Here are a few things I’ve enjoyed recently that cultivate a mindset that counteracts the trader residue I narrowly described in How I Misapplied My Trader Mindset To Investing:
- Liminal Warmth
I came across this blog via the Twitter account @liminal_warmth. I was deep into several posts that grabbed my attention. There are lots of essays so I reached out to ask for which posts LW recommends. And voila, this thread will get you started.
LW lives their own divergent script so it’s not surprising that the writing is unique and provocative. In addition to living in a van in a desert and writing tons of fiction, LW is a solopreneur/freelancer with tons of hard and soft skills for hire.
I’ll single out an excerpt I found resonant from The Weirdness of Becoming Attractive in Your 30s (Link):
Weirdly enough developing more empathy and more compassion and listening more and being more respectful of other people started working its way into my feelings toward myself… and I started hating who I was a little less. And I realized for the first time that attraction is as much about how you make other people feel as how you look (and arguably much more important). This completed a puzzle piece in my communication style that had always been missing. And it was so weird because I suddenly had this massive wave of empathy for everyone around me and I wanted everyone to feel special and pretty and liked because I knew how much it hurt to not feel that way. So again, I spent more time being actively interested in other people and trying to make them feel good and got more feedback loop results where I got positive attention in response and I felt amazing that I was able to make other people feel good and happy too.
There’s nothing more addicting than watching people believe in themselves. Just observe a kid that learned to ride a bike or swim. I have a saying that compliments are the cheapest source of capital. Not in a fake or hollow way. But when someone is just doing their thing and you notice it’s awesome, even if it’s not grandly remarkable, just tell them. It unlocks people in a way that everyone wins.
- The Scarcity Struggle (essay)
@NeckarValueThis post is an outstanding reference for battling a zero-sum mindset. It chronicles the author’s own journey but many of you will be able to relate. It’s much better than my own writing on the topic so I will just leave you to read it.
It reminds me of a hack we use around our house: “You can’t be negative when you are in a state of gratitude”. You are the object of someone else’s envy for one reason or another. Everyone is dust eventually. No point in doing anyone else but you.