pkrftp

Rewrite your internal script, rewrite your external outcome.

[Aadit Sheth @aaditsh]

The founder of Palantir shows how to think like a billionaire (even if you’re just starting out). Save this for later.

[Machina @EXM7777]

how to rewire your brain to learn AI fast:

[Ian Cassel @iancassel]

Three day trip by yourself - $500 and throw some clothes in a travel backpack

Three day trip with the family - $10,000 and a U-haul

[Mubbu @wizofecom]

"If I share everything I know on social media, why would someone hire me?"

Because brand owners are too busy to implement each & every tactic you post out online

The brand owner that reads your posts simply needs to nod, know you're an expert and then they'll book a call

[Jason Cohen @asmartbear]

Two founders A and B start a company with 50/50 ownership.

Two years later they raise $1M at $5M post from investor C who now owns 25%, and they create an ESOP (employee stock option pool) with another 20%, so (fully-diluted) the ownership levels are A=B=27.5%, C=25%, ESOP=20%.

Two years later there’s an offer to sell the company for $20M. In just four years? Wow! Each founder can get $6M before taxes (because the ESOP isn’t fully allocated yet). But both the founders and investors see this as a signal of even bigger things to come, so they turn it down and forge ahead.

Instead, they leverage this valuation validation to raise $5M at $20M pre from investor D, and C takes their pro-rata, and they and top off the ESOP at pro-rata as well, so now it’s A=B=15%, C=25%, ESOP=20%, D=25%.

For the founders to get $6M pre-tax, they would now need an offer of $40M. No matter, we raised money to grow, and we’re growing, so let’s grow!

Two years later things are still going well, so they raise $15M on $75M pre from investor E. TechCrunch is going to write about this for sure! C & D don’t take their pro-rata (better for founders!), so now it’s A=B=11%, C=21%, ESOP=17%, D=21%, E=20%.

At this point the founders have gone through a lot -- six of the most intense and stressful years of their life, even if also fulfilling, so maybe they’d want more like $10M pre-tax in any sale, to feel good about the outcome. At their ownership level, that’s a $90M sale, but they just raised at $75, so the new investors wouldn’t get enough return at that paltry level, so that’s never going to happen.

You can see the pattern. There’s no obvious off-ramp here. Either the company ends up as a unicorn, or… what? The founders (and employees) would have gotten the same money had they had sold long ago?

Note that this is a very good-case scenario. The company grew at a healthy clip for 6 years. Every financing round was a normal valuation and a normal amount raised -- 20%-25% each time. Nothing unfair, no one “exploited” anyone.

What do you do with that information? You could say: Never raise money.

But I’m happy I did at WP Engine, and I’m happy we didn’t sell early in our company’s life when we had a good offer. (The numbers were, in fact, even better than the above scenario!)

It’s not just “how much money did the founders get.” Life is the journey, it’s the people, it’s building things, it’s caring about something, it’s teams caring about the same thing, it’s happy customers, it’s people’s careers, it’s wealth for many instead of just the founder.

Indeed, what I find most common in bootstrapped companies is founders with 100% of the equity, and upon sale, employees get nothing. Remember that the next time you’re tempted to point the finger at the VC’s as the greedy ones.

Even so, is it weird or bad that investors have most of the equity, and thus get most of the money if the company is successful, despite spending 1/100th of the time working on the company than any one of its employees, to say nothing of founders?

For that, you have to decide whether "risk capital" is logical or illogical. And, of course, whether you want to make that trade.

It’s perfectly sensible to say: “I never want to get on that carnival ride. My ownership is my life.” It’s also perfectly sensible to say: “I want to build something large, impactful, meaningful, substantial, creating a legacy.”

I’ve done both, and I’m happy to have done both.

You can pick one, without wasting hours “hating” on people or systems that picked the other.

[Dr. Julie Gurner @drgurner]

Contrarian but correct take from Albert Einstein:

"Reading after a certain age diverts the mind too much from its creative pursuits. Any man who reads too much and uses his own brain too little falls into lazy habits of thinking."

You have to know when to put the books down.

[🐍 Ƥşץ𝕔𝔥𝕠pomp_Đ𝔦o̷͝ηуรǗ丂 ඏ @Read_Acted]

@thereisonlyz Smart people love making things harder for themselves

[Christopher Ho @Chr1stopherHo]

A $1 billion company has operated for 53 years with ZERO managers.

