Good Morning Amigo,

Monday morning. Rise and shine. Grab your cup of joe and let’s go!

Feature Read of the Week:

“The Tyranny of Convenience” by Tim Wu, as featured in The New York Times.

“What happens to human experience when so many obstacles and impediments and requirements and preparations have been removed? Today’s cult of convenience fails to acknowledge that difficulty is a constitutive feature of human experience.

Convenience is all destination and no journey. But climbing a mountain is different from taking the tram to the top, even if you end up at the same place.

We are becoming people who care mainly or only about outcomes. We are at risk of making most of our life experiences a series of trolley rides.” – Tim Wu

What I’m Thinking About:

I’m not crying, you’re crying… “The Austin Hatch Story” as told by ESPN e60.

What I’m Listening To:

Fresh tuneage from an artist you likely haven’t heard of… Think Bahamas vibe but female vocals -> Madison Cunningham laying it down with “Pin It Down” and “Plain Letters“.

Words I’m Pondering: 

“I hope your first deal is a loser, otherwise you’ll think you’re a lot smarter than you are.” – Charles Koch’s dad’s advice to him when he was 26.

Having been majorly humbled myself as an entrepreneur, I couldn’t agree more with this less than sugar coated advice. Failure is definitely tough to accept and deal with in the moment (warning: the moment can drag on for weeks -> months -> years) but it is incredibly rich in the gifts it yields over time. If handled wisely and rigorously reflected on over time for all it’s worth (not avoided or left in the dark to fester), the raw pain one experiences from failure in the public eye will pay itself out over a lifetime of dividends.

Brew, Sip, Think, Repeat,

Wilkesy