Good News Everyone!

Welcome to the newest issue of the Do the Opposite newsletter, sent every other week!

If you want to share any resources (articles, books or anything else) with the community, just reply to this email with your recommendations.

Hey everyone, hope you’re doing great!

Here are some personal updates I want to share with you:

I’ve been thinking of a new name for Do the Opposite. I’ve spent so much time brainstorming ideas for in the past week! I have a super long list of potential names in Notion: so far there are some OK options, but nothing I absolutely love and want to go ahead with yet.

Here’s how you can help, if you want. What do you think the name should be? The themes I’m thinking are: self-discipline and discomfort. Maybe you think I shouldn’t change the name? Reply to this email with your answers, I’d love to hear from you!
A book I’ve been reading and enjoying is “Discipline Is Destiny: The Power of Self-Control” by Ryan Holiday. I love reading about discipline and ways to improve my own self-discipline when it comes to sticking to habits and decisions. Ryan is a great storyteller too, he always finds fascinating real-life stories as examples to illustrate his points.

Full disclosure: it’s an Amazon affiliate link, so if you buy the book I’ll get a little bit of $$. This is something new I’m trying out.
We had a pretty cool weather event this week in Calgary: an intense fog followed by colder weather, which resulted in this:

Articles

Get Your Life Off Autopilot | The Fioneers

As we build the foundation of our lives in our 20s and 30s, it’s easy to get to a place where we think we’ve got it all figured out. Things are falling into their respective places — a mix of a stable job, family, daily routines and habits. These things are great, but we should be wary of our routines taking over our lives and determining our direction as a straight line. The Fioneers show how we can break out of our comfortable existence and explore new things.

Spend Your Time Intentionally | Zen Habits

This article goes together with the one above, as spending time intentionally is the opposite of being on autopilot. However, despite our best intentions to change our habits, we often fail at that. Leo provides techniques we can use to make sure we stick to our decision to live intentionally more often than not.

Videos

Mr. Money Mustache - YOU can become financially independent—here's how. | Compounding Podcast

If you’re curious about Financial Independence (FI), and whether it’s something that’s realistic for you personally, you absolutely have to watch this interview with Mr. Money Mustache, aka Pete Adeney.

It offers an overview of the principles that allow one to become financially independent, like the 4% rule (aka how much you need to save to reach FI) and the relationship between your savings rate and years to reach FI. In other words, how to get to the point where work becomes optional, and passive income from your investments covers all your expenses. See the chart below for illustration:

The Shockingly Simple Math Behind Early Retirement | Mr. Money Mustache

In the video, MMM also shares the tips and techniques he uses to live a middle class life for quarter of the cost it takes an average person.

A couple of useful timestamps:

56 mins: MMM talks about habits
1 hour 2 mins: Baby Steps to start your journey to FI:

John Carmack: Doom, Quake, VR, AGI, Programming, Video Games, and Rockets | Lex Fridman Podcast #309

One of my favourite podcast episodes of 2022. If anyone can be called a genius, it’s John Carmack. He is a co-founder of id Software, responsible for such classic gaming franchises as Wolfenstein, DOOM and Quake. After that chapter of his life was over, Carmack joined Oculus as its CTO to work on VR headsets. Now he’s working on developing Artificial General Intelligence (AGI) at his new company, Keen Technologies. Oh, he also builds rockets as a hobby.

To me, he’s an example of a clear thinker and a bold innovator; definitely one of my personal heroes so I was really happy when I found this interview.

Dick Van Dyke Has Impressive Workout At 95 | Access Hollywood

“At 30, I exercised to look good. In my 50s, I exercised to stay fit. In my 70s, I exercised to stay ambulatory. In my 80s, I exercised to avoid assisted living. And in my 90s, it’s just going to be out of defiance!”

We should all take a page of Dick Van Dyke’s book — exercise should be a non-negotiable priority for all of us. One of my main goals this year is to start exercising regularly.

Featured Tweet

Dr. Rhonda Patrick @foundmyfitness

Frequent aerobic exercise (1-5 days/week) may reduce the risk of colds and other respiratory infections by nearly 50%. Upper respiratory symptoms were also 32-41% less severe among those who engaged in frequent exercise than those who rarely exercised.

Quotes

“What you do every day matters more than what you do once in a while.”
— Gretchen Rubin

“Whenever you're feeling moments of discomfort, that means true change is happening for you.”
— John David Washington

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Keep doing the opposite,
Alex Kallaway
GHOST OCTOPUS INC.

Website: dotheoppo.site
Twitter: twitter.com/ka11away

Discomfort Academy Newsletter (formerly Do the Opposite)

Do the Opposite #84