If you could choose, what would you most deeply want for your life? If today was the last day of your life, would you be happy with how you’re about to spend it?

I value:

• A growth mindset. I always want to be growing and learning how to be a better person, better partner, better teammate, and better at activities
• I will maintain my integrity. I will be direct and transparent with my thoughts and feelings, and advocate for the good of the organization, not myself. I will seek to benefit others. I will not pass on blame for my mistakes and responsibilities. I will value teamwork and professional pride, and I will respect this from others.
• I will be intellectually honest and curious, always looking for the truth of the matter, not to win arguments. I will remain open minded to new ideas and data as they are presented.
• I will value and invest in my good health, both physical and mental. I want to live and long and fulfilling life both for myself and those close to me. My good health gives the rest of my values meaning. My good health allows me to fulfill the rest of my values and goals.
• I will value my family, both new and old. My family is my support structure and I would not be where I am today without them. I value their love and support in me, just as I value loving and supporting them. Supporting my family will always be my top priority.
• I value experience over things. My happiest moments are shared memories with those closest to me. Most things only bring temporary joy, not lasting, but of the things that I do enjoy the most are those that help create lasting experiences (photography).

Ideas I live by

• Learn by doing - The most effective way to learn is by doing. No book or lecture can substitute the knowledge and skills gained by actually doing. You don't learn to play the piano by reading books about it, you learn by actually playing.
• Reality is nuanced - If you try to apply a singular way of thinking to every scenario in life you'll be certain to fail. The only way to effectively navigate the nuance of reality is to be flexible with your beliefs and to set your ego aside in pursuit of the truth. Life is extremely complex and context is everything.
• Every action you take is a vote for the type of person you wish to become - Imagine that your identity is composed of sand piles. Every action you take adds a grain of sand to a specific pile and the biggest piles define your identity. Choose to go to the gym enough times and you become a gym-goer, choose to write enough times and you become a writer.
• Don’t complain - Complaining is a waste of time and energy that does nothing to better your situation. Be grateful for your health and the fact that you live in the wealthiest society on earth during the wealthiest period in human history. Countless people would kill to be in the position you’re in, so stop complaining and seize the abundant opportunities around you.
• The degree to which you retain information is proportionate to your engagement with it - Passively listening < Actively Reading < Writing about what you've read. The more time spent and the deeper your engagement with an idea, the more you will internalize that idea. Go deep.
• Invert, always invert - To find out which actions to avoid, invert words of wisdom and best practices, then avoid these inverted principles. Ex. The inversion of working hard is being lazy, thus one should avoid being lazy. The inversion of being generous is to be cruel, thus one should avoid being cruel. Don’t seek to be exceptional, rather it’s usually easier to avoid making stupid mistakes.
• You'll never regret a workout - Some days I absolutely dread going to the gym. I'm tired, unmotivated, or too comfortable at home. But every time I've felt this way and decided to power through anyways, I've felt better afterwards. It can be hard to see the light at the end of the workout when the last thing you feel like doing is exercise, but know it's there, always.
• Distress is caused by the difference between your desires and reality - If your desires are inline with reality, you'll be at peace. But as soon as what you desire differs from reality, you'll enter a state of angst. The world is as it is, not how you want it to be.
• Only a fool worries over what he can't control - All time and effort spent worrying over something you can't control is wasted. By definition, the outcome of things you can't control is unaffected by whether or not you worry about them. So save yourself the anxiety and focus on things you can control.
• Discipline is freedom - The unintuitive reality that a life of structure and routine affords one more freedom than a life with no plan. Discipline, which I define as the consistent application of effort to a set of tasks that are performed routinely, ensures constant improvement and that what needs to get done gets done. A lack of discipline leads to a reactionary lifestyle, where one is a victim of their environment, constantly extinguishing one fire after another.
• History is the second greatest teacher - From the words of philosopher George Santayana, "Those who do not remember the past are condemned to repeat it." Outside of doing, history is our greatest teacher. Studying history allows us to learn from the mistakes of others and avoid the consequences of their mistakes, without having to spend the time and energy that lead to them.