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Some scratches heal on their own.

Others need work to be fixed.

Knowing the difference—especially in cases when work is required—can be the difference between success and failure.

At the end of last year, my family and I played and completed the board game, Pandemic Legacy. It’s a co-operative game, where you work with the other players to save the world from, well, you guessed it, a global pandemic.

If a normal board game is like a movie—where it’s over in a couple hours—Pandemic Legacy is like a TV series, where each game is part of a broader story and builds on the previous games.

It was, hands down, the best board game I’ve ever played. And we often discussed—over the 16 games we played—what would happen if a real pandemic hit the globe. Little did we know…

Us humans are good at finding the humour in tough situations, though. Humour helps us cope with, reflect upon, make sense of, and lighten the circumstances.

Over the past few months, our family has made jokes about how it’s a good thing we’re not responsible for the world’s COVID response—often poking fun at someone who made a particularly bad board game decision.

We also jokingly wonder if 2020 have been different if we hadn’t played the game? As if us playing had some Jumanji-esque impact on the world.

Of course, none of this is true, but the humour is a welcome break from the talk of lockdowns and vaccines.

Humour is a tonic.

I was recently reminded of this hilarious video from comedian, Oobah, where he breaks dated British laws in front of police.

A few examples are 1) carrying a salmon in suspicious circumstances, 2) shaking out a rug in public after 8am, or 3) being without socks within 100 yards of the reigning monarch.

Of course, the video is only funny because the viewer understands how ridiculous these laws sound. I’m sure there was a logical reason to pass the Metropolitan Police Act of 1839 preventing public rug shaking, but do we really need it now?

Although parliament may be a little slow to update their laws, it got me thinking about the rules, customs, and values we set for ourselves. How often do we say, “that’s the way we’ve always done it.”? And at what point do we say, “we can do better, our world could be different.”?

Back in 1988, Bill Clinton delivered an astonishingly long—36 minute—speech at the Democratic National Convention to endorse Michael Dukakis as the Democratic presidential nominee.

It was so long that in the final minutes when Clinton uttered the words, “In closing,” the crowd erupted with cheers. They were happy to hear he was on the verge of finishing. And that odd moment has not been forgotten.

We only have a short amount of time to land our message, to tell our story, and to persuade others. It doesn’t matter if you’re an employee, a CEO, or Bill Clinton, having a deep understanding of your audience is more than half the battle when trying to land a message.

I was recently reminded of the lesson “show me, don’t tell me”.

This principles works in almost any setting: presentations, blog posts, textbooks, friendships, and even in displays of kindness for our loved ones.

Around the same time, I was reminded of a previous blog post where I shared how you only need to water a basil plant when it’s drooping—I was previously overwatering and killing them.

So I decided to put the two lessons together this week. Here’s a before and after photo of the same basil plant—with only 3 hours and a watering between them.

Regardless of what’s going on today, remember: 100 years from now, there’ll be all new people.

And, perhaps, it can serve as a reminder that today—however bland, challenging, or joyous—is a special day.

H/T Theo Katzmann’s ‘100 Years from now’

I’ve admired Jack Conte for a long time.

He is in two amazing bands: Pomplamoose and Scary Pockets. Pomplamoose landed on the map 10 years ago with their cover of Beyoncé’s Single Ladies, and they continue to perform tasty mashups on YouTube today. Scary Pockets do insane funk covers of classic songs.

In addition to the above, Conte is the founder and CEO of Patreon, a website that allows content creators to get paid directly by their fans. For example, a musician can have a community of ‘Patrons’ that pay a monthly subscription fee. In return, the Patrons get access to early music and exclusive content.

Since I first heard about Conte, it seemed like everything he touched turned to gold. His videos got millions of views, and his company is clearly the leader in its market.

So you can imagine my surprise when I came across his amazing talk called ‘Nothing Works’—where he vulnerably shares hundreds of his failures, and they all ultimately led to his successes.

