Welcome to The Vault.
Every Sunday, I send out ten pieces of winningcore—insights, lessons, and stories to help you win in business, sports, and life.
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On Networking
“I really think networking is overrated. There are all these articles about like, ‘oh you gotta network more’—it makes me wanna vomit. Go do something great and your network will instantly emerge. If you build a great product or if you get a good customer base I guarantee we will get you funded. You will not have to go take internal meetings building relationships years in advance. All that meeting stuff you’re doing, shaking hands, etc—do it for recruiting, do it for really, really smart people, but make sure you have something to offer them too or you’re just taking. But just sort of “networking”, if you’re standing around at an event with a glass in your hand and a name tag, you’re doing it for entertainment, you’re doing it for leisure time. This is not your work time. Let’s just be clear.”
— Naval Ravikant (ht @hamptonism)
Key line: Go do something great and your network will instantly emerge. It’s not about who you know, it’s about who knows you, and the level of esteem they hold you in. Knowing a billionaire will only help you if they respect you and want to help you. Respect comes once you prove your value.
On Reading
Seneca on reading:
(H/t @DylanoA4)
See great books like friends. Don’t just read them once and disregard them. Read them over and over again. Spend time with them. Flick through your favourite sections. Absorb them until their wisdom becomes a part of you—because that’s when they become valuable.
On The Mental Garden
“An excellent way to get acquainted with the two functions of your mind is to look upon your own mind as a garden. You are a gardener, and you are planting seeds (thoughts) in your subconscious mind all day long, based on your habitual thinking. As you sow in your subconscious mind, so shall you reap in your body and environment.”
— The Power of Your Subconscious Mind
Your habitual way of thinking creates your reality. There’s nothing “woo woo” about it. Your way you think affects the way you act and show up in the world. It affects the ideas you have and the solutions you generate (or don’t). It’s the #1 most important factor in winning. To effectively elevate your thinking; elevate the content you consume, affirm expansive thoughts, and train yourself to shoot down any negative thoughts the second they arise. If you master those 3 things, you’ll dominate any game you play.
On Making Mistakes
“When we make mistakes, we try again and again and again until we get it right. We’re not superheroes. We’re just committed. There is no “secret sauce,” but there is a lot of hard work, dedication, and drive.”
— Mark Owens, No Hero
Mark Owens is a former Navy SEAL and leader of the team that took out Bin Laden. “There is no secret sauce”—applies to everything. What looks like extraordinary talent or ability is almost always just the product of YEARS of making mistakes, learning, trying again, and repeating that process to fine tune your thoughts & actions. Anyone can do it. It’s gruelling, but not complicated.
On Holding The Line:
— Alex Hormozi (@alexhormozi)
On Mental Strength
From ‘The Rise of Theodore Roosevelt’ on one of his hunting trips in his late 20s:
Roosevelt, riding a large, coarse stallion, led from the start. Careless of accidents which dislocated the huntmaster's knee, smashed another rider's ribs, and took half the skin off his brother-in-law's face, he galloped in front for fully three miles. Eventually his exhausted horse began to go lame; at about the five-mile mark it tripped over a wall and pitched over into a pile of stones.
Roosevelt's face smashed against something sharp, and his left arm, only recently knit after the roundup fracture, snapped beneath the elbow. Yet he was back in the saddle as soon as the horse was up, and rushed on one-armed, determined not to miss the death. After five or six further jumps the bones of his broken arm slipped past one other, and it dangled beside him like a length of liverwurst; but this, and the blood pouring down his face, did not deter him from pounding across fifteen more fields. He had the satisfaction of finishing the hunt within a hundred yards of the other riders, and returned to Sagamore Hill looking "pretty gay… like the walls of a slaughter-house." Baby Lee, who was waiting at the stable for him, ran away screaming from the bloody monster, and he pursued her, chortling.
Washed clean that night, his cut face plastered and his arm in splints, he presided over the Hunt Ball as laird of Sagamore. Edith Carow was his guest, and took her first cool survey of her future home. At midnight, Theodore Roosevelt turned twenty-seven. With his daughter asleep upstairs, his house full of music and laughter, and Edith at his side, he could abandon himself to bliss rendered piquant by pain. Later he wrote to Lodge: "I don't grudge the… I'm always ready to pay the piper when I've broken arm a bit had a good dance; and every now and then I like to drink the wine of life with brandy in it."
Roosevelt broke his arm, smashed up his face, got back up on his horse and finished the hunt. Remember that the next time you don’t get a full 8 hours sleep or don’t feel like going to the gym.
On Accepting Defeat
“The only way to remove the possibility of defeat is to remove the possibility of victory – by surrendering before attempting”
— Yous, Victory (read the full article here)
This is one of the best and most original perspectives on achieving victory I’ve ever read. Accepting defeat doesn’t mean resigning yourself to failure. Accepting the possibility of defeat is about freeing up your mind to focus 100% on achieving victory. Read the full piece here. (It’s worth it)
On Arbitrary Timelines:
— @thedulab
Impatience kills dreams. You expect something to happen in a certain timeframe, it doesn’t, you feel disappointed, you lose energy and slow down. Repeat this often enough and you may just give up. Crazy, because you can literally solve it by removing your arbitrary timelines for accomplishing your goals. As long as you don’t quit, you will win.
On Solving Problems
This is the best visual explanation of the process of winning I’ve ever seen:
On Thinking
— Ayn Rand
“To remain alive, he must act”—write this down.
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