Most people aren’t violent. Is that because most people are good, or is it because most people fear the consequences? If we knew there would be no consequences, would we be more violent?

I think the answer is sadly clear when we look at mobs and protests. Individuals know they’re less likely to be spotted and arrested if they start to cause damage. You could see this in the BLM riots that left every city in North America with millions of dollars in damages. You can see this today on college campuses where students chant for global violence.

Most of us consider ourselves good people. Even bad people do. So it’s worth asking ourselves the hard questions…

Chew on these questions while you enjoy the weekend. Love you all.

Your Friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski"

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I don’t know the answer. I’d say it depends on each person. But I’m very wary of both camps. I can’t think of a single ideological/cultural movement that was less dramatic than intended. We always seem to overshoot!

Overshooting towards being less productive includes quiet quitting and socialism. In both these cases, the idea is to work less. I think that sounds fantastic! But there’s no clear replacement for those hours. What are we going to do instead?

If we want to know what people do with more leisure time, let’s look at the class of people with the most leisure time - the retired. What is the number one activity of retired Americans? Watching television.

The other option is that we all spend even more time on our phones. Each day, most people have around 8 hours not sleeping and not at work. The average American spends 4.5 hours a day on their smartphone. That’s how we choose to spend over half of the free time we already have. More than half of our free time is spent on our phones. Why then do we want more free time?

Of course, it’s an average and I’m sure it’s very skewed by Gen-Z, but that’s not the point. The point is that we look at work as the source of our misery, but we don’t look at the alternative. Maybe free time’s the cause of our misery.

Less work sounds awesome, and it can be. But make sure you have something better to do with your time. Otherwise, I think we’re looking at even higher rates of depression and “burnout” in the future.

Until we’ve made good use of the free time we already have, why should we fight to have even more? I love vacation as much as the next person, but the thought of endless vacation sound awful.

Because eventually the lack of busyness stops feeling like a luxury, and becomes a source of misery.

Your friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski

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I understood what he was saying in theory, but in practice, it was still brutal. I remember the first time I posted on TikTok; my post had over 20 shares and only 4 likes (including my mom and myself).

It was about 20 people I knew who didn't like the video and checked out my profile. I knew they were making fun of me. I heard from other sources too that my videos were being shared in college group chats with everyone making fun of me.

It was pretty brutal. I was nervous yet confident before, but after hearing those messages, I was very discouraged. However, I kept remembering two things:

1. I agreed with them—my video was bad. I didn’t know how to make a good video yet.

2. I had no reason to expect to be good the first time I tried something new.

   "There is no fruit which is not bitter before it is ripe."

   (The Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, 561)

I had to be bad before I became good. I’m still on the journey. I become less bitter each day, getting closer and closer to becoming ripe.

I’m glad I didn’t quit that day. I’m glad I kept making bad videos and articles. Because each day they get less bad. And that makes me feel proud.

Next time you’re starting something new and you’re getting frustrated at your lack of talent, remember… "There is no fruit which is not bitter before it is ripe."

Your friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

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This is why I try to never take days completely off. Each day I take a step towards my goals no matter how small. I might not have time for a full workout, but I’ll practice the main movements I’m trying to get better at.

It takes way more energy for me to start working after a day off because my momentum is gone. It’s like the scientific principle of friction - static vs kinetic.

Friction is a force that slows us down. We need to overcome that force to move forwards. When an object STARTS moving, it overcomes static friction, and when it continues moving, it’s constantly overcoming kinetic friction. Kinetic friction is a weaker force, meaning once an object is moving, it takes less force to keep it moving.

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Think of a really heavy shopping cart. To get it started takes a serious push, but if you let go, it’ll keep moving for some time. That’s because the friction is weaker once it’s already moving.

Humans work the same way. We chase goals and there’s friction slowing us down that we need to overcome. Friction could be any distraction or anything that stops us from moving towards our goals. The first time you wake up early to go to the gym is harder than the second day and infinitely harder than the hundredth straight day.

The key is to never let the momentum die. Keep rolling. Gather no moss.

Even a tiny step forward is much better than no step forward at all.

More Practical Use Cases

Average Joe: Why are you working after hours?

Big Nerd: A rolling stone gathers no moss

Average Joe: Wow, you’re in great shape. You must work out a lot.

