🧠 How to beat writer's block, the next Indie MBA event, and 5 cool things this week

Updates from The Wisdom Project | Wisdom Letter #144

Jun 5

You know I write for a living.

Across my client work, and my own products, newsletters, and Twitter account I write around 3 to 4 hours a day.

I cannot afford to suffer from writer’s block 🤷‍♂️

For that, I’ve built a system for myself that works great. I actually enjoy and look forward to writing every day.

This 3 part system makes sure that I always have interesting ideas to write about:

Consuming a lot

A note-taking system that works.

The transformations in my life.

If you are a writer (or want to become one) you will love this system.

⬆️Think Better, Live Better

Quick update: If you like our newsletter, you will love our products.

Our e-books and toolkits help you live the life you want, both personally and professionally.

They are extremely actionable and insightful.

Try them out, you won’t be disappointed :

🧠 Mental Models for Busy Professionals - How to think better, live better.
💪The Toolkit for Atomic Habits - Everything you need to build life-changing habits.
🦉7 Habits of Highly Effective Tweeple - The Wisdom Of Twitter
✍️ Make Money With Words - Find your voice and monetize your writing in 2022

Now, let’s get into the 5 cool things for the week.

📖 5 Cool Things

💸 How Zapier got its first paying user, and how you can get your first 100

“You are not the hero of your startup (Your user is!)
Getting paying customers for a product is tough.
Building something worth paying for comes down to solving burning problems for users.
And then going out and spreading word about the solution you built.
In beginning, every strategy to get paying users comes down to timeless advice from Investor Paul Graham:
“Do things that don’t scale.”
This idea is at the heart of how Zapier's founder Wade Foster got his first paying user.”

“You don't want a house out in the country. You want to slow down.
Patience is no longer a virtue. We once idolized the slow and steady grind towards a greater future. Now we enshrine speed, looking to those who beat the clock as our models of success.
I've been working on managing my addiction to Twitter. It's among the most pernicious of addictions since it's extremely easy to convince myself it's good for me. Twitter has brought me much of my professional success. So who knows what opportunities I'm missing out on by not checking it right now.”

Complaining incessasantly
Falling into productivity traps
Saying yes to everything
Glorifying the wrong things
Taking everyone’s advice
And more…

Read the thread:

Sahil Bloom @SahilBloom

15 bad habits holding you back from your potential:

PS: If you want to break bad habits and build great habits, do check out our quick e-book - The Wisdom of Atomic Habits.

The psychology behind Netflix thumbnails | Trung Phan

“A Netflix user will browse the app for 90 seconds and leave if they find nothing. Thumbnail artwork is actually NFLX’s most effective lever to influence a viewer’s choice.
A user will look at one for only 1.8 seconds, so NFLX spends huge to optimize them.
Here’s a breakdown of how it works.
Spoiler alert: humans are visual animals. Our eyes move 3-4x per second to process information and we can analyze an image in as little as 13 milliseconds.”

“TV star, Catherine Reitman, shares her lessons learned in seeing ideas thru to their completion, not allowing others to reshape your vision and a little bit about family dynamics. Catherine Reitman is the creator, executive producer, writer, and star of CBC’s acclaimed original comedy series, Workin’ Moms.”