Why has writing become a critical part of the process?

Back on February 26th, I published my first public Thought related to the Coronavirus. "How Should I Prepare?" was an insight into my thinking about why it felt important to take some small steps to start preparing for a myriad of possible events.

A day earlier, I sent a tweet that my friends who were doctors and nurses laughed at the idea when I asked them if we should start preparing for the virus.

(Side note: this is my favorite on-going tweet thread which I continue to add to any time I find amazing things about nature and wildlife thriving during this worldwide shut down)

The reason I bring this up now is not to make any claim of Nostradamus status. Far from it. I bring it up because I'm glad I published those Thoughts and tweets even though some of them seemed ridiculous. With so much chaos, it brings me some joy that I still published a few things.

It greatly helps me to refine my thinking and decision engine to look back on posts from a few weeks or months ago, let alone the treasure chest of mostly not-so-great posts I have going back to 2012.

And as I'm laying in bed on a Sunday night, realizing that I've only published a small handful of Thoughts over the last month, having a strong desire to give my past self a swift talking to, I know that my future self will greatly appreciate a stronger dedication to writing more consistently.

And so it will be. See you tomorrow world. As I continue to document the process of what it's like to be John during the global pandemic of 2020.

As always, my hope is that my Thoughts bring you some tiny nuggest of wisdom, open you up to a unique perspective or even provide you with some momentary distraction and entertainment with my shenanigans, but really we all know I'm just writing this for Future John :)

What does my life look like when this pandemic is over?

At the end of a zoom with a mentor, he asked me a wonderful question:

"What does life look like for John at the end of this pandemic?"

Before I get to my answer, let's geek out on this question. The path to the best answers is to seek out the best questions, and this one is dope.

Here's the stream of consciousness for this masterpiece of a question:

• We are making an assumption that the pandemic is going to end. Even though we cognitively know this to be true, it's nice to be reminded of this during these times of uncertainty. This will end.
• We make no speculation around the timing of the end. It will end, but we have no idea when. For purposes of this question, it doesn't matter. We have some finite amount of time, so how will I be intentional with it.
• It is beautifully open ended for the imagination of the answerer to fill a blank canvas. In contrast, see how to "make the most of the pandemic" and "18 ways we can ensure we maximize the potential of every minute of our quarantine." This question isn't that. For some maybe they maximize. For others it might be about maintaining sanity, increasing happiness, allowing for deep reflection, making major life change or keeping things the same. Choose your own adventure.
• We are invited to reverse engineer our time. What is the desired end state? Great, now we have a guiding light on where we want to go, and we can start to act accordingly. This is the proactive vs. reactive framework. It's the intentionality. Do we sit back and respond as things happen or do we take control of our situation and work to move the needle?
• Finally, it allows us some semblance of taking control of the situation. It focuses us. We move away from the victim and towards an active participant in our own story.

Ok. Enough about the question. It's a beauty and one I would highly encourage each of you to spend some significant time thinking about. It helps. Trust me.

My answer is quite simple. When the pandemic has come to and end...

• I have returned to my entrepreneurial roots (either by starting a new company or by taking a leadership position at a very young company)
• I have continued forward on the path of my North Star (more on this in a future post)
• I have adapted my daily routines to be as flexible as needed (the rigidity of my routines in the past has been a source of instability for me with rapidly changing external environments)
• I have strengthened my most precious relationships (in a time of social distancing and quarantining, this one may be the most difficult but I'm ready for the challenge)

Because we are designing the future and I can wave my magic wand to have whatever I want, this is it.

Everything else takes a back seat at the moment. It will be interesting to revisit this list in the future when we return to normalcy. But for now, I'm excited to be an intentional designer of my future.

Entrepreneur. North Star. Flexible routines. Relationships. Let's go.

How can I help from my couch?

This past weekend I participated in a Global Covid Hackathon where over 18,000 people came together to build projects to help in the response to the global pandemic.

It was an energizing and uplifting experience to see so many strangers come together to work on projects with a desire to be part of the solution.

My goals in participating in this were two-fold:

• learn something new that is useful
• contribute to a project that has an immediate impact

There were over 1,500 projects that were submitted, and I read through many of the early projects to find where I could contribute. While there were so many fascinating projects in all shapes and sizes, I ultimately felt that it was best to start my own.

In line with my goals, I built Sponsor A Quarantine.

This was my first time using any "no code" tools which provided a super fun learning opportunity. Very powerful to be able to put together something like this in a weekend. Bonus points that my girlfriend helped me get some key things done in order to meet the submission deadline.

We went from idea in the shower to raising over $2,100 in donations in a weekend, and our first food basket of many is out for delivery today.

Even though the hackathon is over, we're going to continue to keep donations open, we're working with a couple of local organizations in SF and NYC to find people in need and do whatever we can to help with this site. I'm still feeling a pull to be doing more which feels reasoanble, and I've been continuing to both listen and take action towards what's next.

It felt a lot better to build this past weekend than occupy time with distractions, and I'll be looking for more ways to integrate that as we bunker down for however long is need.

How do I unlock "anti-fragility mode?"

Professor Nassim Nicholas Taleb is a next level scholar. When I read about the concept of antifragility, I was simultaneously blown away and completely enthralled.

What is the opposite of fragile, Taleb asks? A first guess might lead us to believe that it is something that is durable or resilient, but that is not correct. The opposite of fragile is antifragile, a word that previously was not part of our english language.

Antifragile is the property of becoming stronger or thriving in situations of stress, shock or uncertainty.

What a beautiful quality to possess, especially in times like these.

This is what enabled me to lead mission-critical teams at an international bank during the financial crisis. This is what helped me navigate both the creation and dissolution of several fast-growing organizations. And this is what will serve me well during this global pandemic.

When things are at their worst, how can I be at my best?

There has been a call for the last several years that the world needs more leaders, particularly leaders who have been putting in the work. This call wasn't to help drive record profits. This call wasn't to grow organizations when capital was cheap and the world was pleasant.

The call for leaders who have been putting in the work is exactly for times like these.

The leader who can maintain their composure, who can separate what they can control from what they can't, who have confidence in their ability to navigate the uncertainty, is the one that we are all ready to follow.

How we show up for each other, for our clients, for our colleagues, for our friends and family, and for strangers during these times is the mark of a true leader. It's time to unlock new levels of antifragility and become even better not despite all of the uncertainty around me, but because of it.

What if we choose this?

I sent this Bonus Thought out to my newsletter subscribers on Monday. I thought it was worth publishing the entire piece, and since then have read several articles and posts that show the data behind this. Without further ado, here we go...

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I’m going to go a bit off the deep end here for a moment, so hang on.

I read something today that sparked an interesting line of thinking. If we look at all this forced isolation and economic shutdown from a climate perspective, this is going to be a super healing time period for our planet.

What if we all collectively decided to do something like this once a year. We all shut it down and reduce travel, manufacturing and consumption for some short period of time. It could decelerate our carbon footprint by years.

Also, the added bonus of choosing to go into “shelter from home” mode is that we are making the choice. And when have the mindset of making the choice ourselves, it’s much more agreeable and acceptable than someone else forcing it upon us.

So from now on, I’ve decided to take the mindset of all of this isolation and self-sheltering is not only to help flatten the curve and save lives, but to help heal the planet. Times two multiplier for the win!