PODCAST · business
Dru's Notes
by Dru Riley
One mental model each day in a few minutes. Habits, business, building products and thinking clearly. From Dru Riley, founder of Trends.vc.
Episodes
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Remove Choices to Save Your Willpower | Daily Essay
Each use of your willpower draws from the same depletable reservoir. Ray Bradbury, Ed Viesturs and Andie MacDowell show three ways to save it: change your environment, automate decisions and delete decisions. Featuring: Ray Bradbury, Ed Viesturs, Andie MacDowell, Jean-Jacques Rousseau Watch on...
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I Launched a Product a Day for 17 Days (Then Burned Out) | Daily Essay
I launched a product a day and burned out 17 days in, because the habit counted launches and rewarded nothing else. An Output Habit counts what you finish and an Input Habit counts the time you put in. Bill Atkinson, Jonathan Coulton and Ed Whitlock show what each one rewards, and three questions...
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The Psychology of Getting Comedy From Failure | Trevor Noah | Daily Essay
Comedians get better after a bad night because whatever happens to them becomes stories for the next set. Trevor Noah tries new things knowing they'll either work or give him comedy. Massimo Bottura turned a dropped lemon tart into one of his signature desserts. Featuring: Trevor Noah, Esther...
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The Viral Trap: How Social Media Keeps What You Make | Daily Essay
Reddit priced the Apollo app out of business, Kayla Newman was never paid for "on fleek," and Nipsey Hussle bought the strip mall he once sold CDs in front of. Why I post every essay on a site I own first, then share it on X. Featuring: Christian Selig, Kayla Newman, Nipsey Hussle Watch on…
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The 4 Habit Levels Where Results Get Insane | Daily Essay
Bryson DeChambeau's first year of bulking bought him about 20 yards. His second bought him less than two. Anatoly Karpov led Garry Kasparov 5-0 in the 1984 world chess title match, then lost about 22 pounds and watched his lead shrink to 5-3. Featuring: Bryson DeChambeau, Anatoly Karpov, Garry...
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When You're Winning... And Lose Everything | Daily Essay
A man from Poland and I each had five minutes to checkmate the other. He took one of my pawns. He was still up on points when he lost. Featuring: Lindsey Jacobellis, Tanja Frieden, Harry G. Summers Jr. Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and...
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The Chinese Mastermind Group Behind Volvo | Daily Essay
Before Li Shufu spent $1.8 billion on Volvo, he asked 20 other Chinese founders in his club to argue about it. Paul Jarvis, Nathan Barry and Warren Buffett each had a few people who met with them regularly. Featuring: Li Shufu, Liu Chuanzhi, Paul Jarvis, Justin Jackson, Jarrod Drysdale, Nathan...
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You've Read Enough. It's Time to Start Using It. | Daily Essay
Calcium makes bones stronger only once they carry weight, and what you learn builds a skill only once you try to use it. Jim Koch had three Harvard degrees and had never sold anything until twenty bars a day taught him how to sell. Featuring: Jim Koch, Johann Wolfgang von Goethe Watch on YouTube...
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I Learned This the Hard Way: Write Down Your Rules | Daily Essay
One of the rules I read each morning could have saved me three years: don't force it. In 1846 Peter Panum found the old people of the Faroe Islands stayed healthy through a measles outbreak, because their bodies kept a record of the last one. Your rules for living work the same way, but only when...
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The Compounding Trap: Why Selling a Winner Costs You | Daily Essay
Grace Groner bought three shares of Abbott Laboratories for $180 in 1935. When she died at 100 they were worth more than $7 million. A business, a skill, a friendship and a habit compound the same way if you keep showing up for years. Featuring: Grace Groner, Jeff Bezos Watch on YouTube Read the...
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I Read 1,000s of Founder Stories. Most Won by Copying… | Daily Essay
The first founder to build in a market tends to prove demand, then watches someone who came in later take it. Pebble, Snapchat and Ahrefs show how it plays out, and why marketplaces and networks are the exception. Featuring: Eric Migicovsky, Dmitry Gerasimenko, Sam Walton Watch on YouTube Read…
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How to Do 2.5 Hours of Deep Work (It's Easier Than You Think) | Daily Essay
I just heard someone explain the biggest misconception about Transcendental Meditation: that you're supposed to stop thinking. In TM you silently repeat a word called a mantra, your mind wanders and you come back to it. Featuring: Thomas Keating, Simone Weil, Swami Vivekananda Watch on YouTube…
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Which Business Model Suits Your Personality? | Daily Essay
Pieter Levels runs two apps alone on one server. April Dunford's fees stop the week she does. WeWork raised round after round until it filed for Chapter 11. Eleven plants map to eleven kinds of business. Pick the one your temperament will keep alive. Featuring: Washington Irving, Pieter Levels,...