Big Nerd: A rolling stone gathers no moss,

Average Joe: I’m so scared of aging. I don’t wanna get old.

Big Nerd: A rolling stone gathers no moss

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

PS. Keep rolling my nerds

PPS. Happy Passover!

Then we got a driveway basketball hoop and it my life. Suddenly I would spend every hour from school’s end until bedtime in my driveway. I even asked for a big construction light for my birthday so I could shine it on the driveway and play later into the night!

The problem is that I probably peaked in sixth grade. After that, I was never good enough to be that guy on my teams. I was always good enough to make the team but nobody ever relied on me to put the ball in the basket.

I was just barely good enough to squeak my way onto prep school and college teams.

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During my sophomore year in college, my knee pain became excruciating. I saw doctors, physical therapists… everyone I could! No diagnosis. The knee pain got so bad, I was popping at least five Advils before practice, and sometimes at halftime during games. It was time to hang ‘em up. I quit competitive basketball.

I was heartbroken. I kept believing until my last day that I could make the leap in skills to become a dependable scorer on my team and play at the highest level. But then recently, I had a realization about that situation. I was focusing on all the bad.

But what if I were really good. What if I was actually so fortunate that I was NBA-bound before I got injured. I would have been unrelentingly miserable! I would live the rest of my life thinking “what if…”.

There’s a silver lining to a lack of good fortune. It’s similar to the saying, the bigger they are the harder they fall.

Whenever I take time to be purposefully grateful, either in my head or in a journal entry, I always think of what I HAVE. But there’s plenty I’m grateful to NOT have.

I’m grateful I wasn’t a world class athlete because how awful would it have been to lose it all.

I’m grateful I didn’t get into my first choice college because I loved my college experience as it was.

I’m grateful I didn’t get the job I wanted after college because I’ve grown so much on the journey of starting my own venture.

The lesson is… there’s more to be grateful for than we see at first glance. There’s even fortune in misfortune.

Your Biggest Fan,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

So I would ignore death. I’d shut down the thoughts of my eventual death and pretend that I would live forever. I’d live each day as though I get a million more just like it.

A year ago I began reading Stoic philosophy (beginning with Meditations by Marcus Aurelius - the first book club book) and it taught me to do the opposite. It taught me to always have my death on my mind. To constantly be aware that I might die at any moment.

It was a terrifying idea. The man in the book wrote about how freeing it was but I didn’t feel that way.

Then, one day I was asked to give a speech. In two minutes. To over 600 of my peers. I was student president of Emory’s Chabad and we were hosting a massive Shabbat dinner. Just before the meal, the Rabbi asked me to kick everything off and handed me a microphone. In my head, all I heard was “Hype up the Jews!”

My hands were sweating. I was so focused on organizing the tables, the food, the students and all the little fires came up, I was not ready to speak! But then I remembered,

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I’m gonna die anyways. And weirdly, instead of fear… I felt free. I felt a weight come off my shoulders. I still had some nerves but I was 90% calmer than just a second before.

I went up to speak and it went very smooth. I got lots of handshakes and butt taps (with consent) after the speech and I was happy. But most of all, I finally understood what I’d been reading.

I could die at any moment. Why be nervous? Why be scared? I have one life and it’s my job to live it according to me.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

Any idea how much of that prepared me for writing the last 160 book club articles?

Almost none of it.

All the learning has come through repetitions. Each article now takes me around 30-45 minutes to write. But when we did books like Sapiens and Clear Thinking, each article was closer to 2 hours. That had to do with the nature of the book, its length, the number of ideas in each chapter, and more.

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This is my sixth month running the book club and while I’m still no author, I know I’ve improved dramatically since day 1. And it’s not because I kept studying other book reviewers, or watching YouTube videos on how to run a book club… it’s because I’ve spent hundreds of hours practicing.

The flip-side is that I knew I was terrible when I started. It took over a hundred days before I stopped being embarrassed by every piece of writing I published. But I knew there was no other way to get better.

I had to suck before I sucked less. Until eventually, hopefully, I will be pretty good. And then, one day, it will be unreasonable for me to not be good at this.

