001
Paul Graham
Maker's Schedule, Manager's Schedule
Its distinction between meeting-driven and focus-driven days explains a costly workplace conflict with unusual clarity.
5 min
Essay
Short reads, long aftertaste
Excellent pieces you can finish in five minutes and keep thinking about all day.
25 recommendations
002
Paul Graham
Write Like You Talk
Its single conversational test gives writers an immediate way to make stiff prose clearer, warmer, and easier to read.
5 min
Essay
003
Paul Graham
Keep Your Identity Small
The link between identity labels and impaired judgment offers a memorable safeguard against tribal thinking.
5 min
Essay
004
Paul Graham
The Top Idea in Your Mind
Using unguarded morning thoughts as a diagnostic exposes which concern is truly consuming a person's mental bandwidth.
5 min
Essay
005
Sam Altman
The Days Are Long but the Decades Are Short
A thirtieth-birthday inventory compresses a decade of reflection into concise guidance about choices that compound over time.
5 min
Essay
006
Kevin Kelly · The Technium
You Are Not Late
Looking back at the apparent openness of the 1985 internet counters the fear that every meaningful technological opportunity has passed.
5 min
Essay
007
Derek Sivers
Hell Yes or No
The stark binary in the title supplies a memorable filter for protecting limited time from lukewarm commitments.
2 min
Short essay
008
Derek Sivers
There's No Speed Limit
Questioning an assumed pace of progress encourages learners to follow demonstrated ability rather than an arbitrary timetable.
3 min
Short essay
009
Derek Sivers
Ideas Are Just a Multiplier of Execution
Reducing outcomes to the interaction of ideas and execution punctures the tendency to overvalue inspiration without delivery.
2 min
Short essay
010
Derek Sivers
The Most Important Thing
Its deliberately singular framing forces a useful confrontation with priority when several goals all appear urgent.
3 min
Short essay
011
Derek Sivers
Obvious to You, Amazing to Others
The title identifies a common creative blind spot: familiarity with one's own skill can hide its value from the person who has it.
2 min
Short essay
012
Derek Sivers
Saying No
Centering refusal as a skill foregrounds the boundary-setting required to preserve attention for chosen commitments.
2 min
Short essay
013
Derek Sivers
Done Is Better Than Perfect
The contrast between completion and perfection offers a crisp standard for escaping revisions that no longer improve the result.
2 min
Short essay
014
Derek Sivers
The Donkey Fable
A fable about indecision gives abstract trade-offs a compact narrative form that can be remembered when choices compete.
2 min
Short essay
015
Derek Sivers
Compass Over Maps
Preferring direction to a fixed route captures how durable principles can guide action when circumstances make detailed plans obsolete.
3 min
Short essay
016
Derek Sivers
Full Focus
The uncompromising emphasis on concentration makes a useful case for directing energy rather than merely allocating hours.
3 min
Short essay
017
Andy Weir
The Egg
Uses a fatal car accident and an immediate encounter after death to open a compact philosophical thought experiment.
5 min
Short fiction
018
Chris Dixon
The Next Big Thing Will Start Out Looking Like a Toy
Makes the counterintuitive case that seemingly trivial products may deserve more attention than polished, obviously serious ones.
5 min
Essay
019
Chris Dixon
Come for the Tool, Stay for the Network
Explains a durable product pattern in which individual utility attracts people before network effects give them a reason to remain.
5 min
Essay
020
Randall Munroe · xkcd
Is It Worth the Time?
Turns automation enthusiasm into a concrete break-even calculation based on task frequency and time saved.
2 min
Comic
021
Matt Might
The Illustrated Guide to a Ph.D.
Uses circles and one tiny dent to make the scale, specialization, and modest contribution of a Ph.D. instantly visible.
5 min
Essay
022
Eliezer Yudkowsky · LessWrong
Politics is the Mind-Killer
An evolutionary angle on political irrationality helps explain why ordinary reasoning so often collapses around tribal questions.
5 min
Essay
023
Eliezer Yudkowsky · LessWrong
Cached Thoughts
The contrast between slow-firing neurons and capable brains opens a compelling puzzle about how cognition works at all.
5 min
Essay
024
Fred Wilson · AVC
MBA Mondays
A startup sales leader's approach to generating leads on a small budget addresses a universal early-stage constraint with operational detail.
5 min
Essay
025
Fred Wilson · AVC
Minimum Viable Personality
The playful guest-post setup signals an unconventional voice, making personality itself part of the lesson rather than mere packaging.
5 min
Essay