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Follow boring advice

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Re: Follow boring advice

#81

Post by tomhoward »

egypturnash wrote: post #70
tomhoward wrote: post #27

I've seen PG [1] say/write versions of this: "The Y Combinator founders who followed our advice succeeded. The ones who didn't, didn't." The advice is so simple, it's hard for a lot of outsiders to believe it's worth anything. "Make something people want." "Talk to your users." "Do things that don't scale." "Keep typing and avoid dying." People hear about this and ask "You gave away 7% of your company for that?" No,…

People hear about this and ask "You gave away 7% of your company for that?" No, you give away 7% of your company to join a network of people showing you what it really looks like to do that. I thought you gave away 7% of your company for the big pile of VC money that YC hooks you up with, so you have a few years of runway to find an intersection between "an idea you had" and "an idea people are willing to collectivel…

That outcome was not likely for anyone other than the top 2-3 companies per batch pre about 2011, and in 2009, due to the financial crisis, we were basically told “you probably won’t raise money at all”.

We went to YC because it seemed like the best place to learn how to build successful companies and to be around others doing it.

Re: Follow boring advice

#82

Post by jhardy54 »

knuthsat wrote: post #54
throw1234651234 wrote: post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

1. Because you actually need protein to gain muscle mass, so there goes your "mostly plants" without a caveat about "vegetarian protein", which has its own set of problems. 2. Exercise regularly - what is regularly? What kind of exercise? You never had over-work injuries? Injuries from muscle / postural imbalances? Etc. I concede that most of this advice is available for free, but unless you have a GOOD coach, you wi…

I gained 25kg on a vegan diet through a span of 5 years. You just have to eat a bit more than comfortable but protein digestibility is a non-issue. Stuff that I ate - tofu, seitan, tempeh are very low processed soy/wheat products and can very quickly give you more than 200g of protein a day. For me, the biggest problem was meeting caloric needs. It's very hard to get to 3000kcal+ eating non-processed plants. PDCAAS,…

> bioavailability

Are there estimates available that you find more compelling? I’ve been using PDCAAS as my metric since its the standard for daily value on nutrition labels.

Context: vegan for ~6 years, barbell strength training for a couple months now, and trying to eat to support muscle growth.

Re: Follow boring advice

#83

Post by perl4ever »

WalterBright wrote: post #80

I'll add another one that I repeat often on HN but is profoundly unpopular: Take responsibility for your situation in life. Stop blaming bad luck, other people, fate, your parents, etc. The advantage stems from if your situation is your responsibility, that means you can better your situation. A common thread I've found with happy and successful people I've encountered is that all of them have this attitude.

So, can you change your opinion at will? Can you right now choose to believe people are not responsible for their situation in life?

If not, then it proves you have not even control over your own mind.

"Whatsoever a man is, is due to his make, and to the influences brought to bear upon it by his heredities, his habitat, his associations. He is moved, directed, commanded, by exterior influences—solely. He originates nothing, not even a thought."

https://www.gutenberg.org/files/70/70-h/70-h.htm

Re: Follow boring advice

#84

Post by WalterBright »

perl4ever wrote: post #83
WalterBright wrote: post #80

I'll add another one that I repeat often on HN but is profoundly unpopular: Take responsibility for your situation in life. Stop blaming bad luck, other people, fate, your parents, etc. The advantage stems from if your situation is your responsibility, that means you can better your situation. A common thread I've found with happy and successful people I've encountered is that all of them have this attitude.

So, can you change your opinion at will? Can you right now choose to believe people are not responsible for their situation in life? If not, then it proves you have not even control over your own mind. "Whatsoever a man is, is due to his make, and to the influences brought to bear upon it by his heredities, his habitat, his associations. He is moved, directed, commanded, by exterior influences—solely. He originates n…

> can you change your opinion at will? Can you right now choose to believe people are not responsible for their situation in life?

Yes and yes.

But there are consequences to the opinion you choose. If you choose to believe you have no responsibility for your situation, odds are pretty good you'll have a life of mediocrity and failure.

> "Whatsoever a man is, is due to his make, and to the influences brought to bear upon it by his heredities, his habitat, his associations. He is moved, directed, commanded, by exterior influences—solely. He originates nothing, not even a thought."

Not buying that.

