Justin Kerby

31

February 16, 2019 by Justin Kerby

First of all, I want to stress that a lot of good things happened to me in my 30^th year before I get too grim. I bought a home and a new car to go with it, my business grew substantially, I made great friends, traveled to new places, and picked up some great new habits.

That being said…

Turning 30 hit me hard. It wasn’t just another birthday – it felt momentous. It felt significant. It felt like a year where I would put everything together, have it all figured out, and finally put all my knowledge to good use.

That wasn’t the case.

Almost the day after my 30^th birthday, upon writing about all that I’d learned in 30 years, I felt a sense of relief. I’d written about the most important things I’d learned, and part of me felt like acknowledging them was good enough to hang my hat on for the coming decade. Unfortunately, as it turns out, it wasn’t.

I tripped on my own confidence and fell into a rabbit hole. The confidence led me astray.

Thirty wasn’t so great. I indulged a lot. As my lingering health issues improved, my focus on improving myself lagged. I became less focused, less ambitious, and ultimately less present. I let instant gratification lead the way, which is never a good thing. Cognitive dissonance ran rampant. From my personal life to my work life, I was conflicted for the better part of the year. I constantly told myself that things that were bad for me were okay, which became the overall theme for the start of my third decade on planet earth.

Instead of looking back, like I did last year, for my 31^st birthday I’m going to look forward. Here are 10 things I’m going to be mindful of this year, that are going to make 31 better than 30.

1. Let your work quietly speak for itself

Don’t oversell. Over deliver. Ryan Holiday wrote a brilliant blog about being who you are and letting your work speak for itself that really resonates with me. I don’t want to be a person who bullshits people and goes too far over his skis. I want to be the type of person who is underestimated, and who impresses people with my work – not with my Instagram bio.

2. Make changes when necessary

I don’t want to live a life I don’t enjoy. If something or someone is draining my energy and making me sour this year, I’m going to say goodbye to it. Time is a priceless resource – don’t squander it on things that sap your happiness and don’t align with your destiny.

3. Use the mornings wisely

I don’t get my mornings back. I don’t make up for the time lost in the evenings. When I wake up at 9AM instead of 6AM, three hours are lost forever. Use your mornings to make yourself a better person. Read, write, meditate, exercise, be grateful, draw, and work on the projects you need to explore. The quiet hours are the perfect time to work on yourself.

4. Finish

I’ve started a lot in my life. Finishing is another story. My family motto is, “Until The End”, and it’s something I’d love to start living more consciously. Seeing things through will help me win small victories, and move onto big ones. I want to run a race in May, finish 36 books in 2019, follow through on launching some new projects, and write a bunch of long form blogs for my website. To get it all done, I’ll need to focus on finishing by having fun, being realistic, and planning properly.

5. Track progress throughout the year

Not just in January. Not just in December when my year end goals are approaching. All year. I want to track my progress throughout 2019. What gets measured gets managed.

6. Indulge less

Persist and resist when you don’t need to indulge. When you do need to indulge, be present and enjoy it.

7. Work your ass off – and have fun doing it

Do it quietly. Do it calmly. Do it for yourself. Your work doesn’t have to be a daily grind. It can be your passion. Create things that you love for people you love to work with, and spend lots of time perfecting it. When you’re proud of your work, you enjoy your work. Plain and simple.

8. Live like the day is the year

How you live your days is how you live your years. Eat shitty and lay around? That’s your year. Exercise and eat healthy? That’s your year. Never act like one day doesn’t matter. Act like your day is your year – because it is. The Olympic games are now.

9. Consume more

I’ve written in the past about creating more and consuming less. What I’ve come to understand is that while creating is extremely important, create versus consume isn’t a zero sum game. Consumption, when done carefully, can help you create more. This year I want to consume more movies, albums, documentaries, books, and articles that pique my interest – especially creatively. In my experience as of late, this kind of selective consumption leads to more creation.

10. Give to your loved ones

I had a real scare this year with someone close to me. I also lost someone close to me. It’s led me to understand that you can’t take anything for granted – not your life, not the lives of others – nothing. This year I want to give as much as I can to my loved ones. I want to help them succeed in every way possible, and be there for them when times are tough. Helping others isn’t just good for those around us, it’s the easiest way to help ourselves, too.

A Valentine’s Day Algorithm

February 14, 2019 by Justin Kerby

Happy Valentine’s Day!

If you’re in a relationship, it’s time to give yourself a pat on the back like everyone else on my Instagram feed. Or, better yet, you could not.

If you’re single, good news: tomorrow is Single’s Appreciation Day (SAD, for short). For those looking for a partner, there’s a really cool algorithm I wanted to share that you can apply to your dating life. I first read about this in the book Algorithms to Live By by Brian Christian and Tom Griffiths, a fun read for anyone looking to use math to improve their life.

