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The Observe and Rapport Newsletter
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A weekly guide of my favorite books, articles, products, and lifestyle habits.
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March 17th, 2023 | by Kyle Brennan
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According to multiple studies, what best predicts whether someone becomes a leader? Their experience? Their IQ?
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The amount of time they spend talking. It doesn't even matter what they say, just how much they say it.
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We suck at picking leaders.
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Your nose and mouth have different resistances to air. Breathing through your mouth offers little resistance so the tissues in the back of the throat become loose and flex inward. This makes breathing more difficult.
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Breathing through your nose is harder. There’s more resistance—forcing air against the tissues and creating strong, toned airways.
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3) Life Hack: Use People's Phone Numbers for Passwords
If your go-to password is no longer an option due to the arbitrary requirements of 14 characters, numbers, and a special digit - use a friend's name and phone number that you'll never forget.
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What I'm Reading
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You wouldn't think a cartoonist and creator of the comic strip Dilbert would be a controversial figure, but Scott Adams has cast himself in the limelight for his unique, albeit outlandish, perspectives. I’ve had this book for a few months so it was pure coincidence I started reading this the week he happened to get cancelled, but alas!
How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big was published in 2013 as Scott Adams' part memoir / part self-help manual for success. His career was full of ups and downs, failures, bizarre circumstances, and miraculous attempts - yet he still found a way to ultimately come out clean. He credits most of his success to a handful of hard and fast rules that he has accumulated over the years through trial and error.
He puts the book tease in the Introduction, and frankly, I think that was all I really needed to read. Many of the stories were quite funny, but the majority of the takeaways from the book can be boiled down into the below:
1. Goals are for losers
2. Your mind isn't magic. It's a moist computer you can program
3. The most important metric to track is your personal energy
4. Every skill you acquire doubles your odds of success
5. Happiness is health plus freedom
6. Luck can be managed, sort of
7. Conquer shyness by being a huge phony (in a good way)
8. Fitness is the lever that moves the world
9. Simplicity transforms ordinary into amazing
The book was more valuable than a typical blog so I wouldn't sum it up that easily. I really enjoyed how easily Scott Adams is able to distill the formula for success in business, relationships, health, and happiness.
"View the world as a slot machine. Only instead of asking you to put more money in, all it asks is your time, focus, and energy to pull the handle over and over."
Rating: 4.1 / 5 āļøāļøāļøāļø
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Product That's Helped My Sleep Significantly
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Thanks again to the great Andrew Huberman for his beneficial life-enhancing recommendations. This one in particular ties to sleep quality. I always struggle with consistent sleep quality. On a recent episode of the Huberman Lab Podcast, Andrew Huberman laid out his "sleep cocktail" of 2000mg of Magnesium L-Threonate and 50mg of Apigenin.
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I've tried melatonin and other sleep supplements, but this formula has worked the best for me. Some friends have tried it as well and their feedback is on par with mine.
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Latest Blog Post
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Carl Jung, one of the pioneers of modern psychology, had a doctrine of simply doing “The next best thing.” Jung wrote:
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If you do with conviction the next and most necessary thing, you are always doing something meaningful and intended by fate.
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I like to think of the pathway to success as a long, winding series of slippery stones traversing a river of vicious rapids. It’s so dark and foggy out that you can only see the next stone in front of you. You can’t see the other side but you know the stones will lead you to safety. You can only see as far as your headlamp, but you can make the whole trip that way.
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New Podcast Episode Out Now!
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Keith and Kyle sit down to discuss the novel A Little Life, LIV Golf, Kyle's experience joining the local Fire Department, and how Genghis Khan shaped the world we live in today.
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Books mentioned in this episode:
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Quote of the Week
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āNature loves courage. You make the commitment and nature will respond to that commitment by removing impossible obstacles. Dream the impossible dream and the world will not grind you under, it will lift you up. This is the trick. This is what all these teachers and philosophers who really counted, who really touched the alchemical gold, this is what they understood. This is the shamanic dance in the waterfall. This is how magic is done. By hurling yourself into the abyss and discovering it's a feather bed.ā
ā Terence McKenna
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What's on My Reading List?
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Kyle's Published Work
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33 Life Lessons on My 33rdĀ Birthday
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Thirty-three was a big one. Mostly because I became a dad. Our daughter was born on New Yearās Eveāāāa fitting arrival for a kid destined to reset everything. Itās been a beautiful, if slightly sleep-deprived blur ever since. Iāve only been āDadā for less than ten months, but if Iām being honest, Iāve been preparing for the role for over …
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Depth Over Downloads: Why Spending Time with Books Still Matters
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Everyone wants faster information. But no one asks if faster information leads to better understanding ā or a better life. In the age of AI and tweet-sized wisdom, weāve confusedĀ informationĀ withĀ transformation. But thereās a massive difference between knowing what a book says and beingĀ changedĀ by it. The Delusion of Instant Learning In a recentĀ interview, political journalist Ezra Klein admitted he once believed …
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The Jack Reacher Approach to Never Being Caught Off Guard
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Thereās no difference between a pessimist who says, āOh, itās hopeless, so donāt bother doing anything,ā and an optimist who says, āDonāt bother doing anything, itās going to turn out fine anyway.ā Either way, nothing happens.ā ā āYvon Chouinard, Founder of Patagonia I donāt read much fiction, but Iāve always been hooked on Lee ChildāsĀ Jack Reacher. Heās not your typical …
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