Calling it quits

If you heard me complaining about last week, you’ve seen nothing yet. This week’s coming in hotter than ever.

Without further ado, let’s speedrun this newsletter yet again:

Two men ordered dinner in a restaurant. They both ordered the same items from the menu. After they both tasted it, one of the men went outside the restaurant and shot himself. Why did he do so?

A potential answer, as usual, at the end.

Lateral thinking makes the world go ‘round. So forward this newsletter to a friend and tell them to subscribe by clicking here.

Unrelated to our normal rants, I’m thinking about organizing bi-monthly calls with people to brainstorm and approach subjects from a lateral perspective. It’s going to be small groups, so I have a question:

Would you pay a small fee ($10/month?) to be a part of such a group:

Simple yes or no - vote here. I’m not decided if I’ll do it yet, but your feedback will help me get to it faster (or not at all).

---

When to call it quits

People praise perseverance, but I’d argue that it’s way more valuable to realize when your time and effort is no longer worth it.

That doesn’t mean you have to call it quits forever, but that you should prioritize accordingly.

For example, my time for this newsletter is unfortunately limited. Hopefully, you’ll see why soon enough.

I’m not calling it quits on the newsletter, but I am reducing the time I spent on it. It’s not because I don’t like it or that I don’t think it brings value, quite the contrary. I just realize putting my effort into something else for the time being will yield better results.

If I would blindly try to keep things at the same level, that would be a waste of energy.

Learn to conserve energy, not blindly waste it then praise yourself for going all out.

---

Answer: The food the two men ordered was swordfish. Many years earlier they had both been stranded on a desert island. When one of the men tasted the swordfish, he realized he had never tasted it before. This meant that the meat he had been given on the island was not swordfish as he had been told. He realized that he had eaten the flesh of his friend who died when they first reached the island. The thought drove him to the brink and he killed himself.

For what it’s worth, this is one of the most convoluted lateral thinking exercises I know of. Definitely not my favorite, but it gets the job done.