Curiosity Chronicle

Last week I wrote about failing a marathon.Six days later, at 5am, I drove back to the course alone and ran 26.25 miles in 2:48:47. Not because I needed the official result. Because when I say I'm going to do something, I do it.In this piece, I talk about seven lessons from that solo marathon that have nothing to do with running — how to stack slow progress, how to stay in the long game, and why showing up through the valley is the whole game...•••This episode brought to you by:Delete...

In 1865, English economist William Stanley Jevons studied the impact of the increased efficiency of coal use.The common economic intuition said that as efficiency improved, people would use less coal. Jevons argued that the economic reality was different: As technology improved the efficiency of coal use, demand for coal would increase as people created and justified new uses.It became known as Jevons Paradox: technological improvements that increase the efficiency of a given resource lead to a rise in the consumption of that resource.I think the most interesting application of Jevons Paradox...

Last Sunday, I was scheduled to run a marathon with a goal of completing the race in 2:49:59.I trained all summer for the race, building up to 70+ mile weeks. I tapered. I carb loaded. I meticulously prepared for every detail.And honestly, I was certain I’d do it.But…I failed.After 21.45 miles at a 6:24 average pace, I stopped and walked off the course. I didn’t finish. DNF.That’s not something you read in newsletters or see on social media every day. It’s all about wins. Succ...

The engineer took out an axe and slammed it into the brick wall.It was June 1896. The young man had spent months working in a small brick shed behind his rented house, only to realize, at 4am, that the door wasn't big enough for what he'd built.His name was Henry Ford. His creation, the Ford Quadricycle.His atomic insight was simple: He began viewing the factory itself as the product.While others obsessed over the car, he obsessed over the factory. By the early 1920s, Ford owned an extraordinary 60% of...

Last weekend, my family and I made our annual pilgrimage to a small community in northwest Connecticut.When I was 18 months old, my parents had rented a house there for the summer, seeking an escape from the New York City heat.The next year, we went back. The following, we went again.Soon, the tiny enclave became like a second home. I met my two best friends there. I caught my first fish there. I had my first crush there.But perhaps most importantly, I played my first game of catch...

I first met Tim Cook in 2014.I was just starting my career in finance and had signed up for a local gym that opened at 5:00am. I started arriving at 4:45am so I could get to the office by 6:30.Each morning, there was a small handful of others who would congregate outside the doors at that time. Tim happened to be one of the people in that group.For the first six months, I talked to him almost every day and had exactly zero idea who he was.<...

I'm convinced that the market for telling people what they want to hear is much larger than the market for telling people what they need to hear.That one fact explains a lot of what you see in the world.But my goal has always been to be real. Even if it's unpopular. Because everything I write is something I hope my son reads someday, and I owe him the truth.Today, that truth is a few things nobody told you about success.It may not be...

Imagine two different people on the same mid-January day.One lives in California. He walks outside in shorts and a t-shirt. The warm sun beams down on his face. He puts on his sunglasses, unlocks his car, and turns the AC on full blast.One lives in New York. He walks outside in a heavy jacket. He grimaces as the cold wind hits his uncovered face. He opens the trunk of his car, takes out a brush, and starts cleaning the snow and ice off his windshield.Which one do you assume is...

A few weeks ago, I came across a podcast clip of Conan O'Brien talking about why he doesn't pay to fly private. He likes going through the airport, chatting with people at TSA, and "being in the world with other people that are traveling."It got me thinking about the obsessive pursuit of convenience and the hidden debt it creates in your life.Money has the ability to reduce the simple stresses, burdens, and inconveniences of adult life. But there's a certain level of inconvenience that's an important part of the human experience.<...

In 1628, Sweden's mightiest warship sank less than a mile into its maiden voyage -- not because of an enemy attack, but because a king couldn't stop adding to it. I call it the Vasa Effect: the addition of individual positives can eventually create a catastrophic negative.In this week's piece, I break down why our bias for addition is holding us back and how creative subtraction might be the fastest way to improve.•••This episode brought to you by:DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your personal data o...

