If I manage to do one useful thing every day, it adds up to a lot of useful things over time. And that has proven to be enough.
There's a sort of mediocre Johnny Cash song with the chorus "Even I might get to Heaven at a half a mile a day"
That's basically how I try to live my life.
Not because I want to take it slowly, but because I have a lot on my plate and my natural tendency is to "unflatten time", fast-forwarding in my head all the different plays and things to do. Some of these will only apply in a year, but here I am thinking about them and worrying about them now. Worse still, I sometime make decisions related to these future things and as you all surely know, decisions are paid for with a mental toll.
So I dial back, focus on the immediate thing in front of me and remember that nearly any progress is made of trivial, tiny chunks.
Having an effective system of writing stuff down is key to that approach - your future ideas and various pending tasks need to spill into writing instead of lingering around your head. When you have a good writing system you can trust, then you can free your mind to focus on the now.
I take great joy in the whiteboard writing itself (probably because I was always much better with keyboards than with pens, it's nice to make up some of that difference now).
Whiteboard real estate is always finite so it's not like you could amass too much junk, as you would digitally. You either need to reset your objectives or, well, go out and complete some of them.
I keep one side of the board filled with tasks, the other side I use as a scratchpad.
Obviously some of the notes I take on the whiteboard get translated into JIRA, emails or whatever, but that's only when other people are involved.
Well, take Johnny Cash. Half a mile a day * 30k days gives 15k miles; maybe it's enough to reach heaven, but not enough to e.g. reach the Moon.
So, when choosing to move steadily albeit slowly, you have to manage your expectations, and get used to get by with little.
Investing your time is not unlike investing your money: least risky strategies bring most stable but least spectacular results, while big bets bring both big gains and big losses.
it's actually an asymmetric. The losses a capped - you cannot lose more than you own, and you cannot lose more than the time you put in (which is, of course, something you're going to lose by living any way). Technically, you also lose the "risk free reward" in opportunity cost - e.g., a minimum wage job.
The gains, however, are unlimited. For both yourself, and for society. So i think it's in the interest of society to make many of these "big bets".
only if you did something illegal. You cannot be sued for more than you own in a civil suit.
The only debt you cannot discharge via bankruptcy is student loan debt, iirc.
Why would you lose who you are if you merely lost on a big bet (say, as an entrepreneur?)
> there's relationships with family & friends
I think you may be reading too much - you imply that a big bet will always mean sacrificing your friends and family, but i do not believe that to be the case, and in fact, friends and family are what helps you succeed, and including them in your bet is more likely to help.
> there's time, there's opportunities
you are _always_ using up your time, regardless of whether you're using it in a big bet, or merely lazying around. As for opportunities - yes you lose in opportunity cost, but you cannot for sure say anything about what is lost, other than a sure-fire, 100% successful opportunity that you declined. If there's two startups, and you chose one, the other is _not_ the opportunity cost (because both has the same opportunity cost - that of a stable wage job working for a stable, zero risk company).
I think you may be reading too much - you imply that a big bet will always mean sacrificing your friends and family, but i do not believe that to be the case
Not even two months ago, https://www.cnn.com/2020/06/19/business/robinhood-suicide-al...
2) Success changes people. Failure changes people. It also changes how other people look at you. It's not uncommon for people who achieve a certain level of success to make a break with their former lives in some way. Even before success or failure, simply making a big bet then requires a certain amount of focus & drive that can make it difficult, unless you are very careful (and many people are not) to keep your same relationships, to not allow friendships & family connections to lapse. Or let's use something more concrete: many people finance their big bet through family & friends, asking them to make a bet as well. Failure in those cases can be very difficult.
3) You seem to agree with me here: time is always lost, always lost beyond any monetary gain or loss. And it's not just the time lost on the project: Starting from zero means time spent working your way back up. (Perhaps tapping those family & friends for more resources: see above) You only have time for a very small number of big bets. Doing that casually because you believe the potential downside is capped at money is... an incomplete understanding of the risks. If you choose the "big bet" path, it will likely define your life, and what you do day in & day out. And what life is defined purely in monetary terms? None.
So take those risks, all decisions are risks. But consider the costs as well. It's always more than just money.
Those who faced personal bankruptcies in 2007-2008 and were stuck with mortgages that were worth far more than their home values might not agree with you.
Plus, of course, there’s no fast road to Heaven - whatever Heaven May mean to you.
But in the scale of each year I’m super productive.