Before you leave for college
These are the pieces I’d give a friend the summer before college. Save the letter for last.
- Advice
Patrick Collison's advice to his younger self, broken down by decade of life, starting with going deep on several subjects in your teens.
- There’s no speed limit
How teacher Kimo Williams pushed a teenage Sivers through two years of music theory in a few lessons, showing you can learn far faster than the standard pace.
- Advice for ambitious 19 year olds
Altman argues college, a job, or a startup can each be right at 19 as long as you build things, stay around smart people, and take the right risks, like joining a breakout company over a higher salary at Microsoft.
- Ideas That Changed My Life
Housel's handful of ideas that shaped his thinking, including how tribes bend beliefs, why history repeats in behavior, why room for error is aggressive, and how personal experience skews your view.
- Letter to Jack
A letter to a new high school graduate about adult life: what you repeat becomes who you are, starting with how you get along with the voice in your head.
Next path: Getting comfortable being bad at things