There is no substitute for practice. And before practicing, you will suck. So if you ever want to be good, start practicing now. Embrace the suck.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

I remember the last time I lost my cool like that. I was in the locker room in high school with two of our star players. We just got back from losing by 40 to a team we were supposed to beat and lost our chance at making the playoffs. I was a bench warmer and I wanted to play so badly. So while I sat in my locker listening to them laughing and acting so care-free, I lashed out.

It’s mostly a blur, but I remember raising my voice, calling them names and getting red in the face with anger.

I walked away, realizing what I’d just done and wanting to cry.

I had spent months trying to get closer to my teammates and get a real role on the team. But now I’d broken the law. They would never be in my corner now. I couldn’t rely on them for help. And it was all my fault.

I forgot everything I actually cared about when I let the anger come over me. I forgot what I’d been working so hard to do.

It seems like a theme, that when I get angry, I hurts myself as much, if not more than I hurt the people I’m angry with.

I’ve learned how important it is to keep cool when I start to get angry. Now I’ve gotten much better at controlling it. I use verbal reminders:

• “Noah, what’s actually important.”

• “Noah, is anger the best way to get what you want right now.”

• “Noah, focus on your breath.”

Most of all, I do anything I can to stop the anger from taking over. Because the easiest way to make huge mistakes is to lose control of yourself.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

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One day Ryan crossed the line. He hit a sore spot with Paul in front of a bunch of people. I was furious. I squeezed my hands into fists so hard I had nail imprints in my palms for hours. I couldn’t believe Ryan would disrespect Paul and me… in front of so many people.

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I lost a good friend that day. Not a mean guy. But not worthy of forgiveness. Not yet.

I realize now years later, I have to share the blame. I overlooked his jabs and was surprised when he came with a right hook.

By not addressing the jabs, I was encouraging the right hook. It seemed harmless at the time. I didn’t like it but I didn’t think it was serious enough that I should step in and interfere.

I lost a friend because I was too forgiving and too lenient. Maybe if I addressed these issues sooner, we’d still be hanging out today.

Don’t overlook petty crimes. Address them early. If you don’t you are responsible when it escalates. You’ll have nobody to blame but yourself.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

Relax because if you never do, you put everything at risk.

When we’re too wound up, our defenses from the world get weak. We lose touch with what’s important to us and we make poor decisions. We prioritize urgency over importance.

Anthills start to look like mountains and we can’t see any way around. We become frustrated at nothing. The caring concern of a loved one sounds like an attack and our defenses turn on at the people who love us most.

When you let yourself get wound too tight, you don’t just hurt yourself, you hurt the people around you too.

Relaxing doesn’t need to be a week-long trip to the Caribbean. It can be a meal alone without your phone. It can be a long walk. It can be a relaxing routine before bed. A break can be as long or as short as you need it to be.

The goal is to get your heart rate down so you can see the world without a blurry filter. Whatever does that for you, is a great solution. There’s no right answer. It’s personal. Take 30 seconds or take 2 weeks… just relax sometimes.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

PS. Shabbat Shalom!

Let’s use inversion thinking - finding the answer by finding what is not the answer.

When do we not know if someone is a good friend? What’s a bad time to make judgement? Probably when it’s easy to be a good friend. When it’s easy, even a bad friend can seem good.

When you judge people is important. People ought to get the benefit of the doubt, but be weary of trusting someone before they’ve been tested by rough seas.

Most people are good when life is easy. A person’s true colors show when things stop going smoothly. This can be a dramatic life changing event or even a night out on the town gone wrong.

If I take a wrong turn and get us lost in Appalachia, what do you do?

If our mutual friend wrongs me, what do you do?

Life is much happier when you’re quick to give trust. You invite so much more goodness into your days with less worry. But that quick trust needs to be balanced with awareness.

Be aware of the fact that friends are met in good times and made in hard times. A fun person isn’t always a good friend. A generous person isn’t always a good friend.

“Anyone can hold the helm when the sea is calm” (Publius Syrus)

Your (pretty good?) Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

1. I can fix it

2. It is out of my control

If my issue falls within the first category, then I quit complaining and start solving.

If my issue falls within the second category, then I ignore it and find something in the first category to get busy with. Because saying even a word about problems out of my control is a waste of breathe. And we only get so many breaths before we eventually die. So why waste?

“What’s the harm in complaining to a friend? I don’t actually care that much.”

That’s exactly the problem. Your brain can only focus on so many things at a time. To expend precious time complaining is a waste. Especially if you don’t really care very much. It might feel good for a moment, but the problem persists.

