From 600+ conversations with the world’s leading thinkers.
You need one strong relationship in your life to remain sane. You need a relationship that doesn't depend on digital transmission! You need somebody who you understand deeply, who you can talk to directly, who can give you a reality check when everything coming through your computer and phone is bewildering.
Inventors shouldn't be afraid to take risks. They should embrace failure and learn from their mistakes. I created 5,127 prototypes of the first Dyson bag-less vacuum cleaner and only the last one was right! Not being afraid to fail is something I think all successful entrepreneurs have in common.
The silence we've adopted, along with the habits, behaviours, and patterns we've established, don't have to dictate how we proceed today or tomorrow, even if they characterized our yesterdays. It's challenging, to be clear. Changing behaviours is difficult. But on the other side of that challenge lies the opportunity for us to meet our needs, to build the teams we truly intend to build.
No one wakes up eager to write because it often reveals your shortcomings. It's like staring at your face in a mirror for two hours—after a few minutes, all you see are flaws. Discipline sees me through those self-doubts.
Trust is the golden thread that runs through not just a kidnap negotiation or a business deal, but life in general. It takes a long time to build, but it's lost in an instant. Trust is about following through—doing what you say you're going to do.
When a coach gains the player's confidence and establishes a strong partnership, they can effectively motivate the player, boost their confidence, and help them break through barriers. This can elevate a player's career to new heights.
I mean, people ask me, 'Should I do a startup?' And I say, 'Well, how important is work-life balance to you?' And if they say anything other than 'It's not important,' I say, 'You shouldn't do it.' Because it's a killing field.
It's a matter of finding an approach that works for the individual. A person has to know whether they are comfortable with fundamental or technical, long term or short term, certain types of markets, wider risk or less risk… You can go through a whole checklist of things and find it's different for each individual.
Most people run around like biological robots, as if we are an algorithm not a being. We become the predictable outcomes of the conditioned reflexes of our nerves, constantly triggered by people in reaction to circumstances.
Music can reveal the nature that lies within us, the part of us we cannot hide. When you hear a single note, a C, it's not a single sound, it's the result of many harmonies. It's like God hiding in plain sight.
We are all strategists or game theorists at heart – it took several decades of people writing-down models and articles before we recognised what we know from playing poker; we don't know our opponent's hand.
One reason conflict resilience has declined is that it's become easier to fire off a snarky message or simply block someone and move on. If we share physical space, avoidance has limits; I can leave the room, but I might still run into you in the hallway. Online, though, I can just delete, mute, or block you with no further engagement.