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Competition is for losers "Always prioritize the substance of what you're doing. Don't get caught up in the status, the prestige games. They're endlessly dazzl

Competition is for losers "Always prioritize the substance of what you're doing. Don't get caught up in the status, the prestige games. They're endlessly dazzling, and they're always endlessly disappointing” -Peter Thiel

mcguire 9y ago
..., an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, philanthropist, political activist, and author. He was ranked No. 4 on the Forbes Midas List of 2014, with a net worth of $2.2 billion, and No. 315 on the Forbes 400 in 2017, with a net worth of $2.6 billion. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Thiel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Thiel) "There are many different ways to think of failure, most of which seem designed to soften the sting of it. In Courage to Soar, Ms. Biles unpacks her own thoughts on the matter. This memoir, "written" by a 19 year-old and published three months into her explosive post-Olympic popularity, is a pretty blatant cash-grab. Still, the book's purpose, beyond racking up sales, seems to be to inspire younger readers, young girls in particular. But why do we look for advice from the most talented in society? What do they know of our struggles to rise up, dripping and stinking, from the swamp of mediocrity? Here, for example, is Ms. Biles describing how, after some initial struggles, she finally managed to nail a tricky skill – a release move on the uneven bars called a Tkatchev in which you let go of the bar on the upswing and fly backward, usually straddled, over the bar before catching it. "And then, just before practice ended, I said to myself, I'm going to do it this time. And you know what? I actually did!" Must be nice."
dvtv75 9y ago
Didn't he just use his status and prestige to buy his way into New Zealand citizenship? (This is a rhetorical question, the answer is "It would seem so.")
- seem_2211 9y ago
  While Thiel definitely charmed his way into a NZ Citizenship (amazing piece here by the way: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/indepth/national/how-peter-thiel-got-new-zealand-citizenship/ http://www.nzherald.co.nz/indepth/national/how-peter-thiel-g...), I always read his comment more as advice to avoid the traditional Management Consulting / Finance / Law career paths that a lot of Ivy League / Stanford / elite school students end up taking, where they work 70+ hours every week, generally competing for a 5% chance to become a partner 15 years down the track. The payoff isn't great. But the prestige of working at McKinsey / Goldman / Cravath is.

mcguire 9y ago

..., an American entrepreneur, venture capitalist, philanthropist, political activist, and author. He was ranked No. 4 on the Forbes Midas List of 2014, with a net worth of $2.2 billion, and No. 315 on the Forbes 400 in 2017, with a net worth of $2.6 billion. (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Thiel https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Peter_Thiel) "There are many different ways to think of failure, most of which seem designed to soften the sting of it. In Courage to Soar, Ms. Biles unpacks her own thoughts on the matter. This memoir, "written" by a 19 year-old and published three months into her explosive post-Olympic popularity, is a pretty blatant cash-grab. Still, the book's purpose, beyond racking up sales, seems to be to inspire younger readers, young girls in particular. But why do we look for advice from the most talented in society? What do they know of our struggles to rise up, dripping and stinking, from the swamp of mediocrity? Here, for example, is Ms. Biles describing how, after some initial struggles, she finally managed to nail a tricky skill – a release move on the uneven bars called a Tkatchev in which you let go of the bar on the upswing and fly backward, usually straddled, over the bar before catching it. "And then, just before practice ended, I said to myself, I'm going to do it this time. And you know what? I actually did!" Must be nice."

dvtv75 9y ago

Didn't he just use his status and prestige to buy his way into New Zealand citizenship? (This is a rhetorical question, the answer is "It would seem so.")

seem_2211 9y ago
While Thiel definitely charmed his way into a NZ Citizenship (amazing piece here by the way: http://www.nzherald.co.nz/indepth/national/how-peter-thiel-got-new-zealand-citizenship/ http://www.nzherald.co.nz/indepth/national/how-peter-thiel-g...), I always read his comment more as advice to avoid the traditional Management Consulting / Finance / Law career paths that a lot of Ivy League / Stanford / elite school students end up taking, where they work 70+ hours every week, generally competing for a 5% chance to become a partner 15 years down the track. The payoff isn't great. But the prestige of working at McKinsey / Goldman / Cravath is.