The seat you randomly chose on day one is the seat you'll sit in for the rest of the term. My college professor said that, and he was right -- not just about lecture halls, but about life. Your life has gravity, and most people never even feel it building.This week, I break down the two types of gravity keeping you stuck and the simple answer to making sure you can always escape.•••This episode brought to you by:DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your person...

A fancy robe nearly destroyed a philosopher's life.In 1765, Denis Diderot's financial means went from meager to extravagant. Soon thereafter, he came to own a fancy scarlet dressing robe.Diderot liked the status that the fancy robe conferred on him but quickly felt the remainder of his possessions could not compare.So, in quick succession, he purchased a new leather chair. New shoes. An elaborate wooden desk.All of which seemed appropriately matched to his lovely scarlet robe.Or, perhaps more important, appropriately matched to the...

Everyone's asking: how do I stand out in the AI era? A 1968 German mathematician's traffic paradox holds the answer.When everyone floods the new shortcut, the fast lane becomes the slow lane.Here's how to find the open road... •••This episode brought to you by:DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your personal data online. Origin Financial - Your personal AI Financial Advisor. Track your spending, investments, and net worth—all in one place.Innerbody Labs - A Higher Standard. After reviewing thousands of health pro...

In the early 1900s, an aging Japanese steam train engineer named Yasoichi Hori was growing increasingly concerned about his deteriorating eyesight.Hori's job relied on his ability to quickly read small track signals at a distance while moving at a high rate of speed. The cab he worked in was at the back of the locomotive, behind a large boiler, which meant that he often had to lean out a side window to catch the signals coming up on the track ahead.In the small, cramped cab, it was just Hori and his...

I think I'm having a midlife crisis."That's what my friend, who I'll call Joe, said to me at dinner a few weeks ago. Joe is in his early-40s. He's had a good career on a steady rising track in the world of finance. He's married with two kids, ages 7 and 4. He lives in the suburbs outside New York and commutes into the city for work.In many respects, I think of Joe as something of an archetype of the dream. Good job. Good family. Good life.So, naturally, his words...

Why do you value the things you build yourself so much more than anything you can buy?In this episode, I share a personal story from my first apartment and break down the fascinating science behind why effort is the secret ingredient to a meaningful life.•••This episode brought to you by:DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your personal data online. Origin Financial - Your personal AI Financial Advisor. Track your spending, investments, and net worth—all in one place.Innerbody Labs - A Higher Standard. After rev...

"So, what's your 5-year plan?"That was the question posed to me by a mentor in January 2021. At the time, I was about seven years into my career, on the "track" in finance.Climbing slowly up the mountain, I had started to wonder if it was the wrong one. I just didn't seem to have the same energy for the work as most of my colleagues.All of the future mountains I envisioned were (at most) one degree of separation from the mountain I'd been climbing.As I...

On January 27, 1986, just 16 hours before the Space Shuttle Challenger was set to launch, an engineer named Roger Boisjoly presented data showing a catastrophic risk with the shuttle's O-rings in cold temperatures.His warnings were overruled. The next morning, 73 seconds into its flight, the Challenger exploded, killing all seven crew aboard.Sociologist Diane Vaughn coined the term Normalization of Deviance to describe what had happened—not a single moment of negligence, but a slow, systemic drift where unacceptable practices became accepted because they were repeated without immediate consequences.In this episode, I ex...

I’m increasingly convinced that the willingness to change your mind is the ultimate sign of intelligence.The most impressive people I know change their minds often in response to new information or evidence. It's not that they lack conviction in their beliefs, but more so that they've developed enough self-awareness to understand what it would take to change them.The world will pressure you to stubbornly resist such change. To cling to every belief as though it might be your last. But there's immense power in resisting that pressure.I...

Last week, I ​wrote a piece​ about reinvention. Specifically, the myth of too late and how to reinvent your life at any age or life stage.It clearly struck a chord.I received thousands of replies in the days following the piece. One reader reply referenced a two-decade-old newspaper advice column segment that had resonated on the subject.Me being me, I decided to try to find the column. After all, if something was still etched into my reader's memory 20+ years later, it must have been good.​I did​...