Standing on the shoulders of Giants
Musings from various podcast episodes across business, investing, football, psychology, health, entertainment
Standing on the shoulders of giants is the best way to learn.
In today’s world it has become very easy to obtain knowledge from the finest minds in the world! The world of podcasting has made this possible. Be it during a long walk or traveling for a meeting or commuting to work and back; precious hours of the day can be spent by listening and learning from great leaders and artists across business, investing, entertainment, psychology, health, sport or any other topic you love to follow. Education is now universal, the only question we should ask ourselves is that do we have a desire to learn?
Naval Ravikant- “Reading is more efficient when at rest. Audio is more efficient when in motion.”
By audio this could mean podcasts, audio books, interviews. Personally I abandoned the idea of listening to audiobooks on the move because I feel when an author had written a book, it was meant to be read at peace. Once it is being narrated it loses the original charm for which it was created and a lot of key pointers would be missed that could be obtained only by the process of reading.
Here are a few scribbles from various episodes that I listened to across the spectrum of wealth, investing, philosophy, comedy, entertainment, health. I have picked out notes from random episodes and wanted to keep this post as raw as possible so the lines have been paraphrased as per what I have heard on these episodes. You can access the entire episodes through the links!
Jim Collins on the Knowledge Project
Writing is like running. Running at a hard pace everyday is tough, so why would writing every day to perfection be easier?
History has shown that there is no correlation between consensus decisions and intelligent decisions, most great decisions have been taken when there were substantial disagreements in the air, one off debates, arguments etc and eventually leading to a moment of clarity.
If you can't make it fun, what's the point? You have so little days on this planet than you think
People have such a need to resolve ambiguity and uncertainty that they often act quicker than they need to because of dealing with the need to make their own uncertainty go away. But the fact is that uncertainty never goes away
Naval Ravikant on the Joe Rogan Experience
Desire is a contract you make with yourself to be unhappy until you get what you want
Books make for great friends because the great thinkers of the last 1,000 years share me their wisdom
Build a unique profile so that luck finds you
A happy person wants 10,000 things. A sick person wants 1 thing
Escape competition through authenticity
Competition is for people who are not authentic
In long term games, people are making each other rich
In short term games, people are making themselves rich
Don't conflate people's characters over their political ideas
When you are reading a book for example math, science, logic. No book should scare you, a number of them are going to be difficult. Go back and reread them. The confusion of this reading is like the confusion of soreness we face at the gym, here we are creating mental muscle instead of physical muscle
Peace is not a guarantee, always flowing and always changing, you want to get into the flow
Peace is happiness at rest and happiness is rest in motion
Impatience with actions, patience with results
If you eat, invest, and think according to what the ‘news’ advocates, you’ll end up nutritionally, financially and morally bankrupt
Howard Marks on Invest Like The Best
Risk means more can happen than will happen
The S&P segregates value and growth as a process. Growth has above average growth in sales and earnings and stock is showing momentum. Value is showing Low P/E, Low P/B, not a word on fundamentals. It takes cheapness into account. Fundamentals may be poor hence the multiples are so depressed
Physics would be much tougher if electrons had feelings, always flow from switch to bulbs, and follow a process. But Markets involve people and psychology, there is no straightforward process
Manish Chokhani on the One Percent Podcast
‘Compounding’ term is used very loosely, markets and life go through cycles. We were not meant to be just compounding, nature and markets are not linear, we have to be willing to change with the times.
Swadharma- Everyone is not born to do the same thing, I may like something which others hate and vice versa
Michael Mauboussin on Master of Business
Growing earnings is not synonymous with growing value, if you are earning exactly your cost of capital
1st Level thinking is only earnings and P/E
2nd Level thinking is how much of the earnings is FCFF, investment into intangibles
A speculator is someone who buys with the hope of the price going up, an investor is someone who buys into the business
Ask yourself whether you can lose on purpose, if you can't lose on purpose or if it is really hard, then luck dominates that activity. If it is easy to lose on purpose, skill is more important
Play easier games because the market is always a zero sum game, losers and winners
ATG Longevity Checklist Podcast with Ben Patrick
Applying pressure on your body reduces aging by making you physiologically stronger
Walking backward activates more of the synovial fluid in your body around your knees and hamstrings
Chinese Philosophers advised walking backwards to protect health, burning 10x more calories. Finland weightlifters walk backwards
When you stop bending the joint all the way, your body no longer realizes that you are using the joint and the body does not flow synovial fluid to that area, which is the oil that provides nutrients to the joint and you don't fully stimulate the tendon that's what holds the muscles to the bones thereby causing tendonitis, you are asking for it.