It’s long—at 35 minutes—so I was hesitant to share it. But I got so much out of it, and think you may, too. If you’ve ever felt called or compelled to create something, this talk will inspire you, I can guarantee that.

I went cycling yesterday. As soon as I set off, it started to drizzle. And after 5 minutes, the rain had picked up to a steady patter.

I stopped on the side of the road and contemplated returning to my dry, comfortable living room.

I then had a flashback to 2016, when I spent 2 months travelling down the Mississippi River with friends. We were outdoors the entire time. And when it rained, if we weren’t in our tents, all we had were our jackets.

I wasn’t concerned about the rain back then, so why was worrying about it now?

The tension in my shoulders subsided, I lifted my face to the clouds, and felt the droplets fall on my face.

This week, after 102 days of being virus free, New Zealand identified its first resurgence of COVID-19 community transmission.

In order to battle the spread of the disease, the New Zealand government has announced a dramatic change to their containment strategy: going forward, any person who tests positive for the virus will be quarantined in a government facility.

This is a no tolerance approach, and is similar to the strategy China used at the beginning of the outbreak.

This aggressive response is only possible when the problem is small.

It got me thinking about the way we deal with other problems in our workplace, in our homes, and in our communities.

When the problem is small and measurable, it’s better to move fast and nip it in the bud. But once the issue has multiplied and embedded itself, elimination no longer becomes and option, and we need to shift our focus to mitigation.

I loved this quote from the cartoonist and creator of Calvin and Hobbes, Bill Watterson.

Here’s hoping it helps you take a step back and think about the big picture. It did for me.

“…having an enviable career is one thing, and being a happy person is another. Creating a life that reflects your values and satisfies your soul is a rare achievement. In a culture that relentlessly promotes avarice and excess as the good life, a person happy doing his own work is usually considered an eccentric, if not a subversive. Ambition is only understood if it’s to rise to the top of some imaginary ladder of success. Someone who takes an undemanding job because it affords him the time to pursue other interests and activities is considered a flake. A person who abandons a career in order to stay home and raise children is considered not to be living up to his potential—as if a job title and salary are the sole measure of human worth. You’ll be told in a hundred ways, some subtle and some not, to keep climbing, and never be satisfied with where you are, who you are, and what you’re doing. There are a million ways to sell yourself out, and I guarantee you’ll hear about them. To invent your own life’s meaning is not easy, but it’s still allowed, and I think you’ll be happier for the trouble.”

It was 36 degrees Celsius (97 degrees Fahrenheit) in London this past weekend. Which, if you know London weather, is insane.

As I walked along a road with a melting ice cream in hand, I noticed someone leaving a shop with a large box under their arm—a fan.

The peak of summer isn’t the time to prepare for the heat wave. There are fewer fans to go round, and they’re more expensive. The fan we bought back in April—before the summer—has increased in price by 32% on Amazon.

Of course, fan-buying-timing is a trivial problem, but early preparation is a timeless lesson.

Last October, I posted about our acorn seedling, Carlos. I then provided another update in December 2019 on his growth progress.

Today, I finally got round to putting Carlos into his own pot—it’s the first time he’s sat in real soil. Weirdly, I feel like a parent. Although, I’m sure being a real parent is far more daunting.

There is something magical about growing an oak tree. So many things have to go right for the acorn to survive in the wild. But when it does, we all marvel at the strength of the oak—never for a moment remember it was once a tender sapling.

There are multiple metaphors for life hiding in the story of the oak.

Note: For those interested, we bought the delightfully designed acorn vase from Ilex Studios to house our little acorn for the first year of its life.

Earlier this week, I shared how a former colleague set up a print-on-demand t-shirt business during lockdown.

Today, I’d like to share another inspiring story about my friends, Kylene and Harry.

As the coronavirus crisis began to escalate in the UK—along with Harry’s Masters programme being put on hold, and Kylene’s ability to work remotely—they decided to move back to Australia.