And just like depression, the more we talk about and think about our problems, the bigger they seem. That means logically that the less we talk about and think about our problems, the smaller they seem.

So when you catch yourself complaining, remind yourself there are only two courses of action.

1. Start fixing it.

2. Find something else you can start fixing.

Your Friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski

This morning I was thinking, why do I like camping so much? My quick answer is that it’s time out in nature, where we belong. But honestly, it feels deeper than that. I wake up on the ground with only a tarp over my head aching from the big tree root molding my back into a new shape… with a huge smile on my face. I even laugh as I get a whiff of my buddy beside me’s gross morning breath.

Why is that so much fun? Why smile and laugh? If that happened to me in my bed, I’d be complaining for weeks.

I think I found the answer while reading this morning. Publius Syrus said,

When I’m out in the woods, I don’t desire much. I want my food to be satiating. I want to be mostly dry when I sleep. I want cleanish water. That’s about it.

At home, I want my food to taste good and be quickly prepared. I want my bedroom to be cold and the pillows to be the right height so my shoulder can rest comfortably. I want coffee and tea and lattes and protein shakes and I want them all to have the perfect flavor.

The less I want, the less I need. No wonder I feel so at peace in the woods. The less I need, the easier to have everything I need.

Ask yourself today what you really need. When you’re unhappy, ask if you need this to change, or if you just want this to change. Try to find some peace.

Your Friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski

Why do we study the lives of strangers but not study our own lives?

We read biographies, we watch documentaries, we even read big books of common advice (eg. The Subtle Art of Not Giving a F***). But we don’t study our own lives with the same effort.

Your own life is the only one for which you have all the context. Every lesson you learn studying your life yesterday applies to your life tomorrow.

I’m not telling you to ignore other people or to stop reading books (this is a book club after all). But look at how you spend your days and ask how much energy you spend looking outwards for solutions to problems.

You have all the answers inside you. It just takes time to find them. But if you aren’t searching, you might never find them.

Your Friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski

What makes people overweight? What stops them from losing weight? I like to simplify things, so let’s go to the base laws of physics - thermodynamics. Energy cannot be created or destroyed, only transformed.

We transform calories into energy for our muscles to use. We use those calories to think, move and keep our bodily functions steady. When we do that, we convert the energy into heat.

That is why calories in, calories out works. It’s not a diet type, it’s a law of physics at work, just like gravity.

If I put a gun to your head and asked you to write me a weight-loss plan, you would say something like eat less, exercise more.

We all know it. But about 100 million people in the US don’t follow the simple advice.

The problem is about much more than weight loss. It applies to money, relationships, careers… everything.

We’re all really good at giving advice, but the best in the world are great at using advice. Of course, there needs to be a way to sift through all the poor advice, and there are lots of good ways to do that.

But again, none of them mean s*** if you won’t follow the advice on following advice.

When you ask for advice, don’t ignore the answer. . That’s what everyone does. Don’t be like everyone.

Just make sure you’re asking the right people for advice

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

PS. On asking the right people for advice: this is something I’ve been trying to get better at myself. What I’ve learned seems incredibly simple but is overlooked. The best advice is from people who recently accomplished the same or similar thing to what you’re trying to accomplish. The closer they are in recency and similarity to your situation, the more seriously I take their advice. So someone like Elon Musk probably can’t give me advice right now as well as Ryan Holiday or Lezlie Karls. Situational similarity + recency = serious advice. ANY OTHER ADVICE ON GETTING GOOD ADVICE?

It was true. I did everything and they did nothing! I couldn’t think of anything they did for me. IN MY HEAD, it was true.

I was quick to forget favors received. And also slow to forget favors given.

My focus made my reality. My reality made me angry. My anger hurt my relationships. It was a vicious cycle that all started with where I placed my focus.

I believe in trying to simplify things. Make them explicit. One problem I’ve been spending time simplifying is “how to be more happy”. A long term goal of mine is to find no more than 4 rules to follow that could make happiness simple.

I believe I found one in this book. A one-liner that’s been edged in my mind for months since the first time I read it.

I found a pattern in my life - specifically in my anger. Whenever I was mad at someone I loved it was because I was focusing on what I was giving and forgetting what I was getting.

