Artists, Investors, & Chefs… creativity cures and curses
Decision Balance Newsletter | 8.20.2024
Key Insight
The great actor Anthony Hopkins said “The moment you give up trying to prove yourself, things begin to happen. I guess it’s so-called surrender. I’ve emptied my mind of all the turmoil, all the I’ve-got-to-prove-myself. I don’t have to prove anything.’ Maybe the rest of us can get to this mindset before we are 86. The secret is tapping into intrinsic motivation (mastery, improvement) vs extrinsic (trophies, awards, likes, & yes, money ).
A question to ask yourself
If you could accomplish anything, what would it be? For those with a ‘fear of failure’ mindset you can ask the same question a different way…If you knew you could not fail, what would you do? How big is the gap between how you currently spend time and your answer? Do you have a strategy to narrow the gap each month, each year?
Reading, podcast thoughts
Mix overconfidence, FOMO, and cheap capital (low interest rates, expanding money supply) and you are likely to find speculation and volatility. As investors and collectors search for outperformance they are compelled to look at illiquid, low transparency individual investments and asset classes (e.g. art). One of the best recent examples where all these ingredients come together is the ultra contemporary art world where prices have declined by as much as 90% in the last few years.
Acclaimed chef Jeremiah Tower of Chez Panisse, Stars, and Tavern on the Green tells the story of opening Stars in this newsletter. The team was late with construction and had a firm deadline for a make or break press lunch for the restaurant. They had “no hood, no gas, no license.” They had to improvise by taking turns in front of the burning charcoal and the next chef would jump in before the prior one passed out from breathing in too much carbon monoxide. The gamble paid off and Stars became one of the top restaurants in America. ‘Breaking rules’ is sometimes a requirement for survival and can lead to lasting innovation when used intelligently. Uber is likely the most famous example but as you can see from Jeremiah Towers, the strategy is not only reserved for tech startups.
Health
Many would consider John D. Rockefeller the most formidable capitalist of all time. What is less known is that he was a passionate and prolific tree farmer and landscaper. In his 1909 biography, Random Reminiscences of Men and Events, Rockefeller describes his strong interest in “the making of paths, the plantings of trees, and the setting out of little forests of seedlings.” His intense work at Standard Oil was balanced by a devotion to the growth of the natural world. I do not think he could have sustained the mental and physical toll of creating one of the strongest companies in U.S. history without the nurturing time he spent actively growing plants in his gardens or national parks. This was his method of recovery; what is yours?
Welcome to the DecisionBalance newsletter where I share insights, questions, and reading recommendations. I coach asset managers and start-up founder/CEOs to set goals, improve performance, and find deeper meaning in their work.