Here’s what the 37% rule is, and how it can be applied to dating.

The rule can be applied to any situation where you have to screen options in a limited amount of time, and want to make the best (or most optimal) decision. It can be used when you’re looking for a house, when you’re trying to hire a job candidate for your business, or yes, to find love.

Here’s what you do.

#1. Pick a start date and an end date.

When are you going to start looking for a life partner? For the sake of this example, let’s say you’re staring your search at age 30. Let’s also assume that you want to find a partner before you turn 40. That gives you 10 years to search.

#2. Count your options.

How many first dates can you go on in that time period? If you went on 6 a year, that would be 60 first dates within the 10 year time period.

#3. Search until you go on 37% of your potential first dates.

For this example, you’d go on 22 first dates. Don’t pick a partner yet, just keep going on dates. This is crucial to the rule: don’t fall in love!

#4. After your 22 dates, start looking for someone better than all the rest.

At this point, it’s time to get serious. From your 23rd date onward, you have one simple task: Find someone better than all of the 22 dates you went on. As soon as you find someone you like more than all the dates prior, lock him/her up.

Obviously, this is a touch impractical for dating. If you fall in love, tell the algorithm to go to hell. But this algorithm is proven to be the best way to optimize your outcome. I found it super helpful when searching for a home. I gave myself a window of time in which I wanted to purchase a home, figured out the amount of open houses I could go to within that time period, and then applied the 37% rule.

And it worked out pretty good!

Keep in mind, I married the first girl I ever went on a date with – so I’m a total hypocrite for suggesting this strategy. Nevertheless, I found the algorithm pretty cool for analyzing other time-bound situations.

The Shape of Ideas

February 12, 2019 by Justin Kerby

Grant Snider is a wonderful illustrator, but it’s his creativity that really sets him apart. He’s constantly coming up with out of the box ideas for his illustrations that make you pause, think, and read them again.

The Shape of Ideas is his illustrated exploration of creativity. It’s full of beautiful imagery that I absolutely loved. I picked it up at the library and I’m definitely going to be buying it for some of the creative people in my life. Each page (or two) in the book stands alone, and the book itself is separated into 10 parts. Here’s one of my favorite pages (that resonates), I’ll add a link below the image if you want to check out Snider’s website at Incidental Comics.

Here are a few other samples. Tough to read, but just to give you an idea of how he does his illustrations.

Go buy or borrow this book.

My Goodreads Rating: 5/5

Exploring Cognitive Bias

February 12, 2019 by Justin Kerby

A few years ago I read Daniel Kahneman’s Thinking Fast and Slow, which got me hooked on learning about behavioral economics and psychology – something I wish I had studied in college.

One of the most fascinating parts of the book was reading about the biases of human intuition. Kahneman suggests that when we become aware of our biases, we can work to become better thinkers (and better people overall).

How do you define a cognitive bias?

They are systematic patterns of deviation from norm or rationality in judgment. A mistake in reasoning, evaluating, remembering, or other cognitive processes, often occurring as a result of holding onto one’s preferences and beliefs regardless of contrary information.

Cognitive biases are confirmed by replicable research, however, there is often disagreement about how to classify them. Regardless of classification, they’re extremely interesting to study – many demonstrate harmful behavior chains, while others can actually be explained by more useful behaviors. It’s only through exploring the biases one by one that we can figure out how to understand and correct our mistakes, and use them to our advantage.

Which leads to my new project. I’m going to be spending time researching each of the cognitive biases and writing about the ones I find most interesting. With over 100 cognitive biases listed on Wikipedia, I’ll have lots to choose from.

I’m going to breakdown the biases into three categories:

Decision-making, belief, and behavioral biases
Social biases
Memory errors and biases

Stay tuned!

Beware of the Visionary

February 11, 2019 by Justin Kerby

fake it til you make it — Gaping Void / envoyworld.com

It’s fine to be a visionary, as long as it’s not a self-appointed title. If it is, I’d argue that your vision is quite limited. I saw this fantastic design from Gaping Void recently on the subject and thought I’d share it. Way too many people fall victim to their own ego, especially online.

We used to identify with our job. I’m a dentist, a doctor, an artist. As the world went online, that began to change. It feels like we’re in a world with more voices, and more competition, so more and more people are feeling insecure. Thus the need to self-identify as a “dreamer”.

If I could give one piece of advice on this subject, it would be to under sell and over deliver. This Ryan Holiday’s article on Thought Catalog about faking it ’til you make it continues to be one of the best things I’ve read on the subject. It’s a must-read.