Patience, Sowell, and Protecting Our Own Interests
Quote of the week + links and recommendations
Quote of the week
"Patience…is like a muscle that requires training and repetition to make it strong.”
- Robert Greene
Patience, like most virtues, is an important habit to cultivate.
Without it, we become impulsive, and fall prey to immediate gratification and our short-term whims.
Patience requires sacrifice. You need to be able to withstand pain in the present, and have faith that in future, you will be rewarded.
And it is akin to a muscle. Some people are good at waiting and seeing, a quality they have cultivated through practice.
You see this in sports which have a ‘war of attrition’ like feature. The best players wait for the right moment to pounce, usually when their opponent least expects it. Weaker players, on the other hand, are rash in their play, and governed by their emotions.
Cultivating patience implies one is in control of the situation and oneself, a a state which is encouraged in Greene’s book The Laws of Human Nature.
From the archives
Links, recommendations and highlights
Signalling - Why You Do The Things You Do
This is an older podcast between Rob Henderson and Chris Williamson. They discuss signalling, why we do it, and whether we are conscious of it. According to Henderson, we are signalling all the time, but we are not necessarily aware of it. The signalling ranges from the clothes we wear, to the volume of music in our cars, to the pitch of our voice when we speak. Interestingly, they also discuss anxiety during public speaking, and the evolutionary roots of why this is a common phobia. Highly recommended.
Thomas Sowell - The Books That Influenced His Life
An interesting list here. Sowell discusses books which influenced him during adolescence, including those which he wouldn’t recommend anymore. I intend to look into this list and publish excerpts on my Notes in the not too distant future.
How to Write a Book Like Ryan Holiday
A couple of sections of this podcast interested me. Firstly, Holiday talked about the process of learning. He said something which I don’t necessarily agree with, in that we overestimate life experience as being pivotal to the learning process, and argued that if more people read before they acted, they’d make better decisions. While this is not entirely inaccurate, I do believe mistakes are inevitable, and inaction is generally a vice. The person that doesn’t read but acts will always be more successful than the person that reads and doesn’t act on what they have learnt.
Secondly, and where I do agree with Holiday, is the idea that leadership requires reading. Holiday affirms that good leaders are always readers. This is true in my experience, as well.
Reminds me of the well-respected commander Kutuzov from Tolstoy's War and Peace.
"'It is not difficult to capture a fortress but it is difficult to win a campaign. For that, not storming and attacking but patience and time are wanted.' [...] 'They must understand that we can only lose by taking the offensive. Patience and time are my warriors, my champions,' thought Kutuzov. He knew that an apple should not be plucked while it is green. It will fall of itself when ripe, but if picked unripe the apple is spoiled, the tree is harmed, and your teeth are set on edge."