Since I switched my focus, I’ve been much happier. It’s not always easy. I’m not perfect. But I believe this will be one my happiness pillars.

Never forget a favor received; be quick to forget a favor bestowed

So. Good.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

“We all seek to know whether we shall be rich; but no one asks whether he shall be good.” (Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, 46)

It’s odd how 99% of people, if you ask them “would you rather be rich or good”, they would answer “good”. But 99% of people spend more energy trying to get rich than trying to be good.

We stress about our money more than we stress about our goodness.

I’m guilty of the same!

I think there’s lots of reasons, but the biggest one that pops into my brain is our desire to measure and compare. If I become rich, nobody can deny that. If I become good, anyone could deny that. It’s less concrete.

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In fact, an angry person could start one false rumor and ruin my reputation. Nobody would see me as good anymore. Even worse, I might do lots of good deeds all day long and not get any recognition for it.

Well then what’s the point of trying so hard to be good? The answer is simple…

What else is there to be but good?

The goal is not to be good so that…

The goal is simply to be virtuous. The Stoics have four pillars of virtue:

1. wisdom

2. courage

3. justice

4. moderation

The goal is to live by these pillars. That is the main quest. Everything else is just a side quest. The pursuit of money, fame, and even friends, is all secondary to the pursuit of wisdom, courage, justice and moderation.

You may not agree with these pillars. You might not think of these as your pillars of virtue. That’s fine. Find better pillars. Find yours.

Define what it means to you to live a virtuous life. Then, live that way.

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

“We all seek to know whether we shall be rich; but no one asks whether he shall be good.” (Moral Sayings of Publius Syrus, 46)

In the book Influence, Dr. Robert Cialdini outlines the seven principles of persuasion he discovered in his academic studies. He went on to publish two more books on persuasion and all three were bestsellers (whatever that means nowadays).

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One major principle he discusses is “liking”, meaning we are more likely to be influenced by people we like. But the more interesting part is that we are also more likely to like someone who we think likes us.

If you’ve ever been to a Middle Eastern souk (market), it’s obvious the shopkeepers know this principle already. They rush up to each person showing a little interest, tell them they have great taste and always use the familiar “my friend”.

Did they all read Cialdini’s groundbreaking books? Maybe. More likely though is that this knowledge has been passed down generation to generation for thousands of years. Except instead of being tested by numbers, it was tested by usefulness overtime.

2000 years ago Publius Syrus said,

There are many similar proverbs and sayings throughout history. The ideas that are repeated generation after generation have withstood the test of time.

And if you look at all the billions of people who have lived and the millions of ideas each one has had, as a species, we’ve thought almost every conceivable thought. Is it even possible today to have a new scientific breakthrough outside of the hard sciences?

This is all a long-winded way to say, read old books. An old book that’s still in print has survived this long for a reason.

New food. Old ideas.

Your Friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski

Tomorrow, we start our new book: THE MORAL SAYINGS OF PUBLIUS SYRUS

Your Friend,

Noah BigNerd Sochaczevski

Does that mean that losses hurt more than equal wins? I used to think it did, but I’m more skeptical now.

Taleb points out that we don’t consider how wired we are to hate risk. If I gain a hundred dollars, unless I was already at huge risk in life, then it’s just a monetary gain.

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If I lose a hundred dollars, I start to think about my car payments, my Netflix subscription and the gifts I need to buy everyone for Christmas soon. I’m launched into base-level risk analysis mode. I think about how far I am from zero - big risk.

I think that’s why even small amounts of money lost can hurt. It’s a primal response to being in a worse position that you were just in. You became mentally at ease with a certain level of risk and suddenly it’s gotten worse. For the most part, I think that’s a binary reaction - either your risk analysis mode is turned on or it’s not.

I also think it’s a step function. For example, I don’t feel much different losing five dollars on ten dollars. I don’t feel a huge difference losing ten dollars or twenty dollars. But that only holds to a certain point. But if I lose fifty dollars, I’m more upset. Up to about a hundred dollars I think I’m equally upset.

Still working through the step function idea. Need to think harder, research and refine it. Test it. But this is my initial thought on it.

Takeaway: Loss Aversion is nothing new, losses hurt more because we already have lots of other risks in our lives.

Your Friend,

Noah “BigNerd” Sochaczevski