I picked up a 600 page biography of Herbert Hoover. I was visiting family in Austin, Texas and they have these gigantic used bookstores. When you read these stories, they just hold you to a higher bar. That's the reason I'm obsessed with issues because they just did more. Henry Kaiser is as famous in his time as Elon Musk is today. He found like 100 different companies. But he has a great line: problems are just opportunities and workflows. So it's not a problem. It's an opportunity. It's just you got to put into workflows to figure it out.
“To get me stop, they’re going to have to pry the microphone out of my cold dead hand”. Hot on the heels of his hugely popular appearance on ‘Invest Like The Best’, David Senra joins a marathon episode of Infinite Loops to discuss obsession, education, optimism, podcasting, and so much more. Unsurprisingly, this one is not to be missed. Important Links:
Show Notes:
- David’s grandfather, refugees, and risk-taking
- Why reading history raises our ambition
- Obsession and genetics
- Why founders are the most important people in the world
- Our failing education system
- “To get me to stop, they’re going to have to pry the microphone out of my cold dead hand”
- “Don’t do anything that somebody else can do”
- Societal responses to change, predicting the future
- The benefits of small teams
- “Plan B should be to make plan A work”
- Optimism, risk and the bridge of nihilism
- Why you need to start a podcast
- “History doesn’t repeat, human nature does”
- AI and art
- The internet is the greatest variance amplifier in history
- “You can’t fake passion”
- Infinite networks
- Luck, burnout, learning and excuses
- “Don’t be surprised if your best idea comes 30 to 40 years into your career”
- The blueprint for a great day
- Pick the right heroes
Books Mentioned:
- Am I Being Too Subtle?: Straight Talk From a Business Rebel; by Sam Zell
- The Sugar King of Havana: The Rise and Fall of Julio Lobo, Cuba's Last Tycoon; by John Paul Rathbone
- The Hypomaniac Edge: The Link Between (A Little) Craziness and (A Lot of) Success in America; by John D. Gartner
- One Summer: America, 1927; by Bill Bryson
- Reluctant Genius: The Passionate Life and Inventive Mind of Alexander Graham Bell; by Charlotte Gray
- Born of this land : my life story; by Chung Ju-yung
- Shoe Dog; by Phil Knight
- Pulitzer: A Life in Politics, Print, and Power; by James McGrath Morris
- Only the Paranoid Survive: How to Exploit the Crisis Points That Challenge Every Company; by Andrew S. Grove
- Time to Make the Donuts: The Founder of Dunkin Donuts Shares an American Journey; by William Rosenberg
- Creativity, Inc.: Overcoming the Unseen Forces That Stand in the Way of True Inspiration; by Ed Catmull
- The Tao Te Ching; by Laozi
- My Life & Work - An Autobiography of Henry Ford; by Henry Ford
- One from Many: VISA and the Rise of Chaordic Organization; by Dee Hock
- Zanies: The world’s greatest eccentrics; by Jay Robert Nash
