Book Freak 124: Excellent Advice for Living by Kevin Kelly
This is a special issue of Book Freak. The book I’m featuring was written by my longtime friend and business partner Kevin Kelly. Excellent Advice for Living: Wisdom I Wish I'd Known Earlier, is the ultimate Book Freak recommendation because it consists entirely of hundreds of pieces of bite-sized advice. I would love to run them all, but I’ll limit myself to just ten.
Would I do this tomorrow?
“When you get invited to do something in the future, ask yourself: ‘Would I do this tomorrow?’ Not too many promises will pass that immediacy filter.”
Understand why someone believes something stupid
“You can reduce the annoyance of someone’s stupid belief by increasing your understanding of why they believe it.”
Do
“The greatest teacher is called ‘doing.’”
Creep up
“When you need to cut something extremely exact, don’t try to do it with one cut. Instead, cut it a bit bigger and then keep trimming it bit by bit until perfect. Professional makers call this ‘creeping up’ to the precise measurements.”
Play the long game
“We tend to overestimate what we can do in a day, and underestimate what we can do in a decade. Miraculous things can be accomplished if you give it 10 years. A long game will compound small gains that will be able to overcome even big mistakes.”
Who should I become?
The only productive way to answer ‘What should I do now?’ is to first the question of ‘Who should I become?’”
A good way to spend $20
“If you loan someone $20 and you never see them again because they are avoiding paying you back, that makes it worth $20.”
Reveal the adventure of the worst that can happen
“Fully embrace ‘What is the worst that can happen?’ at each juncture in life. Rehearsing your response to the ‘worst’ can reveal it as an adventure and rob it of its power to stall you.”
A guide to collecting art
“The perfect kind of art to display in your home are odd pieces that a child is unlikely to forget.”
How to get unstuck
When you are stuck, explain your problem to others. Often simply laying out a problem will present a solution. Make ‘explaining the problem’ part of your troubleshooting process.
Unclassifieds
Buy a Book Freak Unclassified ad for $50 and reach over 10,200 readers!
Connect with your creativity, home in on who you truly are, and unlock your entrepreneurial potential. The award-winning book, Buoyant: The Entrepreneur's Guide to Becoming Wildly Successful, Creative, and Free ($13.89), shows you how.
***
I use a fantastic app called Reader, the first read-it-later / newsletter / RSS-reading / web-highlighting app for power readers. Save everything to one place, highlight like a pro, and replace several apps with Reader. Book Freak readers can try it free for 60 days.
***
1440 is the daily newsletter helping 2M+ Americans stay informed—it’s news without motives, edited to be unbiased as humanly possible. Culture, science, sports, politics, business, and everything in between - in a five-minute read each morning, 100% free. Sign up now!
***
The Magnet is Book Freak editor Mark Frauenfelder's newsletter of curiosities across space and time. Subscribe here.
***
Nomadico is our bite-size newsletter for working travelers. Get 4 useful tips each week.
***
Setapp is a hand-picked collection of quality software, packed with prime apps. There’s no store — just a folder on the Mac, and no hidden costs — just a flat monthly fee. It's simple, and users love it.
Book Freak is published by Cool Tools Lab, a small company of three people. We run the Cool Tools website, a video review YouTube channel, and other newsletters, including Gar’s Tips & Tools, What’s in my NOW? and Recomendo. You can support our work by becoming a patron via Patreon.