Strengthen through length
Morgan Housel on the Tim Ferriss Show
People think about themselves 99% of the time and assume that others are thinking about them
I am writing for an audience of 1 and that is me, just taking a leap of faith that others will enjoy it if I personally think it's interesting
GEICO is Ben Graham's biggest investment and it is against all his principles of investing, remove that and his returns are average. Capitalism at its best
Disney was such a disaster in the start and almost bankrupt, Snow white and the Seven Dwarfs changed everything.
Buffet on leverage- If you are smart you don't need it, if you're dumb you shouldn't be using it
Bad advice is due to underlying incentives
Sadhguru on the Joe Rogan Experience
Illinois may go through a famine by 2035. Farming practices are harming the soil. The nutrition from one orange would have to be obtained from 8 oranges
High Heel Life- Living above the sky, way beyond your expectations
Bad managers can't naturally produce the chemicals in their bodies so they look at external sources
Human misery is in you, not in India or America
Jordan Peterson on the Joe Rogan Experience
The only way to make the earth greener is by making the poor rich. The poor use a lot of resources to produce limited outcomes. Example is slash and burn farming
More people die from solar energy than nuclear energy
7 million children die a year from indoor particulate pollution, burning wood, charcoal.
United States has cut carbon emissions by 15% due to fracking. Fracking is the process of injecting liquid at high pressure into subterranean rocks, boreholes, etc. so as to force open existing fissures and extract oil or gas.
"fracking has created a shale gas boom in the United States"
Where Karl Marx is buried, they charge you
You cannot criticize capitalism by owning an Iphone and drinking a Starbucks coffee
Detroit was once the richest country in the world a few decades back. Chevy, Ford was there. Henry Ford ramped up wages. His notion was to sell cars to expand the consumer market by ramping up wages. Detroit was averse to bringing competitor cars in. Japan was the opposite, it allowed competition which caused a ramp up in their own production due to pressure
IQ has gone up by 7 points for high school students every generation
A part of nihilism is being aimless because you think everything is gonna end up in the dust eventually. So such people's lives become bitter
70% of YouTube is male because women tilt more towards fiction
Under anxiety people will revert to their society accepting personas
Gengis Khan changed the carbon footprint of the world
When you get the gold share it with everyone
Lord of the Rings is a lesson in shamanic spirituality. All the hobbits come back from the journey and share what they learnt
Price of being a prick on twitter is zero
Receding gums is a sign of cardiovascular disease
Success happens through effective communication
Face what you're most afraid of and you'll be free
There is value in struggle
If you are surrounded by people who are dull, try listening more, if you find people boring maybe it's you
Dr Pete Berg 5 Tips on sleep
If you have congested liver don't sleep on the left, it's better to sleep on the right where your heart is sitting on top
Slow your breathing down. When your adrenals are congested this happens. Try box breathing- breathe in for 4 seconds, breathe out for 4 seconds and repeat
Early to bed, you have to match the time of your circadian rhythm so that you can get that deep sleep
If you ever go to bed and hear your pulse rate, you are deficient in potassium. Normal pulse rate is around 65. Eat more vegetables. Stress also causes potassium deficiency, even sugar.
