“I only believe in statistics that I doctored myself.” — Winston Churchill
When I recently went to the time-traveling mailbox at my lake house, I found this letter from Winston Churchill inside. Apparently, he really took this question on Quora to heart. Here’s what it said.
Read MoreWhen our math teacher in high school introduced a new topic, what happened next would always follow the same pattern:
Steps 3-5 of the pattern would then repeat until the majority of the class understood the new concept and the “More examples!” screams slowly died down. Then we moved on.
Since I was often part of the group who got the gist the first go around, I’d be bored for the remainder of the lesson, waiting for everyone else to get the joke so we could continue. In the meantime, instead of listening, I tried to come up with more of my own examples.
I didn’t know it back then, but as it turns out, I was doing something right.
Read More“Knowing and not doing is the same as not knowing.” — Peter Sage
If you read a lot, but seem to forget most of the information you so eagerly soak up, this is for you. I’d like to give you 3 things today:
Let’s go!
Read MoreThere’s this little thing called the internet. It’s pretty awesome. I know you have heard of it, but actually, most people still haven’t.
As of right now (checked 5th of January, 2017 via Internet Live Stats), 3.5 billion people in the world have access to the internet.
The current population is ~7.5 billion (checked same date, via World Population Clock).
That means 3.5/7.5 ≈ 47% of all people in this world have access to the internet – and 53% DON’T.
I know we all love talking about “the next big thing,” but actually, our last “next big thing” still isn’t quite here yet.
So before we upload and link our brains, live forever in VR and casually talk with each other over Skype, no matter what language we speak, we have to get everyone online first.
Facebook is making one of the biggest efforts in this arena with unmanned aircrafts, powered by solar panels and supplied with internet access via laser technology. They’ve already helped 25 million people get online.
Note: I’m well aware of the fact that people not having access to the internet ≠ people don’t know it exists, I just thought it’d be fun to point out, since we’re talking about space paint and meat from a tube when there’s a huge pink elephant in the room that also deserves to be addressed 🙂
First of all, James has written publicly about this, and it seems to me most people are more busy trashing him and his service than actually finding out what he does, which is sad, because he’s a good guy who knows his stuff.
I’ve been reading James’s blog since 2012, I’ve read all of his books and my roommate got the Top 1% Newsletter when it came out. I’m personally not a member yet, but I plan on joining this year.
One of the special reports you get when signing up is about trading like a hedge fund. My friend let me read it and it describes the “backdoor” approach pretty much the same way his blog post does.
Read MoreAll of these are important at times, but self-esteem is the one you truly want. Of course the three are all tied to one another, but work on different levels.
“Choose not to be harmed, and you won’t feel harmed. Don’t feel harmed, and you haven’t been.”
— Marcus Aurelius
Perform a random act of kindness that makes as many people happy as it possibly can. Here’s how.
What I should do:
Hand the book to the store owner and tell him or her: “Hey, here’s 500 bucks inside this book, do you know who they belong to?”
But the way I know my used-bookstore-owners, they’d just get greedy and pocket the money themselves.
Here’s a better idea that’ll make not just one, but six people happy.
What I would do:
Take out all of the bills but one, walk to the four corners of the bookstore and put one $100 note into a random book in each corner.
Now 5 people can find random books with $100 in them and have a really happy day, plus I’ll be happy because I know 5 others will be 🙂
Let’s work backwards. If you calculate how much growth you want to achieve, you can then use that number to find the right risk/reward ratio for your investment(s) and maximize your chances of making this happen in a given time frame.
What you’re trying to get is a 666% ROI. Basically, you want to 6.66x your money.
Doing this in 5 years indicates an annual interest rate of 38% – that’s steep. Your effective annual rate (which includes compounding interest and tells you the average growth per year) needs to be even higher: 46.2%
Basically, your money would need to grow by half every year, in order to reach $1 million within 5 years.
That’s a lot of real estate bets that have to go in your favor, in order for this to work out.
Read More24,000 people are injured in bus accidents every year. 283 of those aren’t lucky enough to walk away with a few scratches.
I’ve always imagined getting hit (and killed) by a bus like this: You cross the street, hear a noise, look to the side and in the last split second you realize what’s going to happen.
You only have time for one, last thought. What’s it going to be?
Read MoreHas anyone ever asked you for directions and you were too embarrassed to admit you don’t know? So much in fact, that you tried to tell them where to go regardless? Just to save your face?
“Uhhh, I think it’s that way.”
That’s what most career advice feels like these days. Nobody has a clue, so everyone goes with their best guess — which is everybody else’s best guess also.
Hence, we live in a world of depressed millennials, which is permeated by two ideas:
If you’re fine with putting your life into the hands of chance, then you can stop reading right now.
Or, you can flip both of these ideas on their head.
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