Workers buy $500,000 machines without approval. Hire their own colleagues. Set their own salaries.

And they're outperforming every competitor in their industry.

The coolest company you've never heard of 🧵

[James Clear @JamesClear]

The more control you have over your attention, the more control you have over your future. And it starts with having enough courage to protect your time.

It's so easy to say yes. We want to be agreeable, helpful, liked. That's how time disappears and attention becomes fragmented: not in big chunks, but in a thousand small concessions.

What you trade your attention for is what your life becomes.

[Jay Yang @Jayyanginspires]

Spend your youth lore maxxing.

[Tim Denning @Tim_Denning]

My dad once told me in the car:

“You’re either an investor or an expense tracker. One is wealthy and the other one is always poor.”

I still think about this.

[roobz 🌙 🌸 @tishray]

My favourite line from the movie Interstellar is, "A machine doesn't improvise well, because you can't program a fear of death." The reason why humans can innovate and push boundaries is that we know that our time is finite. Our greatest source of inspiration is the hope that maybe someday, we can create something that can cheat death.

We try to create art that lives in people's memories, medicine that extends life, and technology that transcends the body. We're even trying to find a home on another planet in case we live so long that we outlive Earth.

At the heart of almost every major human innovation is the desire to outlast ourselves. This is why I don't subscribe to the idea that we need to live longer, or forever. The knowing that death will someday arrive at our doorstep is what drives us as human beings to create something that will transcend time.

There's an irony in it. Our sickness is also our cure. It gets me thinking that maybe death isn't a flaw. Maybe it's a gift.

[DAN KOE @thedankoe]

If you’re young, the reason people don’t believe in you is because you don’t have any evidence. You haven’t done anything. Until you become someone worth believing in, expect very few people to honestly support you.

[Blake Burge @blakeaburge]

One of the biggest unlocks in life: Stop arguing with reality. Start where you are, not where you wish you were. Every minute spent bitching about or denying your current position is a minute stolen from your future. The faster you face the facts, the faster you can change them.

[Leila Hormozi @LeilaHormozi]

Avoid a convo? Relationship debt
Skip a workout? Physical debt
Put off work? Professional debt

Every time you avoid what has to be done you create a future problem with interest

You don’t need to be perfect
But don’t lie to yourself - everything you delay eventually comes due.

[James Clear @JamesClear]

The person who focuses on one task and sees it through to completion—even if they work in a somewhat slow or outdated manner—beats the endless optimizer who jumps from tool to tool and always hopes a new piece of technology will help them finish what they start.

[BONESAW 🕊️ @BonesawMD]

Male goofiness becomes an intolerable ick because it is largely performative and fake.

Women will intuit it very quickly, because it shows a man is not comfortable or truly confident in himself.

He hides behind the jovial, smiling veneer.

It is the subconscious need to be validated and make everybody feel comfortable. To ease all tension as quickly as possible.

He values this above his own inner integrity and dignity.

Eventually, men grow out of it when they become comfortable with themselves and realise they aren't circus clowns for entertainment and to lighten the mood.

Women can finally trust the man who doesn't feel the need to fake his entire persona.

[Luke Belmar 👽 @lukebelmar]

Warren Buffet sold the top. Legendary.

[du @thedulab]

You want to get to a point where you're so into something in your life, that other people's behaviors no longer even register in your mind

Someone randomly blocks, ghosts, or says something weird to you, literally who cares. You raise your eyebrow for a split second, then never consider it ever again

Someone bumps into, stands in front of, or inconveniences you, simply not a problem. You don't even look at them and have no idea what or if they said anything. You just keep walking ahead

It's all completely unforced. You're not trying to be unbothered. It's merely a natural side effect of having a way more meaningful object of fixation to nourish and satiate all of your stores of mental energy

Never seen a respectable individual who loved who they are and where they're headed ever let an external annoyance one shot them out of that vibration

The thoughts in your brain are the safe space and you have no interest in inviting junk in without your permission

[Wealth Squad Chris @Chrissssjohnson]

This part of life is called get money, find peace, do dope shit with people you care about and don’t try to live up to societies weird ass expectations