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Work on yourself like the Golden Gate bridge (077)
1st Law Friday - July 17th 2024
Lucas Dondertman
July 19, 2024
Welcome back to the 1st Law Newsletter - Friday Edition.
In this email:
Overcoming Resistance
Work on yourself like the Golden Gate bridge
Investing or Trading
Quote from Confucius
What I’m Reading
For the first time this year, there was no 1st Law Newsletter on Monday. I will not miss another one.
Overcoming Resistance
Resistance is the silent force that holds you back from many achievements, including doing anything creative, getting abs, dieting, starting a business, and the list goes on. There are so many ways that we hold ourselves back. The only real way to overcome it it to just sit down and do it.
“The most important thing about art is to work. Nothing else matters except sitting down every day and trying.”
I have been missing too many days of writing recently, mainly because I have felt like I don’t have any ideas or topics to write about. However, I think not sitting down and writing anyways is the reason the ideas have not been coming. Today, I had nothing, but when I sat down to actually write I came up with this, I came up with other sentences that you read above and below. I came up with a lot because I had to. If you just start writing, something has to come out. Don’t overthink it and just do it, you may end up with something worth sharing.
“This is the other secret that real artists know and wannabe writers don’t. When we sit down each day and do our work, power concentrates around us. The Muse takes note of our dedication. She approves. We have earned favor in her sight. When we sit down and work, we become like a magnetized rod that attracts iron filings. Ideas come. Insights accrete.”
Skipping days is the only way to guarantee failure. If I don’t stop, if I never quit, I cant fail. That goes for anything in life.
Work on yourself like the Golden Gate bridge
The golden gate bridge is constantly under maintenance. There is a team of ~30 workers whose only job is to repair and repaint the bridge continuously, all year long, forever. This goes for anything substantial in life. It will take thorough planning, a long time to build with strong execution, and once its done, it will immediately begin breaking down. The only way to maintain such achievements is to continuously maintain them.
Treat yourself and your skills like this (think health, languages, specific knowledge, etc…).
Source: Here
Investing vs Trading
“We believe that according the name 'investors' to institutions that trade actively is like calling someone who repeatedly engages in one-night stands a 'romantic.'“
I don’t want to spend my life analyzing and picking stocks and hoping to beat the market. There is so much more to life than that. My plan for guaranteed financial independence is to save aggressively while I am young and my expenses are low, and achieve average gains for an above average timeline.
Invest, don’t trade, play the long game and don’t interrupt the compounding interest.
"To be wronged is nothing, unless you continue to remember it."
If someone has wronged you, there is no need to carry it around with you after. The damage is either done already, in which case you should move forward, or the damage will be done by the constant remembering of being wronged. Either way, you avoid damage by forgiving, forgetting, and moving on.
What I’m Reading
Finally finished The 48 Laws of Power by Robert Greene. It was ongoing on and off all year. This is a book that I will revisit constantly, but I will probably never mention it again as I have now learnt the 49th Law of Power: Don’t let people know you are reading The 48 Laws of Power.
The next book I am reading is The Almanack of Naval Ravikant. Naval Ravikant is an investor, founder, and modern day philosopher. This book is based on his famous tweet storm How To Get Rich (without getting lucky). If you have never read it, you need to. Go do it now.
Thanks for reading!
Lucas