Category Archives: Learning

How To Analyze A Project

When you start something new, whether it’s a marketing project or a habit, it’s helpful to see why and how everything turns out the way it does. Analyzing starts before you launch and ends after you finish. It’s impossible to ever know exactly what happens, but the frames below give you a good idea:

1. What is the best case scenario? [5 sentences]

2. What is the worst case scenario? [5 sentences]

2. What do I think will actually happen? [5 sentences]

[execute]

3. What actually happened and why? [5 sentences]

This exercise roots you in reality. You can never get predict the future, but this is as good a system as any to attempt to.

Improv Classes and Vulnerability

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Vulnerability is hard to embrace but when you do, you get to know yourself better. I found a way to safely confront it: improvisational comedy. I took a six-week training and left with some unexpected insights. The stage is a social equalizer that exposes everyone’s personality in a fair and brutal manner, quickly exposing how people really feeling. I learned that the best way to confront vulnerability is through boldness. Finally, I realized that being vulnerable is a way to quickly feel comfortable with people. Improv is a seemingly therapeutic environment where people can be vulnerable without suffering social ridicule.

Here’s how improv works: people play a series of games with around four people who invent a story or jokes based on the rules of the game, what the other actors say, and audience prompts. My class was a diverse group of about fifteen; one guy owned a construction company, there was a psychologist, a pediatrician, two guys were podcasters, and a bunch of others. Throughout the six weeks, everyone was overwhelmed on stage, had their minds freeze, broke character, and felt extremely embarrassed. A Ph.D doesn’t save you from stage fright. Everyone was forced to reveal a sensitive part of themselves to strangers, something that most people never do.

Most are desperate to avoid confrontation and be socially accepted by others. They mask vulnerability behind an arsenal of words and actions. Improv forces people to leave that armor backstage. One improv constant became clear within the first few minutes: feel embarrassed and make people laugh by being bold and energetic, or feel embarrassed, act embarrassed, and people will feel bad for you. The inner voice that is always suppressed is forced into the spot light, and when the spotlight hits it, parts of yourself you never knew were there come alive on stage. In my case, I usually think of sexual jokes, or my first reaction to things has some kind of sexual undertone. It’s weird, whatever. That combined with a higher than average aversion to social confrontation means that I tend to keep that part of me quiet. In improv, even though I am embarrassed and my mind tells me a thousand different ways that people think I am weird, if you’re bold and come out guns-a-blazing, you can pull it off, it feels amazing because you’re being yourself, and the audience laughs.

I did not think that I would relate to any of my classmates on the first day. I was the youngest by at least 8 years, but surprisingly the entire class became really close to each other on the first two hours. Much more so than say, a defensive driving course could have brought people. After the second class, I joined everyone at the bar next door to the theater. Even before we got our glasses, everyone started honestly sharing and relating to each other about how the stage made them feel and act. We felt comfortable being open because all the awkwardness came out during class. We all shared a hidden part of ourselves on stage, so it was fun to talk about it afterwards. We were proud of each other for allowing ourselves to be judged.

Improv brings people to the cutting edge of reality that makes people feel vulnerable, but it’s an environment where you can feel safe too. It helps you get to know yourself and others in a way that would not be possible in a coffee shop or a bar. It’s a great beta-test for embracing boldness in other parts of your life. Because of improv, I am more comfortable being myself.

Changes Since September

What I’ve been reading

The Simplest Way to Form a New Habit

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1. One thing at a time, make it easy, and be specific. No matter how many things you want to change, you can only change one thing at a time. Period. One thing. I’ll say it again. One thing. No matter how special you think you are, how smart you are, how mentally tough you are, your success rate will be zero percent if you try to do two things at a time. Momentum is a big factor in this, so your first habit must be easy, so easy you can’t fail. Whatever you think is easy, make it twice as easy. If you want to run more, tell yourself that you’ll run for 5 minutes a day. Sounds painfully easy, but you have to start small for this to work. The alternative to adopting a small, simple habit is no habit at all.

2. Identify a trigger action. This is something you already do everyday. It’s the tripwire for your new habit. When you carry out your trigger action, you then perform your new habit. Example: I wanted to write more. I know that every day, when I get back from work, I walk into my room and set my bag on my desk chair in my room, get a glass of water and generally do very little work for the rest of the day. I’ll surf or to the gym, and when I get back from, I eat dinner, read, and go to bed. So my trigger was pouring a glass of water. I told myself, “When I come home from work and pour myself a glass of water, I’ll write at least 200 words in a WordPress draft.” All it was was 200 words of whatever came out. Very little was special, but at least I was sitting down and writing. Identify your trigger action that will guide you into the new habit you want to form.

3. Buy a big calendar. I got this part from Jerry Seinfeld. When you complete your habit, make a big X over the that day’s date. The motto is “don’t break the chain.” After a few days, those Xs will feel as good as reaching the top of mountain or finishing a book. My calendar is above.

4. Every three weeks, choose a new habit Since I put this this calendar in my room in August, this system has worked better than anything I have ever tried. It keeps you honest and you can clearly track your results as you progress. Instead of moping about the things I haven’t changed, I now wake up with no snooze every weekday, write at least 200 words everyday, smile more, and regularly go to the gym.

If you slip up and miss a day, just keep going. Finish the three weeks and start a new habit. If one habit was too hard, be honest with yourself about it. Don’t make excuses about why you didn’t do it. You failed and that’s fine. Just pick an easier habit the following session and keep your momentum up. After you’ve adopted a few habits, you’ll become confident in the process.

The hardest thing here is not starting a new habit, it’s making it normal, easy part of your life. It’s common to watch some TED talk or a youtube video and get inspired and excited to change your lifestyle. The idea of changing habits is awesome, but it’s psychologically draining when you make lots of changes at once. You will stall and relapse into old habits and not even know why. Take this smart, slow approach, and start building real habits, one at a time.

Startup Lessons Pt. 1

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I’m working for a food startup in San Diego called uberfood. We launch very soon, and I’ll talk more about it then.

The team is made up of an investor/co-founder, general manager/cofounder, and me. The Investor is a successful entrepreneur and I’ve taken some notes on some the things that he’s said about business, negotiating, and entrepreneurship. Here’s the list so far.

1. Titles are toxic

When egos, salaries, and deliverables intermingle, titles make people act irrationally. A boring title is a good thing.

2. Entrepreneurs always act without all the information

There will always be more information to gather and evaluate. When we were deciding on which chefs to work with, I wanted to wait try all their food before we made a final decision on who we would move forward with. The Investor advised that we just pick some chefs that we liked and move ahead with the negotiating and testing. If it didn’t work or something broke down in the in meantime, we would move on to someone else. It make sense. We can find out information by waiting until the next meeting, or we can insert the information we do have into our business model and see if it’s compatible.

3. Everything will go wrong

The Investor is extremely cautious. When we were discussing initial operations of the business, he made it clear that we have to assume everything will go wrong, people will sue us, and workers won’t show up for work when we expect them to. I first thought this was extreme, then I realized I was delusional if I thought these things would never happen. You have to be prepared for when everything breaks. This lens has set us up with a thousand what ifs. We can’t damn every leak, but we can get most of them with forethought.

4. Be clear, explicit, and honest about expectations

There have been no serious misunderstandings about the expectations we all have for each other so far. The Investor has made it clear from the beginning that everything about uberfood will be done legally, by the book. All the contracts, negotiations, and discussions dealing the company have been ego-free, open, and honest.