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Same Habits, Different Days: My Daily Experiments | Daily Essay
To prove my friend wrong about habits, I sent him a photo of Thai chilies. His meme said discipline makes each day look the same, and one of my habits is to run experiments each day. Featuring: Ralph Waldo Emerson, Ferran Adrià Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc:...
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Remind Yourself Who The F*ck You Are. | Daily Essay
Tim Ferriss kept a jar of awesome, slips of good moments he read when he felt down. I keep a highlight reel, a list of my wins, and read it each morning. Olympic diver Laura Wilkinson watched a video of her best dives before each meet and won gold months after breaking her foot. Featuring: Tim...
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Every Type of Courage Explained | Which One Do You Have? | Daily Essay
You can run a marathon and still dodge a hard talk with your wife. Courage comes in three kinds: mental, social and physical. Bravery in one kind stays in that kind. Featuring: Alex Hormozi, Jia Jiang Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and...
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The Power of Focus: What Early AI Models Taught Me | Daily Essay
In 2012 I gave a side project two hours of deep work each morning before my day job. It failed and I dropped the habit with it. METR grades AI models by the longest task they can finish, and a person with chopped-up attention is stuck where GPT-2 was. Featuring: Ken Thompson, Llion Jones Watch on...
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The 1 Rule That Stops Me Raising My Goals Too Soon | Daily Essay
A week of easy runs had me ready to make an hour my new floor. Then I remembered the run my rule asks for first. Seán Quinn's 35 years of wins ended in a €3 billion loss on one Irish bank. Featuring: Seán Quinn, Carl Sagan Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover...
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What a Depression Drug Taught Me About Rich People's Habits | Daily Essay
I looked up dozens of people who got rich before 50 and what they did each day. When I went looking for people with the same habits who never got rich, I could barely find any. Featuring: Ben Goldacre, Warren Buffett, John D. Rockefeller, Galeazzo Ciano Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought...
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If It Fits, It Sticks | Daily Essay
I love to bike, but I run instead, because on foot I feel safer. After cars killed more than 3,000 people in the Netherlands in 1971, the Dutch kept biking and changed their environment instead. Featuring: Vic Langenhoff Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover…
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I Quit The ONE Thing Three Times Before I Got It Right | Daily Essay
Scored on the finish, my one thing shrank until it took a few minutes. The work I cared about barely moved, until I heard Gary Keller say he blocks four hours a day for his. Featuring: Gary Keller, Raymond Chandler, Alex Hormozi, Cal Newport, Charles Darwin, Haruki Murakami Watch on YouTube Read...
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A Day on the Moon. A Decade of Depression. | Daily Essay
Buzz Aldrin spent 21 hours on the moon and the next decade fighting depression and alcoholism. Some goals give you a high and fade. Others make each ordinary day better after you reach them. Featuring: Buzz Aldrin, Fyodor Dostoevsky, Pete Adeney Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you...
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Why “Systems Not Goals” Is a Trap | Daily Essay
A goal needs a system to reach it. A system needs a goal to give it direction. Featuring: Maurice Ashley, Bill Walsh, Seneca Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when your competitors move. Before your customers…
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The Truth About Running Multiple Businesses at Once | Daily Essay
I spread one daily marketing block across 8 products and each one lost momentum while I tended to the other seven. With 8 products sharing that block, each one got marketing time once or twice a week. Featuring: Serena Williams Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc:...
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The 4 Anti-Habits That Make My Habits Possible | Daily Essay
Each day I reach out to 13 people, do 8 courage challenges and run 34 minutes. As my habits grew, I tightened my anti-habits. Haruki Murakami went to bed at 9pm to buy his 4am writing start. Formula 1 brakes let drivers stay at speed longer before each corner. The more aggressive your habits are,...