Re: Follow boring advice

#85

Post by [deleted] »

WalterBright wrote: post #79
AlbertCory wrote: post #73

I have one really boring bit of advice (on public speaking) that many people refuse to believe is worth anything. Similar to what OP says, they imagine there's some deep secret, like "power poses" and body language, or eye contact. It's this: know your subject inside and out, plus the answers to all the questions you're likely to get. When you're speaking, remember: you know the stuff, they don't, you want to communi…

Reminds me of all the trick advice on how to do well on the SATs. My advice is simple: 1. take all the math classes your school offers 2. read lots of sci fi books That's what I did, and I got the SAT results I needed. The other day I picked up a book on building vocabulary for the SAT. Flipping through it, I knew essentially all the words. I've never studied vocabulary in my life. I just read a lot.

[deleted]

Re: Follow boring advice

#86

Post by kamaal »

amelius wrote: post #2

Author should explain this: everyone can follow boring advice, so why aren't far more people successful?

They are.

It's just that successful doesn't always mean famous, and its not always glittery.

Most people getting rich are not start up founders. Or SV job hopping tourists. Most are people who work one job for long periods of times, max out on 401Ks, invest in IRA/RothIRA, index funds, real estate etc. They have stable families, and good health.

This kind of stuff doesn't get profiled on Techcrunch.

Re: Follow boring advice

#87

Post by perl4ever »

WalterBright wrote: post #84
perl4ever wrote: post #83

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So, can you change your opinion at will? Can you right now choose to believe people are not responsible for their situation in life? If not, then it proves you have not even control over your own mind. "Whatsoever a man is, is due to his make, and to the influences brought to bear upon it by his heredities, his habitat, his associations. He is moved, directed, commanded, by exterior influences—solely. He originates n…

> can you change your opinion at will? Can you right now choose to believe people are not responsible for their situation in life? Yes and yes. But there are consequences to the opinion you choose. If you choose to believe you have no responsibility for your situation, odds are pretty good you'll have a life of mediocrity and failure. > "Whatsoever a man is, is due to his make, and to the influences brought to bear u…

>Not buying that.

So, you are not changing your opinion. But you could if you wanted to.

You could change your mind about something that you believe to be false, without any outside influence, through pure will.

>If you choose to believe you have no responsibility for your situation, odds are pretty good you'll have a life of mediocrity and failure.

The link is to a well known essay by Samuel Langhorne Clemens, mediocrity and failure. It goes into the consequences of such beliefs at great length.

Re: Follow boring advice

#88

Post by tomhoward »

jokoon wrote: post #66
tomhoward wrote: post #27

I've seen PG [1] say/write versions of this: "The Y Combinator founders who followed our advice succeeded. The ones who didn't, didn't." The advice is so simple, it's hard for a lot of outsiders to believe it's worth anything. "Make something people want." "Talk to your users." "Do things that don't scale." "Keep typing and avoid dying." People hear about this and ask "You gave away 7% of your company for that?" No,…

Reads like standard survivor bias

Yes, someone always has to be the person to point this out as if the commenter or other readers had never considered it before :)

Do you have examples to share of companies who were as devoted to talking to their customers and making something people want as Airbnb, but who failed to build a successful company?

That YC W09 batch had about 16 companies. They were all far less successful than Airbnb (though some of them did well and got solid exits, and others live on and are going OK, like mine). But none of the companies who did less well than Airbnb were remotely as engaged with their users as Airbnb was. It was blindingly clear, even in the first month of the batch.

Re: Follow boring advice

#90

Post by scns »

throw1234651234 wrote: post #24
darkerside wrote: post #23

My favorite example of this is how to get stronger and healthier. There's no secret, and you actually don't have to do anything too extreme. Exercise regularly, drink water, don't eat too much, mostly plants, get lots of asleep, avoid drugs and alcohol. Now that I do so well with all that advice, I can't quite remember why that all sounded so hard or "boring" before.

1. Because you actually need protein to gain muscle mass, so there goes your "mostly plants" without a caveat about "vegetarian protein", which has its own set of problems. 2. Exercise regularly - what is regularly? What kind of exercise? You never had over-work injuries? Injuries from muscle / postural imbalances? Etc. I concede that most of this advice is available for free, but unless you have a GOOD coach, you wi…

Vegan protein was good enough for a world record setting strength athlete [0][1]. This documentary [2], produced by James Cameron, made me go vegan, sometimes i eat animal protein but rarely, aware that my inflammation values will rise by 70% doing it. The oldest olympian on the pedestal for the US was 39,5 years old at the time and vegan.

[0] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Patrik_Baboumian [1] https://medium.com/four-pursuits-ventures/worlds-strongest-m...

[2] https://gamechangersmovie.com/

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