Dr Andrew Huberman on More Plates More Dates
When you are younger your pineal secretes melatonin better, lesser effort to sleep
If you don't feel tired when you wake up then your sleep schedule is on point
Insomnia is not about not getting sleep but feeling sleepy during times of the day when you need to work
Studies show that excitement causes less sleep but quality is better. Therefore looking forward to sleep can help improve sleep
Daniel Ek on the Invest Like the Best Podcast
When he was speaking to a glucose monitor founder- We know all the systems in life and monitor them, except for the most important one in our bodies
We need to figure medical solutions before they happen to avert them, same thing with our bodies we need to figure with nutrition before going to a doctor
Starting off puts you in the top 1%
If you remove San Francisco and Seattle from the US, there is not much value, power is centralized. Europe is decentralized
James Lindsay on the Joe Rogan Experience
Renormalization- When 3-4 extremely intolerant people can move the needle. Drawing examples of vegans today in a neighborhood and how women bloggers back in the 1900s had a small voice but influenced a large group. These people can revolutionize social media.
Ryan Holiday on the Joe Rogan Experience
The beauty of Meditations by Marcus Aurelius is that he never meant to write the book unlike authors today who write to have others read
The Romans spoke in Latin but the philosophical language was Greek, he wrote in Greek
Irony of the Gladiator is that Commodus, who was played by Joaquin Phoenix was even worse in reality, his psychopathy was underplayed in the movie
The Stoics spoke a lot about athletic pursuits. Aurelius hunted, some stoics ran
Seneca- We treat the body rigorously so that it will not be disobedient to the mind
Neuralink is going to be great for people with spinal cord issues by improving the connections of neural links with muscles. Also it could be possible to speak without saying the words
Ido Portal on Huberman Lab
Movements are the container and movement is the content. So choosing the container first is important
The less toys you have the more advanced you are with your practice and vice versa
Movement is the most advanced technology
Charles Poliqouin stated that restricted movements early on in life reduces neuroplasticity. Development doesn't end, are growing from childhood to adulthood
Forgetting and not knowing are 2 different things. Writing allows you to forget the moment, it is a homeostatic movement
In Scandinavian countries the conditions for squatting are not ideal. They push Pull heavy things. Better deadlifters. Their deep hip sockets are not the best
If you are not folding your body you will lose the foldability of your body.
Tim Ferriss Podcast of multiple guests
Sam Harris- Think of the moment that happens to you as the last time, it seems even more beautiful
Meditation is the art of doing nothing. It is the thought of stopping the search
Ashwath Damodaran on Invest Like the Best
People who have not lived through inflationary period will say it's no big deal
There are 2 types of inflation
Expected and Unexpected Inflation
Expected Inflation is something we can expect, inflation at 5, buy a bond with coupon at 7 to cover inflation. This is the more benign part.
Unexpected Inflation can cut both ways. When inflation comes higher than expected, bonds are marked down because coupons are lower. Stocks you can manage because you can adjust the cash flows down.
70s and 80s were periods of high inflation but 70s were a period of unexpected inflation +ve or higher than expected and reversed towards 80s end. Markets performed accordingly
T bills did well with expectations but long dates expectations did worse like bonds and stocks
70s low PE small cap stocks did well
Companies that have long term projects in their capital budgeting models can get killed by variations in inflation
Every company that has hyperinflation becomes a financial services company because adjusting the pricing power is easier than other industries. Easier to build a bank on the side and lend short term than build factories
Only a few companies with pricing power can do this by adjusting prices quickly. Product has to be extremely non discretionary
Tax laws are built around book value so things like depreciation become less valuable because you get the same dollar depreciation that used at 2% and 12% inflation levels
Goods and services should be redefined as discretionary and nondiscretionary. A Netflix or an Iphone are examples of this when prices rise 15-20% are we going to buy
The Volcker effect is when you send your Economy into a deep long recession to combat inflation. Countries give up because eventually election season changes this outlook
Inflation is like a genie in a bottle analogy
Microsoft has moved from the software upgrade business more to subscription business. This makes the business less discretionary and people are unlikely to cancel their subscriptions. This works well to combat inflation with an increase in pricing power
ROIC is for declining mature industries, capturing the past. ROIC for tech companies is negative because of cash on books.
Running a screen is not valuing a company. The answer he got from Omaha investors was that they don't value companies because they don't like to make assumptions. But investing is a set of assumptions.
