☕ saturday mornings - January 7, 2023

raising ambition, scarcity vs abundance & leaving a legacy

Tommy Dixon

Jan 07, 2023

Happy Saturday Morning!

I hope you’re having a great start to your weekend and your New Year.

What I’ve been up to:

I did a 90-hour fast, with my first meal of the year on January 4th at 12 pm.
I finished up my annual planning process for the year ahead. I'm excited to get back into a routine, replace some bad habits with good ones, and get to work. Let's make this year a great one.

Here's a recap of the most interesting ideas I've explored this week.

✍️ Quote I’m pondering:

Tyler Cowen, economist and author, on raising people's ambitions:

“At critical moments in time, you can raise the aspirations of other people significantly simply by suggesting they do something better or more ambitious than what they might have in mind.
It costs you relatively little to do this, but the benefit to them, and to the broader world, may be enormous.
This is in fact one of the most valuable things you can do with your time and with your life.”

📚 Book passage I loved:

We evolved for scarcity but live in abundance.
There's a constant struggle to say no when your genes always want to say yes.

― The Almanack of Naval Ravikant by Eric Jorgenson

Share your saturday mornings with a friend! 🙂

The Coronation of Napoleon Bonaparte | COVE — The Coronation of Napoleon (1807, Jacques-Louis David)

You're going to die.

In 200 years, no one will remember you existed. Don't worry about your legacy because you won't have one.

Do whatever you want. Pursue pleasure. Have fun!

This is an argument I hear all the time. But, I have a problem with it.

In Meditations, Marcus Aurelius journals, "Is it your reputation that’s bothering you? But look at how soon we’re all forgotten. The abyss of endless time that swallows it all... Soon you’ll be ashes or bones."

He reflects on great Emperors that came before him, who "destroyed so many cities, cut down so many thousand foot and horse in battle", that were quickly forgotten. If they were, he would be too.

Your memory will be lost to the evaporation of time. Don't sweat it.

Alex Hormozi, an entrepreneur, recounted how his great great grandfather was the ruler of Iran. "He had all the wealth and status you could imagine. But, I can't even remember his name. The idea of "creating a legacy" is absurd... My great great grandfather was the ruler of a country, and I can't even remember his name."

A few weeks ago, I was standing outside the Louvre in Paris. The building is magnificently ornate, originally constructed as a residence for the King of France. On the tops of the walls sit hundreds of life-size statues of Paris' great musicians, artists, and writers.

As I studied the building I realized, these men were impressive enough to be memorialized in marble to decorate the most famous museum in the world, yet I barely recognized a single name. (Voltaire something?) Never mind what they did.

If we follow this line of thinking, it leads us to a valid conclusion: The opinions of others don't matter. Do what makes you happy. You're going to die, your days will come to an end, and it'll all be washed away in the river of time.

But, I disagree that we'll be entirely forgotten. I disagree that we won't have a legacy.

Your actions are your legacy. The decisions you make and the person choose to be ripples through eternity.

David Senra, host of Founder's podcast, was asked what the kindest thing anyone ever did for him was.

He replied:

"The kindest thing anybody's ever done for me happened a few decades before I was born. My grandfather was living in Cuba. He was 38 years old. He had a wife and a newborn baby when the Cuban Revolution happened and Castro took power. He didn't understand English, had no money and no education. Yet, he took the gigantic risk to flee Cuba to go to America, to give his family more opportunity.
That one decision changed the entire trajectory of my life.
None of my genuine interests, the passions that chose me, would make a lick of difference if I grew up in Castro's Cuba as opposed to America. It exemplifies how our decisions not only affect our loved ones now, but how they reverberate through the generations.
If you think about it, not in the context of what's going to happen in your life, this year or next year, but how the decisions you're making will affect people that aren't even born yet, you will make your decisions differently."

Your great great grandkids may not remember your name. Their parents may not remember much about you. But, the choices you make affect future generations.

Legacy isn’t about having your name dance on the tips of people's tongues for millennia or having holidays commemorated in your honor. It's not statues or coins with your face stamped on them.

It’s the decisions you make during your short time on earth.

What you do matters.

❓ Question for You:

What did you learn last year? How will you put it into practice this year?

📸 Photo of the week:

The quote that's been on Jeff Bezos' fridge for years: