A 24-year-old Polish tennis player arrived in Paris last week ranked 114th in the world, with no sponsors, no guaranteed income, and no certainty she could even pay for her hotel room.
She had to win three qualifying matches just to enter the French Open main draw. Prize money is only paid at the end of the tournament, so a Polish sports drink brand quietly stepped in and covered her hotel bill.
Her name is Maja Chwalinska. And today, she plays in the French Open final.
Before this tournament, she had won exactly one Grand Slam main draw match in her entire career. She had battled depression so severe that in 2021 she couldn't get out of bed. She underwent knee surgery in 2022. She spent years grinding through small tournaments across Europe just to stay afloat.
Then she arrived in Paris, won three qualifiers, and kept winning. Zheng Qinwen. Elise Mertens. Maria Sakkari. Diana Shnaider. Nine straight matches. One set dropped.
She is now the first qualifier in French Open history to reach the final. The last time a qualifier reached a Grand Slam final, it was Emma Raducanu at the 2021 US Open. Raducanu won.
By simply making the final, Chwalinska has earned more prize money than her entire career combined. The runner-up cheque alone is $1.6 million. If she wins today, she takes home $3.25 million.
One week ago she couldn't pay for her hotel room.
Not a day goes by that I don't call upon .@ScottAdamsSays sage, yet simple advice from "How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big", Ch.11
"Don't be an A**hole"
The best leaders don’t just get the job done; they make it easier for everyone to excel. They show up with empathy, initiative, & positive energy that turns friction into forward momentum. They know when to speak up, step back, or clear the runway so others can soar.
🧵2/3
"If we start something, we see it the entire way through. At the end of it, even if you don't like it to the highest level, you know that you put your time, energy into something that you're at least proud." - Kevin Hart
On the most professional flight decks, great leaders don’t clutch the controls. They delegate.
Your crew can handle the mission--trust them, give them room to fly, & step in only when it’s critical.
Are you still gripping the controls when you could be trusting your crew?
I get asked this question a lot: what's your favourite episode of The Diary Of A CEO ever?
The answer is fairly easy.. episode 101 with @MGawdat. It was our most shared episode ever, not because of fame or celebrity, but because what he said was so profound it changed the way I think about life..
Mo was the Chief Business Officer at Google X, the "moonshot factory" behind self-driving cars and some of the most futuristic technology on the planet. He co-founded over 20 businesses. By any external measure, he had achieved everything. But he was desperately unhappy..
So he did what any engineer would do - he tried to solve the problem. He spent years researching, collecting data, and eventually he discovered what he calls the happiness equation.
It's deceptively simple...
"You're happy in your life when your expectations of how life is supposed to be going are met. And you're unhappy when those expectations go unmet."
Therefore... so much of our happiness is about the gap between what happens and what you expected to happen."
I use this as a framework now to think about why I'm unhappy at certain moments in my life.
And it's always.. without any exception.. because I had an expectation of how something was going to happen and it's currently falling below that expectation.
This also explains why gratitude has always been seen as one of the great answers to happiness.
Because gratitude is the realisation that your expectations are being met in various areas of your life right now.
If you think about everything that's made you unhappy in the last week, I guarantee it's all about an expectation you had about something.
Someone cuts you off in traffic? You expected them not to. Your partner didn't do what you asked? You expected them to. Your dog pooped in the house? You expected it wouldn't.
So can we manage our expectations? of ourselves, of others, of our partners, of life itself?
Mo's son Ali died suddenly during a routine operation. It was the ultimate test of his equation. And somehow, through the worst thing a parent could ever endure, his framework helped him survive.
Have you listened to this one yet? ❤️
A royal-worthy aircraft! In 1987, the Airbus #A320 received a truly regal christening from the Prince and Princess of Wales. It marked history as the first commercial airliner where every function was controlled by computer systems—thanks to its groundbreaking fly-by-wire technology.
The inaugural A320 proudly rolled out of the final assembly line in Toulouse. Just eight days later, on February 22, it took to the skies for its maiden flight, lasting 3 hours and 23 minutes. The comprehensive flight test campaign that followed spanned 1,200 hours across 530 flights.
Happy 39 @Airbus A320.
Watching the #A350-1000 perform at #SingaporeAirshow2026 is a breathtaking experience, but the view from the cockpit is even better.
Our Experimental Test Pilot Bernardo shares the secrets behind this graceful dance in the skies.
I have to give props to someone who went through all of this to help explain what to do if you fall through ice.
I learned something. I didn’t quite know all of this. Is it just me? Does everyone know this? He must be sooooo cold!!
Even the best pilots don’t fly solo. Behind all successful missions is a trusted team--wingmen who watch your six. It’s the same in business--your team influences how high you climb & how well you navigate turbulence. Choose a team that will keep you steady when skies get rough.