Instead of sitting around waiting for things to blow over, they teamed up with Harry’s sister, Victoria, to start The Flying Zucchinis—a fruit and veggie box subscription service built on the growing demand for grocery delivery brought on by the coronavirus pandemic.

I’ve loved following their textbook lean start-up approach. They’d set up a website and social accounts within days. They hacked together a range of Software as a Service third party systems to handle inventory, checkout, and subscription orders. And most importantly, they got their product out to market as quickly as possible.

At first, their product selection was modest—they only had one fruit and veggie box option, as they were testing to see if there was interest for their product. But as they’ve gained momentum, their product selection and their branding have taken leaps forward.

They now offer multiple fruit and veggie box options, along with eggs, milk, and bread subscriptions. They added a hella cute logo, and made a mini cooking show via Instagram stories for how to use that week’s produce.

They also follow Paul Graham’s classic advice of doing things that don’t scale by providing a handwritten card with each order to build a strong early community of customers.

I love seeing their posts about the inner workings of getting a business going: the 3am wake ups to head to the fruit and veggie markets, the delivery runs, the warehouse space they’re about to move into, and the new logo printed on their boxes. It’s gritty, real, and human.

And they’ve had success, too! Last week they completed their 1,000th order, and are now nearing 200 active subscriptions. This is huge growth in 4 months.

Finally, I asked them what they’ve enjoyed and learnt by going on this journey. I’ve summarised them into 3 learnings:

1. They’ve learnt the importance of customer obsession (in the Jeff Bezo’s sense. They use the product themselves and feel all the frustrations when things go wrong. And when that complaint comes in at 11pm at night about the missing brussel sprouts, they don’t go to bed until it’s sorted. They also realised their customers loved the more personal nature of the business (e.g., Harry cooking 3 times a week behind the camera) so they’ve invested heavily in growing that part of their operations.

2. Go hard when the opportunity is ripe (pun intended). They’re based in Melbourne which has just gone back into a strict lockdown. People want subscription boxes more than ever. They’re unlikely to have as much organic demand as they’re getting now, so they’re trying to scale up their operations as quickly as possible.

3. Starting a business and running it is all-consuming, but the joy that comes with throwing yourself into it 100% is intoxicating. They’re loving the journey, and that, perhaps, is the most important thing.

“Study as if you know nothing. Work as if you can solve anything.”—James Clear

I don’t think I need to add anything to this quote. It’s simple, clear, and pithy.

H/T to James Clear’s weekly newsletter. It lives up to its goal of being “the most wisdom per word of any newsletter on the web.”

In a recent blog post, I shared an article full of advice on how to write well in the workplace.

In that article, I leant about the Gunning-Fog Index, which is a way to “measure the readability of your text by counting words-per-sentence and syllables-per-word.”

The output of the GFI can be interpreted as the years of formal education required to understand the text on the first reading.

For example, Winston Churchill’s war time speeches were so simple the average 10-year-old could understand them, versus Kodak’s Security and Exchange Commission filing, which is so complicated it likely requires a Masters Degree.

I then got curious. What if I took a random sample of 5 of my blog posts and run it through this nifty GFI Tool? How many years of formal education would be required to understand my posts on the first reading?

I picked 5 posts at random from my blog: 1, 2, 3, 4, and 5; and I inserted them into the tool.

These posts received a score of 9.97.

Assuming these posts are representative of all the posts on my blog, it means that the average 14-year-old should be able to understand my posts on the first reading.

I’m okay with this score, but I want it to be lower.

It’s important to remember that the GFI isn’t assessing content. It only looks at sentence length and average syllable count. So, in my mind, irrespective of the topic—or complexity of the content—a lower GFI score is preferable.

If you’ve got any writing that you think is representative of your style, I encourage you to throw it into the tool and see what number you get. Is it where you want—or hoped—it would be?