Momentum vs. Burnout
Observe the following tweet storm by Sam Altman.
I've found this to be super true, and it is a specific case of what I believe to be a larger truth/way of life.
It's something my dad has repeatedly harked at me, and it's this: keep on winning.
Yeah, it sounds ridiculous. How can "keep on winning" be a way of life?
I believe it's a choice. It's a choice to consciously ask the right questions and strive for the right goals in order to make small successes happen over and over, and to build upon them.
The most obvious context for this statement is in programming. My dad told me a lot of coding is just getting a "hello world" to work over and over and scaffolding up from there. Almost all functions are just some fancy "hello world" in one way or another.
But the idea is more universal than just its applications to how one creates something through code. And while we're lost "in the fray" or in the "heat of battle", the fundamental truth that you must keep on winning is often lost in favor of other things. In fact, my theorem that you must keep on moving is probably a corollary of the law that you should keep on winning.
Success reinforces itself. Success is a possibility opener. Getting small results that you want out of your work is the best way to alleviate burnout. It keeps you aligned with your goals. Why? Because you have something to show for your toil. For me, burnout is when I am so tired of my work that I lose sight of why I'm working in the first place. Why would I lose sight? Because I have seemingly no progress. The road is long, I've worked so hard, and I've barely moved. I can't see things coming together. I didn't keep on winning. Winning bolsters your investment hypothesis and keeps you excited and passionate about your work.
Success is something that you can scaffold upon. It brings you to a place where you can think about new ideas and fresher problems. It's a possibility opener that really gets you excited about your investment.
In some way, Rich's talk Simple Made Easy also endorses this view, but from a different angle. In a nutshell, his notion of "easy" being "nearby" affirms that you must keep on winning. The more you win, the closer you get, and the easier it gets. I'll write a post about it.