I’m starting the year with a newsletter. I set the timer for 25-minutes. Last year I learned I don’t really have a handle writing anything long. (Mostly from trying to write about Bill Simmons’s writing from college.)
Instead, I’ll write a bunch of short things. Here are the podcast recommendations from me and Wally from our latest episode.
Joe DeFranco 142 (Mickey Gall): Turning Setbacks into Comebacks —
You might know Mickey Gall as the person who destroyed CM Punk in his UFC debut. I was rooting for CM Punk. I’ve been a casual MMA fan for a few years. Watching this fight and hearing Overeem commenting on CM Punk’s BJJ experience pre-fight (something like “What is he a purple belt?… Oh he’s blue? Oh boy.”) really opened my eyes to the gap created by experience in MMA.
Oh yeah, this episode. It’s about failure. Mickey Gall lost his most recent fight. It’s his first UFC loss. They talk about going through a loss and Gall talks about the steps he took to get over it and the steps he’s taking to start bouncing back.
Art of Manliness #363: Budgeting Doesn’t Have to Suck —
Wally recommended this as a good discussion on budgeting and personal finance. I recommended the app Clarity Money. Last year I wanted to save more so I installed Prosper Daily to keep an eye out. That app was discontinued and users were recommended to transfer to Clarity Money. It works really well also.
Tribe of Mentors: Jocko Willink – Discipline Equals Freedom —
Jocko in Tim Ferriss’s book, Tribe of Mentors: “Look at the situation and assess the multitude of problems, tasks, or issues. Choose the one that is going to have the biggest impact and execute on that. If you try to solve every problem or complete every task simultaneously, you will fail at all of them. Pick the biggest problem or the issue that will provide the most positive impact. Then focus your resources on that and attack it.”
The Tribe of Mentors podcast has guests giving answers to the questions in the book with some commentary and they also answer a few extra questions. It reminded me that you can learn a lot through podcasts. (Which will lead to me and Wally probably shifting our focus from books to podcasts.)
Knowledge Project: Is Sugar Slowly Killing Us? (Gary Taubes) —
Wally recommended this. It’s a good one for your New Year’s health goals. Stop eating sugar. Or at least so much of it. Speaking of, here’s another thing I wanted to mention: Martin is back at Leangains and the site is refreshed. If you want to learn about intermittent fasting, go there.
For a good sample of his writing, check out his classic F-arounditis: “It might sound tedious to keep doing the same movements every week and the appeal of ‘mixing it up’ can seem strong. However, the tediousness will soon be replaced by the much stronger joy you get from seeing your lifts go up on a weekly basis.”
I should probably read that every single week.
Active Recall: Tribe of Mentors (ep. 28) —
I’ll be sending out a newsletter whenever Wally and I release a new episode. It will have links to our latest episode and some podcast recommendations. I mentioned that I don’t have a handle on writing long things.
I’m also learning that it might not be the best thing for me right now. I get super distracted in the midst of it. I’ve noticed I’m not present when I’m writing long posts. With practice I bet you can learn to turn it off and on. But it’s probably lots of practice. Right now, I’d rather make short things and finish them. Videos are better for that so I’ll be working on videos. (Check out the channel!)
Here’s a photo for the week. If you’ve got some resolutions, go do them!
