traveling, maybe I will go back to school, maybe I will start one of about a billion businesses I have bouncing around in my head, hell maybe I will get into politics and become the president.

I am fine sitting at the top of this amazing roller coaster for another couple days, enjoying the views, and reflecting about which track I want to begin on, but by next week the crazy free-fall will have begun.

Tuesday, February 4, 2014

Petting the Cat

Every morning, immediately after turning off my alarm, I remain in bed and pet my cat for about 5 minutes or so.

No, that wasn't a euphemism.

Plus, seeing as I am a guy, that doesn't even make sense.

No, I mean my real, live, breathing cat.

His name is Dex(short for Deckers) and he is pretty much the most awesome thing in the world.

That didn't used to be my morning ritual though. It looked much more like: check facebook, reply to all posts on facebook, check instagram, like all first 50 photos on instagram, read all 4 email accounts, reply to all emails on all 4 email accounts... and that was before I even left my bed.

Maybe living in Boulder or reading "Walden", has made me review how much clutter I actually have in my life.

Maybe it just instilled in me the virtue of quality over quantity.

I do know one thing though, that spending 5 minutes of quality time laying in bed, petting my cat(well maybe he's still a kitten), brings infinitely times more joy to him than any number of likes or email responses bring to the world.

Maybe we just all need to spend more time petting our cats, spending quality time with true friends, and building one truly amazing shit, as opposed to trying to reach more people, reach more customers, build more acquaintances or build more mediocre pieces of shit.

Monday, February 3, 2014

Readings of 2013, Part 5

Well, as they say, all good things must come to an end, and this is the end of my readings of 2013 series of post, seeing as these are the last of the books that I read in 2013. I did, however save my favorites for last.

The 4-Hour Workweek by Tim Ferris:

When there is an elephant in the room, it is best to call it out, so I will go ahead and do just that... after reading this book, I may have just a tad bit of a completely heterosexual man crush on Tim Ferris. Powerlifter, "drug dealing" entrepreneur, and author, what's not to love?

Ok, now that I cleared the air with that, time to move on to the book.

This book is about as candid as it gets, and completely unapologetically so. It was also rather eye opening to exactly how little one needs, as well as how easy it is to outsource/automate the biggest time sinks in life(read email).

I will try and sum it up(but will probably screw it up royally, so read the damn thing): automate what you can, outsource as much as the rest, do the remaining yourself, and then travel around the world finding your vocation. There are also some really interesting challenges throughout the book to get you used to being out of your comfort zone.

Do Cool Sh*t by Miki Agrawal:

Now there is the another elephant in the room... Miki Agrawal is pretty much the female, soccer playing version of Tim Ferris, who just so happens to deal pizzas as opposed to "drugs"... so naturally, if reading Tim's book can put me in heterosexual man-love land, Miki's book had the same effect, minus the man part.

This book was actually the inspiration for me to start writing this blog(nod to the book in the sub-title of the blog). It had been an idea that I had been tossing around for awhile, and, well, reading the book inspired me to "do cool shit"(more cool shit on the way too).

It is essentially a chronology of a lot of the cool shit that Miki has done in her life(there is a lot of it), with attached take home lessons from each encounter; they include, but are not limited to, almost getting kicked out of her study abroad program, juggling semi-professional soccer with her I-Banker job, and James Bonding her way into the offices of newspaper food critics to get the word out about her wholesome pizza shop(which she started to accommodate her lactose intolerance, despite not having a clue about making pizza or running a restaurant).

There is also a section about health and fitness, which was just the icing on the cake.

Oh, do you remember those interesting challenges in Tim's book? Well one of the was reaching out to successful people. Miki was one of those people I reached out to... and she responded... now that is some cool shit!