TOOLS FOR YOUR MENTAL TOOLBOX

Opposition directs your growth.

Being willing to face and work with obstacles is how you’ve grown personally and professionally. You did not accomplish whatever good you have by avoiding challenges. Getting to where you need to go will require that same alchemy of turning obstacles into opportunities.

My hope is that here you will find the mental models, tools, and ideas that can help you to do just that. Welcome!

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Hey, I'm Larry

I’m a Navy brat born in Hawaii and after living in 10 states I’m currently staying warm in Florida. I’ve spent a decade in hard skills working with technology brands and digital platform companies, maybe to the detriment of my soft skills. 

Recently I’ve become fascinated by systems theory and how we acquire knowledge through challenge. As a result, I’ve felt compelled to talk to thought leaders across a variety of fields, ask dumb questions, and record it.

Let’s connect and I’ll share what I’m learning.

Popular Podcasts

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My guest on this episode is Pedro Domingos, a leading AI researcher and recipient of two of the highest honors in AI and the author of the worldwide bestseller "The Master Algorithm." Pedro is a professor of computer science at the University of Washington in Seattle, and he helped start the fields of statistical relational AI, adversarial learning, machine learning for information integration, and influence maximization in social networks.
Kieran Setiya is a Professor of Philosophy at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Kieren’s newest book, Life is Hard, How Philosophy Can Help Us Find Our Way, is the topic of this podcast. In this episode, Keiran challenges the idea that happiness should be life's primary pursuit. Instead, he argues that we should try to live well, and living well means how one lives in relationship to difficulty - not without difficulty.
A.J. Jacobs is the king of self-experimentation and participatory journalism. He is an author, journalist, lecturer, and human guinea pig; the results of which have led to some extreme field experiments like living the rules of the Old Testament for a year, thanking over a thousand people who served him coffee, reading the Encyclopedia Britannica to acquire knowledge about everything, and ...
This podcast is about every promise you made to yourself but broke. Let me introduce you to the Pope of Procrastination, who forgives you of all that. My guest is Piers Steel. Piers is a Distinguished Research Chair at the University of Calgary. He's also the inventor of the procrastination equation, encapsulating pretty much every scientific finding on procrastination out there to date.
Rory Sutherland is one of the most admired and influential intellects in advertising. He is also one of the most interesting and witty people I've had the privilege talking to. Rory is Vice Chairman of Ogilvy & Mather and co-founder of Ogilvy Change, a behavioral science practice were he co-heads a team of psychology graduates who look for "butterfly effects" in consumer behavior - these are the very small contextual changes which can have enormous effects on the decisions people make.
In this episode I talk with Shane Parrish. Shane is a former cybersecurity expert and the genius behind Farnam Street, a site immensely popular among the elite innovator and investor class. Shane is also celebrated for his bestselling three-volume series on mental models and his latest book "Clear Thinking: Turning Ordinary Moments Into Extraordinary Results," is the topic of this podcast.
Hadley Vlahos is not just a seasoned hospice nurse but also an end-of-life educator and now a New York Times bestselling author. Her journey and her experiences became the foundation for her bestselling work, The In-Between: Unforgettable Encounters During Life's Final Moments. The book captures deep, poignant stories from her time with patients, giving insights into what life's final moments can teach us about existence itself.

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