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3MM: Not Caring, Left Wing & Reading
3 MINUTE MONDAYHi friend, My live tour starts this Thursday in NYC. 5 shows are already sold out - NYC, Austin, Boston, Denver & Chicago all have very limited space left. Last chance for tickets at http://chriswilliamson.live/ I recently came across a blog post from Sam Altman about how to not care what other people think. It's definitely worth reading. “A founder recently asked me how to stop caring what other people think. I didn’t have an answer, and after reflecting on it more, I think it's the wrong question.
Almost everyone cares what someone thinks (though caring what everyone thinks is definitely a mistake), and it's probably important.
Caring too much makes you a sheep.
But you need to be at least a little in tune with others to do something useful for them.
It seems like there are two degrees of freedom: you can choose the people whose opinions you care about (and on what subjects), and you can choose the timescale you care about them on.
Most people figure out the former but the latter doesn’t seem to get much attention.
The most impressive people I know care a lot about what people think, even people whose opinions they really shouldn’t value (a surprising numbers of them do something like keeping a folder of screenshots of tweets from haters).
But what makes them unusual is that they generally care about other people’s opinions on a very long time horizon—as long as the history books get it right, they take some pride in letting the newspapers get it wrong.
You should trade being short-term low-status for being long-term high-status, which most people seem unwilling to do.
A common way this happens is by eventually being right about an important but deeply non-consensus bet.
But there are lots of other ways–the key observation is that as long as you are right, being misunderstood by most people is a strength not a weakness.
You and a small group of rebels get the space to solve an important problem that might otherwise not get solved.” — Sam Altman
MODERN WISDOMI do a podcast where I pretend to have a British accent. This week’s upcoming episodes: Monday. Thursday. Saturday. THINGS I'VE LEARNED1. The University of Arkansas found that political ideology predicts how people judge male leaders based on physical strength:
Researchers suggest this reflects evolved stereotypes: strength signals dominance, hierarchy, and enforcement — values conservatives admire but egalitarian authoritarians reject. 2. 73% of Boomer males: "No matter what psychological challenges I face, I will not let them define me." 72% of Gen Z females: "Mental illness is an important part of my identity." — The Presidential Election Survey 2024 3. “One in 5 American adults is illiterate. 54% of adults read below a sixth-grade level. And the numbers are getting worse. Relatedly, it is alarming how bad so many college-educated adults are at reading.” — Rob Henderson LIFE HACKLMNT Lemonade Salt is back in stock. This stuff is phenomenal and was sold out for ages. They had a $1.6M truckload of it stolen recently (no joke). But it’s available now, so go get it. I keep harping on about LMNT because it really works - try it and feel the difference that proper, tasty hydration makes. They also offer an unlimited duration money-back guarantee - so you can buy it 100% risk-free. Try LMNT Risk-Free with a free sample pack. https://drinklmnt.com/modernwisdom Big love, Try my productivity drink Neutonic. PS |
3 Minute Monday
Podcaster with 1bn+ plays. I write about the most important lessons from the best thinkers on the planet. 300,000+ people read my free newsletter. Press subscribe to join.
3 MINUTE MONDAY Hi friend, My tour finishes this week. Salt Lake City & Vancouver have been sold out for months, Denver on Friday has a few tickets left! I was recently asked why I try and stay out of drama on the internet. There’s no shortage of it to inject yourself into. It is much easier to grow an audience by creating an enemy, even an imaginary one. Galvanising people’s in-group & out-group biases will bring you ardent fans more quickly than anything else, it's something I'm proud of...
3 MINUTE MONDAY Hi friend, I’m coming back to Australia with a brand new live show in March! Plus New Zealand and Bali 💜 Sydney, Brisbane, Adelaide, Melbourne, Perth, Christchurch, Auckland and Canggu. Get your tickets now. In celebration, here’s a story from that side of the world. In Australia in the 1970’s a woman was assaulted. Her assailant had broken into her house and attacked her inside of her home. The police were called and took her report, she identified a TV psychologist, Donald...
3 MINUTE MONDAY Hi friend, Modern Wisdom’s merch drop has 24 hours left to buy. Pre-order finishes Tuesday. After that you will never be able to buy these designs again. Last chance for MW Merch. We like to pretend procrastination is a time-management problem, but regularly it isn’t. It’s often a self-protection strategy wearing a Fitbit. When we delay doing the thing we know we should do, we’re sometimes not wrestling with our schedule, we’re wrestling with our self-worth. The logic goes...