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2020

• Neil Gaiman - Inspirational Commencement Speech at the University of the Arts 2012: Neil Gaiman talks about a distant mountain which we can all dream of. An excellent commencement speech on creative life and self-doubts. “... people who know what they're doing know the rules and they know what is possible and what is impossible. You do not and you should not. The rules on what is possible and impossible in the arts were made by people who had not tested the bounds of the possible by going beyond them and you can if you don't know it's impossible.”
• Master Shi Heng Yi – 5 hindrances to self-mastery: Mastering yourself is a true power and this talk provides on how to overcome 5 hindrances to gain clarity. “I am not the body, I am not the mind and I am not my emotion" -such a powerful thought.” “All our lifetimes are too unique to copy the path of someone else.”
• Admiral McRaven addresses the University of Texas at Austin Class of 2014: One of the best commencement speeches!
• Do schools kill creativity? | Sir Ken Robinson: Sir Robinson on relationship between creativity and schools.
• Bret Victor - Inventing on Principle: I love Bret Victor!
• Oliver Jeffers 2: His captivating voice delivers the most wonderful message in this time of crisis (2020 pandemic), “We need each other more than ever before.” “By drawing lines in the sky we've attempted to make sense of chaos, and by drawing lines on the earth we've tried to determine where we belong and where we don't; but they're all just stories.” And more, “If earth is the only place where people live, is actually the least lonely place in the universe. There are plenty of people to be love by, and plenty of people to love.” “With the wheels of progress going silent, we have the wildest of opportunities to press the reset button, and take a different path.” He is so poetic.
• Oliver Jeffers 1: Artist Oliver Jeffers talks on the topic of Surreal, his new book, why he became more political in his art, and why we need to take care of this world. He is my favorite artist in the world and I am pretty obsessed with him.
• Frank Abagnale: "Catch Me If You Can" | Talks at Google: One of the world’s most notorious con men to an international cybersecurity expert trusted by the FBI has been mythologized in film and literature – but the takeaways he shares are the real deal. And, such a great public speaker!
• My philosophy for a happy life | Sam Berns | TEDxMidAtlantic: What a beautiful story and outlook on life. Sam Berns passed away shortly after giving this talk.
• Earthrise: The Story of the Photo that Changed the World: Everryone's life can be defined by their perspective. Larger the universe, the more you realize, you are a tiny dot.
• The call to learn | Clifford Stoll: I want to be like Clifford. So much passion for building and learning.
• Runnin' Down a Dream: How to Succeed and Thrive in a Career You Love | Bill Gurley: Bill pushes the boundary on learning and growing. A young mind who can acquire his mindset can thrive in this world.
• Doris Kearns Goodwin author of "Leadership In Turbulent Times": Doris Goodwin studied the heck out of US presidents and she shares what leadership means in trying times.

2020

• The Lifecycle of Greed and Fear: Morgan Housel does a wonderful job explaining the lifecycle of greed and fear. “All greed starts with an innocent idea: that you are right, deserve to be right, or are owed something for your efforts. It’s a reasonable feeling.”
• Statement by Jeff Bezos to the U.S. House Committee on the Judiciary: This memo was recommended to me by a family member. Bezos seemingly is popular in unpopular times for his wealth, policies and corporation drama. However, there is so much American entreprenurial spirit. America is indeed a nation which does not stigmaitize risk-taking. If you can dream it you can do it. A must read!

• Researchers and Founders: This post led me to other great articles on conducting not good, but great research. Hamming question is really worth exploring— “what are the most important problems in your field, and why aren’t you working on them?”

  1. An Opinionated Guide to ML Research
  2. You and Your Research by Dr. Richard W. Hamming
  3. Principles of Effective Research
• The Mundanity of Excellence: It was written over 20 years ago in which Chambliss defines excellence as “consistent superiority of performance.” Excellence does not mean do more of the same drills and sets, he or she also does things better. That's what counts. Very small differences, consistently practiced, will produce results.
• Inventing on Principle: This is so good by Bret Victor. “I'm going to talk about following a principle — finding a principle for your work, something you believe is important and necessary and right, and using that to guide what you do.”
• Ingredients of a Genius: Everyone knows that to do great work you need both natural ability and determination. But there's a third ingredient that's not as well understood: an obsessive interest in a particular topic.

2019

• What You'll Wish You'd Known Paul Graham's speech that could've been given to high school students but he never got an opportunity because the school authorities vetoed the invitation. Wish I read this speech in high school.
• The Knowledge Project featuring Naval Ravikant: Naval is an incredibly deep thinker who challenges the status quo on so many things.
• How to be an artist: Jerry Saltz is a Pulitzer prize winner for art criticism. Here he shares his thoughts on creativity and how to be an artist.
• Productivity: Sam Altman shares his thoughts on optimizing productivity. What hit home for me was just like how money compounds, making incremental productivity hacks can also compound. Sleep was a big one! I no longer preach "sleep when I die" attitude. It is actually completely opposite today. If I don't get enough sleep, my body really feels the pain.
• Geeks, mops and sociopaths: this one was fascinating about how things take off and the role geeks, mops and sociopaths play a role. This can be applied to so many things, especially the digital coin trend.
• Death is optional: I am a huge fan of Yuval and his work on Homo Sapiens. And there is no one better than Daniel Kahneman to lead the discussion on access to medicine and the society's role. Sad to say, it does not surprise me there will be inequality in health care just how we are facing income inequality today.
• The cost conundrum: Atul Gawande does an exceptional job explaining how healthcare cost varies in two seprate towns in Texas for the same treatment. A long but worth the read to understand the health care issues in America.
• 1000 true fans: no more chasing millions and 20x growth rate because a creator's job is to find the true fans. There is so much joy in finding the first 1000 true fans.
• Sick systems: 4 rules on sick systems which shows you how to keep someone with you forever.
• LTM: I have a personal fascination with long term memory and I still haven't cracked the code yet but I am a huge believer in space repition and its benefits. Michael Nielsen does a great job covering space repition techniques using the tool called Anki.
• Luck vs hard work: can't get any simpler than the title itself. A great piece on luck vs hard work.
• Peter Thiel cs183 essays: Peter Thiel is one of the most outcry and an independent thinker. These notes capture his wisdom he shared during one of the CS183 lecture on startups.
• Solitude and leadership: leadership is solitude and solitude is leadership. Being able to think for yourself is one of the most underrated skill. This is how leaders our born!
• Stay in the game: this one is emotional and hit home for me. We all have demons but Max had demons which were beyond his control. He stayed in the game and kept battling. A must read!
• How can I be as great as Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Elon Musk or Sir Richard Branson?: fascinating answer by Elon Musk's ex-wife on what it takes to have an extreme success. Extreme success results from an extreme personality and comes at the cost of many other things.