On Risk and Investing, The Messy Middle, and Stillness
On Risk and Investing, The Messy Middle, and Stillness
Books that changed my life
Hello all!
Here is your weekly dose of books that changed my life.
1. Personal finance
The Most Important Thing: Uncommon Sense for the Thoughtful Investor
Summary
Howard Marks’s work is fabulous. He is the co-founder of Oaktree Capital Management and is one of the most consistent voices I listen to over the last fifteen years (through two major recessions). This book is a distillation of Marks’s thought process and how he manages risk for his clients–a topic that is typically not well covered in most personal finance books. If personal finance is important to you, Marks’s work deserves space on your bookshelf.
Principle: Risk control is the best route to loss avoidance. Risk avoidance, on the other hand, is likely to lead to return avoidance as well.
Insight: The road to long term investment success runs through risk control more than through aggressiveness
Quote: Experience is what you get when you didn’t get what you wanted. -Howard Marks
Authors: Howard Marks
Themes: Personal finance, Investing, Wealth creation
My personal notes from the book
2. Entrepreneurship
The Messy Middle: Finding Your Way Through the Hardest and Most Crucial Part of Any Bold Venture
Summary
This is one of the most important books for business startups. There is a point in a startup where you are past infancy and moving into the adolescent and teenage years. As in life, these years get messy. Belsky’s work helps you to get though the hardest parts of any bold business venture.
Principle: If you are hesitant to let underperformers go, you are punishing the best performers by limiting their potential. The best reason to fire people not performing well is to keep your best people. The short term pain of letting a troublesome employee go outweighs the long-term gain of keeping the rest of your team engaged.
Insight: The easiest route to take is to glide in the direction of whatever fate pushes. But living at the mercy of circumstances makes you a passive participant in your own story. (Fight the current or the current will take you where it wants to)
Quote: You cannot travel the path until you have become the path yourself - Buddha
Quote: The best advice doesn’t instruct, it provokes -Scott Belsky
Behavioral truth: When you are anxious about your business, there is no easier, quick-relief antidote than checking things. Insecurity work.
No intended outcome
Does not move the ball forward in any way
Is quick enough that you can do it unconsciously multiple times a day
Antidote: A combination of awareness, self-discipline, and delegation.
Author: Scott Belsky
Themes: Entrepreneurship, Running and rowing a business, Culture, Productivity, Work hygiene, Product development
My personal notes from the book
3. Personal development
Stillness is the Key
Summary
Every book written by Ryan Holiday is worth reading (others include Ego is the Enemy and The Obstacle is the Way). With so much “noise” in our lives, Holiday provides his insights and tools to help us achieve a modicum of stillness. This book is enlightening and will certainly inspire change.
Principle: Learn to filter the inconsequential from the essential.
Insight: We are overfed and undernourished. Overstimulated, over scheduled, and lonely.
Quote: People who don’t read have no advantage over those who cannot read. -Ryan Holiday
Quote: As any seasoned captain of the seas of life can tell you, what is happening on the surface of the water doesn’t matter–it’s what’s going on below that will kill you.
Author: Ryan Holiday
Themes: Personal development, Health and wellness, Living a full life
My personal notes from the book
That’s a wrap. Thanks for reading!
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Best,
Adam
P.S. Do you have a favorite book that changed your life? Please share it with me by replying to this email.
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