Brain Dump n. 1

My latest thoughts: how to get better at anything, happiness, and other minor things.

July 04, 2023 • Estimated Reading Time: 3 minutes

lucabrando sanfilippo brain dump

  1. How to get better: “Mathematically, you have three levers to create a masterpiece: Increase your average (get better), increase your variance (try different things), increase your sample size (try more times, churn more quantity)” - by Tomas Pueyo. Of these, the latter is the easiest one to achieve, it’s just easy to put things out (I am doing it now). Even if you don’t obsess over quality, you will inevitably get better over time.

  2. There is something deeply relaxing and beneficial for mental health about knowing about the vastness of the universe, alongside its complexities. It allows for perspective and detachment from daily struggles.

  3. When something new comes up and only rich people are able to afford it there is some sort of stigma around it - “it’s a rich people thing”. But unless we are talking about luxury, all things useful for a large number of people will inevitably fall into the affordable realm. If they don’t, it’s either because of some technical challenges (ie. electrical cars 10 years ago) or political (ie. cheap nuclear energy). But otherwise, money will follow the market.

  4. Relative vs. Absolute happiness: Humanity needs to go from relative happiness to absolute happiness and teach it in schools. If we do things right, we will all live in a superabundant future where people don’t have to work. But this will remove from us our usual strive to survive, which never happened in history. So it will be crucial for us as a species to learn how to proactively appreciate the future we will live in.

  5. Seed the dots, collect them, and connect them when the opportunity comes. This is what I have done with Sirius Biotechnology. I have dug into the industry for months with daily 1 AM rabbit holes trying to get as much knowledge as possible with no proper direction. But when I met my future cofounders, I collected the dots.

  6. It’s great to spark conversation through questions, but it’s also useful to spark conversations through thoughts. Don’t be afraid to show your mind.

  7. The secret to productivity is not apps, but simply narrowing what you need to work on.