Over the past twenty years I’ve learned how to distinguish between amateurs and professionals. I’ve seen the difference in many areas of work and life and at the core it’s always the same concepts that differ the best performers from the mediocre.

So what are these differences between amateurs and professionals; what sets the great thinkers and action-takers apart?

The answer is nuanced and likely multifaceted.

There are many differences. Let’s consider some general ones.

·  Amateurs have a goal. Professionals have a process.

·  Amateurs give up at the first sign of trouble and assume they’re failures. Professionals see failure as part of the path to growth and mastery.

·  Amateurs focus on identifying their weaknesses and improving them. Professionals focus on their strengths.

·  Amateurs complain about mankind’s flaws, biases, and contradictions; professionals exploit them for fun and profit.

·  Amateurs think good outcomes are the result of their brilliance. Professionals understand good outcomes are (also, largely) the result of luck and randomness.

·  Amateurs want money. Professionals want freedom.

·  Amateurs focus on the short term. Professionals focus on the long term.

·  Amateurs avoid risks. Professionals take and domesticate risks.

·  Amateurs think in absolutes. Professionals think in probabilities.

·  Amateurs seek to win the rat race. Professionals seek to escape it.

·  Amateurs look for problems. Professionals look for solutions.

·  Amateurs save money. Professionals both save and invest money.

Reference: Farnam Street Blog

One of the reasons that I am not interested in politics is the fact that most of what politicians say is just fluff and outright lies. When their lies and corruption gets uncovered later, they resort to apologies and pronounce them “mistakes”.

Big businesses, like politicians, have a habit of making very good use of the words “apology”, “mistake” and “sorry” for things that were not mistakes in the first place, and for which they are not really sorry in the original sense of the word.

[Read more…]

For many years I struggled with associating myself with the country where I was born, especially when I started to travel on a long-term basis and now that I’ve spent most of my adult life living outside of that country.

Mine is not an isolated case, and I know many others who have several thoughts and feelings after going through similar experiences.

I do not feel patriotic nor feel any particular pride for the country I was born in. I do appreciate everything I benefited from while living there, but at the bottom of it what I feel is a sense of being lucky to be born in a very good environment, compared to all the other places that I could have been born and raised in.

I strongly dislike nationalism and have seen its negative outcomes and induced madness first hand in Catalunya.

The concept of the nation-state has been very influential in the past few centuries, and has fully taken the place of religion in many parts of the world. I believe that we are seeing the first signs of the fall of the nation-state, and more and more people losing this strong sense of binding their identity with their country of birth or childhood. For many people who work in the digital industry, this is already the case. As one of them, I consider myself a citizen of the world. Home can be anywhere where I can find a supportive environment, good internet and the freedom to work and live.

Here’s an excerpt from My Country, a song by one of my favorite musicians; Roger Taylor:

I would not fight for my country
I would not work to no rule
Don’t have no truck with no power game
Won’t be some other jerk’s tool
Don’t have no part of no partisans
Won’t have no part ‘cos one party and another’s all the same
All the same
Gonna play it at my own game

Don’t wanna die for some old man’s crusade
Don’t wanna hear what they feed
Don’t wanna kill for some cause of the age
Don’t wanna cry for somebody else’s need
Don’t want no piece of no flag in the breeze
Don’t want no part ‘cos one party and another’s all the same
All the same
Gonna play it at my own game

Going forward, nations will have to compete to attract people to live there, by offering the best possible conditions. In many ways, they will be like today’s companies, in a healthy competitive environment. This will cause governments to stop acting in a totalitarian way and focus on actually being efficient and improving their country in order to attract more quality citizens.

One question I’ve spent a lot of time on (as in, years of internal thought, research, etc) is how should I spend my time.

I’ve always had this feeling that we don’t give too much importance to this question, and fall into well-defined societal templates without much care.

I think I’ve finally cracked the code and found my own personal answer.

I realized that the question does not involve endless productivity exercises and extremes of lifestyle design and optimization.

It really boils down to what my priorities are.

That might seem like an easy answer, but it was quite a struggle to get to the bottom of it and be honest enough with myself to come up with three main priorities.

Anyway, here they are:

1. Health and Fitness
2. Relationships
3. Wealth Generation

With those in place, it’s very easy to know what I need to do every day in order to feel fulfilled and satisfied.

Within the health and fitness domain, my main objectives are strength, flexibility and injury prevention. With those covered, I also cover the cardio and play needs through playing padel and tennis. Being in good health and physical shape keeps me lucid and positive, and thus able to reach out beyond myself and move on to my second priority: relationships. I need to train with specific objectives in mind, using the deliberate practice theory.

Hopefully, we all know how relationships are essential to leading a good life. The saying no man is an island really is true. I’m not talking about constantly being surrounded by people, but about cultivating deep relationships with at least 5 people in our lives. I know who those 5 people are and make sure that my bond with them stays strong.

And my third priority is wealth generation. Generating wealth in various ways keeps my mind alive and excited. I’ve always been interested in business and ways I could provide value to the rest of society and in so doing generate wealth for my family. It’s not that much fun being very healthy and having great relationships when you can’t provide for your family and enjoy fine things in life like a comfortable and relaxing home, good food and drink, travel, etc.

If you’re not sure about your life priorities, a useful exercise would be to talk to an older person in your family like your grandma or grandpa and ask them what they regret most about not doing more of in their lives. If they’re no longer alive, just read the top regrets of the dying here and here.

Be sure to be completely honest with yourself about whatever your priorities might be, and don’t let others’ expectations define your priorities and the way you live.