The T Bond rate will reflect the level of inflation
Equity Risk premium is a collection of all our hopes and fears
Edward Thorp Tim Ferris
Buffet gave Ed Thorp some of his money for his math quant strategies
In 20 years 3 down months less than 1%
20% annualized still low Risk strategy
Beat the Market book
Fisher Black and Myran Scholes were fond of the Beat The Market book (Black Scholes Model)
Then both of them published the idea and did a better job of the math model. People didn't catch on though when the Chicago Board of Options opened this. So only Thorpe's traders read this
The people who don't publish, don't win awards
Ed had huge conviction in Warren Buffet and knew he was gonna be the richest man in the world. Thorpe bought Berkshire at 82, now at 500,000
Give a person a fish they will eat for a day, teach them how to fish they will eat for a lifetime
Thorpe was invited to review Mckinsey's portfolio. They had a profit sharing and pension plan
One strange investment printed out 1-2% every single year, covered call options. They were winning in an up and down market. A mysterious trade was put on with S&P Index options. Peter Madoff was the guy handling it (Bernie's brother). Half the trades never happened, some low volume.
He went to Bear Sterns to see the trades that happened because of his relationship he found out that Bernie Madoff and company were on the other side. He told the firm that you’re making 20% now, if I'm right you save big, if I'm wrong you make 16% which is not a lot less. They exited and did DD of Madoff investments. They found 500 mil of investor money with Madoff. The hedge fund manager who called Ed Thorpe, believed Madoff and raised money for him through his fund of funds. He went to zero in 08. Thorpe had advised them to not invest with Madoff 17 Years ago. Thorpe found out about the Madoff breakout many years before it blew up
Kuntal Shah on the One Percent Podcast
Companies were not doing win win i:e pre covid companies were having cash on the balance sheet and were not paying out rent to vendors and landlords
Financial markets are basically cycles, human psychology and how money is managed during these cycles
Cycles are often similar but do not rhyme
Tim Ferris Terry Crews
You can either get success or revenge. Revenge is usually settling a score, but the score is never really settled.
Jeff Cavaliere on the Huberman Lab Podcast
As you get older it is the length of the workout that could make or break you
Bro splits can work for example if you do biceps on one day and back after 2 days. Structure matters
Grip strength training was an important aspect of training. Cavelier trained with the Mets.
Measuring grip strength output on a daily basis can show your level of output! Can skip the gym if it is 10-15% below baseline
Sleeping on the stomach should definitely be avoided, unless spinal issues to realign the spine
Muscle shortening is happening when sleeping sideways also. Especially for hip flexors
Sideways sleeping is better for those with sleep apnea.
Body stores patterns for motor efficiencies
Try to jump on your heels back to back! You will feel it in your jaws. With running when you land on your heels, you are messing up your entire body! Hence go barefoot more
Shoulders have the most mobility but lowest stability
Dr Andy Galpin on the Huberman Lab Podcast
Soreness is not a great indicator of a good workout for beginners to mid level workouts
You can do sets in the middle for a different muscle which forms a super set but strength gains won't be so good
Mind Muscle connection
Swimming engages many of the muscles and motor neurons effectively, Lats especially, see swimmers lats.
Every athlete has a breathing technique in Between their rounds of training
When starting training, don't get too heavy into box jumps etc start with isometric esometric movements like a sled and then progress because you jump on your bodyweight 8-10 reps. Start with box carry with weights
Zone 2 Cardio may not affect hypertrophy/strength infact may be it can improve blood flow. Galpin says you can do daily
Ice Bath after hypertrophy training can be detrimental for muscle growth
Same way for saunas, don't workout in the sauna. It does work post workouts
Roy Keane on Overlap
If you are not doing well yourself it is difficult to inspire confidence and leadership, it is human nature
Joe Rogan on the Lex Freidman Podcast
Everything that irritates us about others tells us something about ourselves
Conclusion
Listening to these intriguing conversations instills a level of self awareness in myself and allows me to apply these learnings in my personal and professional life. I am grateful that the internet allows us the opportunity to do so in a world where we always complain about having a lack of time.