📚 A&B #166

🙏 Support:

This week's newsletter was made possible by World Builders.

This newsletter is written by my friend Nathan Baugh who shares practical advice on how to become a better storyteller every week. Why learn storytelling?

Knowing how to tell better stories will help you grow your business, create better content, become more persuasive, and so much more.

Join 75,000+ readers for free here!

👋 Hey everyone,

Two quick announcements:

1) I’m doing a new 50-book giveaway. Learn how to enter here.

2) 450+ People have already signed up to learn more about my upcoming reading course. Here are just a few of the lessons I’ll be teaching:

• How To 5x Your Motivation To Read More Books

• How To Figure Out If A Book Is For You In 5 Minutes or Less

• How To Filter & Prioritize Books Using Time, Reviews, & Summaries

• When To Quit A Boring Book (& How To Do So Without Feeling Guilty)

• 3 Tactics That Will Help You Find An Amazing Book In Under 3 Minutes

• How To Never Feel Guilty About Spending Money on Books Again (& How To Get Books For FREE)

• How To Speed Read & The Truth About Speed Reading That Gurus Won’t Tell You

And lots more helpful lessons!

If you want to be the first to get notified about the course (and get the presale discount), enter your email here.

📚 Book Summary:

This week's book is “The Anthology of Balaji” by Eric Jorgenson.

This book is similar to “The Almanack of Naval Ravikant” (it’s written by the same author), except it’s more focused on science and technology than wealth and happiness.

If you’re a fan of Balaji, are into futuristic tech, or want to know what the world will look like in 10-15 years, you’ll enjoy this book.

PS: You can read Balaji’s book for free here and Naval’s book for free here.

Here are 3 lessons from the book:

📖

1) Stop Complaining, Start Creating

There are tons of businesses and systems in the world that suck.

But complaining about them won’t change anything (even if your complaints are valid).

Instead, the best way to change something that sucks is to build something better:

• Instead of complaining about taxis, Travis Kalanick built Uber.

• Instead of complaining about the music industry, Daniel Ek built Spotify.

• Instead of complaining about the monetary policy, Satoshi Nakamoto built Bitcoin.

Don’t argue with words, in fact, don’t argue at all–just build a better alternative. “When legacy institutions are beyond saving, build something better,” writes Balaji.

Sidenote: That was part of the reason I built Alex & Books.

I saw video gamers and pranksters build these huge audiences and for what? To influence people to play video games for 10+ hours a day or do foolish pranks that hurt people?

But instead of complaining about it, I set out to build a brand that would (hopefully) influence people to read more books and become better versions of themselves.

So if you find yourself constantly complaining about an existing business or system, that might be your sign to build something better.

📖

2) Your Job As CEO Is To Stay Jacked

When Balaji started his first company, he was “as jacked as it’s possible to be.”

He lifted weights, ran often, and worked out basically every day.

Staying in great shape while operating a startup is difficult because there’s always a temptation to make a short-term sacrifice such as staying up late or skipping a workout to spend more time on sales calls or programming.

However, Balaji realized it would only benefit him in the short term while hurting him in the long run.

And since building a company is a long-term game, he would be doing a disservice to his employees and investors if he burned out, got sick, or gave up on his company due to mental or physical health problems.

“Even if sacrificing sleep seems like the selfless thing to do on a daily basis, on a long-term basis, you want to take care of your health for the health of those around you,” writes Balaji.

So if you’re a founder or CEO, make sure to focus on your health. Not just for yourself, but for your employees, investors, and everyone around you.

And just in case you disagree with his perspective, Balaji went on to sell his company for $100 million and his next company for $375 million so I think he might have a good point.

📖

3) Read New Journals & Old Books

Balaji writes that one of his competitive advantages is having a strict media diet.

Just like how the healthiest people are strict about what they put into their bodies, Balaji is strict about what he puts into his mind.

He says that the best and most profitable forms of media are the newest technical journals and the oldest books.

They contain the least popular facts and the most monetizable truths.

“I’m focused on finding things that are true but that most people don’t know,” writes Balaji.

He views technical journals as an underappreciated source of truth since most people don’t (or can’t) read them. But these journals share the latest findings in cutting-edge science that, with the right team and distribution, can lead to a massively successful business.

Old books are his other favorite source of media.

Interestingly, this is how Brian Chesky got the idea for AirBnb.

He read about how rooming houses and room sharing were popular in the late 1800s and early 1900s. He then took this idea from a hundred years ago and modernized it to create a now multi-billion dollar company.

“The newest technical papers and the oldest books are the best sources of arbitrage,” advises Balaji.

✅ Actionable Advice:

1) Make a list of businesses you complain about the most:

• Are there any that you think are ripe for disruption?

  • Maybe you’ll find your next business idea on this list.

2) If you’ve been neglecting your health, set a goal to change that this week:

• Make it a priority to exercise for 30 minutes every day and get 8 hours of sleep every night this week.

  • Do this and I guarantee you’ll feel at least 5x better both mentally and physically.

3) Here’s a list of books Balaji recommends reading:

• AI Superpowers by Kai-Fu Lee

• Catching Fire by Richard Wrangham

• The Cold Start Problem by Andrew Chen

• High Output Management by Andy Grove

• Only the Paranoid Survive by Andy Grove

• From Third World to First by Lee Kuan Yew

• Richard Feynman’s Lectures by Richard Feynman

• The Sovereign Individual by James Dale Davidson and Lord William Rees-Mogg.

   

📖 Reading Lesson:

The average person checks their phone 144 times per day.

And spends 4 hours and 25 minutes on their phone each day.

Here's a quick life hack to spend less time scrolling and more time reading.

💎 Weekly Gem:

Product: Massage Gun

If you workout a lot or feel sore often, I highly recommend getting a massage gun.

It can be used to help you warm up your muscles before exercising or to relieve muscle fatigue after a workout. I’ve been playing basketball 3x a week and working out 2x a week recently so using a massage gun has been a game changer.

It’s like having your own personal massage therapist for only 50 bucks.

PS: I read all of the comments from this poll so if you have any constructive criticism or positive thoughts, I’d love to hear from you.

Thank you for your support, I'll see you next Sunday!

Read on,

Alex W.