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I Use Evolution to Predict Which Markets Survive AI | Daily Essay
Chegg lost about 99% of its market value while electricians got busier. Markets take the same five routes species take through an ice age: gone, hurt, unchanged, thriving and new. Featuring: Elizabeth Kolbert Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets…
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What Google's M&M Jars Taught Me About Willpower | Daily Essay
Ten years back, my interior designer wanted to put a bar cart in my house. Put liquor in plain sight and you're subconsciously primed. Move it out of sight and the thought doesn't form. Featuring: Leonardo da Vinci Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new...
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What a 20-Mile Night Run Taught Me About Negative Returns | Daily Essay
Kiese Laymon ran at least six miles a day for 2,564 days straight until his body broke. With most good things, more does less each time. With a few, more starts producing the harm it was protecting you from. Featuring: Kiese Laymon, Dongfang Shuo Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc:...
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How I Play Aggressive But Safe | Daily Essay
Blue team defends a system. Red team breaks in. The defender needs to be perfect, while the attacker only has to find a single error. Featuring: Biggie Smalls, Cory Doctorow, Phil Hellmuth Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities....
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Why I Turn My Phone Screen Red at 9pm | Daily Essay
Unlocking your phone by face is instant. A passcode adds a few seconds of friction where you decide whether to keep going. Featuring: W. Clement Stone Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when your competitors…
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The 2,000-Day Experiment I Couldn't Shut Down | Daily Essay
I ran a daily standup for 2,000 days. Hundreds of founders joined and logged 44,110 standups, but ending it took years. Featuring: Milton Friedman Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when your competitors move....
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How I Quit My YouTube Addiction | Daily Essay
I was on a Trends.vc Masterminds call when the host asked what move had a payoff that wildly outran its cost. Curfew was my answer: an app that blocks YouTube on my laptop until 4pm. Featuring: Gustave Flaubert, Jonathan Franzen Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc:...
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I Thought Bigger Muscle Just Meant More Strength | Daily Essay
I thought bigger muscle just meant more strength. Then a health podcast on a run split capacity from firing. Two fishermen showed why waiting to feel ready is just not starting. Featuring: Dickie Bush, Flannery O'Connor Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover…
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How I Learned Spanish While Running | Daily Essay
I tried to learn Spanish for years and never consistently found the time. Any hour I gave it came straight out of something else I needed to do. Featuring: Kevin J. Anderson, Nilofer Merchant, Alice Walker Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and...
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I Did It Once, So I Can Do It Again | Daily Essay
Roger Bannister broke the four-minute mile and within two years dozens followed. Proving that a threshold is possible destroys the mental hurdle and ratchets belief forward. Featuring: Roger Bannister, John Landy Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new…
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How a Dark Mexico City Room Killed My Output | Daily Essay
I paid two to three times what the same condo cost outside the city. It was the tail end of a three-year mini-retirement. Featuring: B. F. Skinner, Wilbur Wright, Lee Robins Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know…
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The Habit That (Quietly) Changed My Life | Daily Essay
My shirt rubbed my nipple raw when I moved my run from 55 minutes to 89. Dehydration arrived at the same time. Featuring: Safi Bahcall, Emil Zátopek Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when your competitors move....
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Why I Said No to Venture Capital for Trends.vc | Daily Essay
On the show Creator Lab, Bilal Zaidi asked me whether I would take investors for Trends.vc. I said no. Featuring: Bilal Zaidi, Phillip Knowlton, Craig Newmark, Jim Buckmaster, Travis Kalanick, Fawzi Kamel Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and...
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I Got Everything I Wanted at 23 and Stopped Growing | Daily Essay
I got the thing I'd wanted my whole life and then I stopped growing. Doing hard things when your back is against the wall is survival; courage is doing them when nothing is making you. Featuring: Søren Kierkegaard, Jia Jiang, Tim Ferriss Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by:...
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The 1 Area I Ignored Across 20 Businesses | Daily Essay
I tried more than 20 businesses before one of them worked. One or two made a little money, but none of them got big despite working hard on each one. Featuring: Thomas Reid Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when...
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Plenty of Fish Sold for $575M. He Had 3 Employees.
Markus Frind built the largest dating site in the world by himself, ran it on about an hour a day and sold it for $575 million to a single shareholder. Then he bought more than 1,100 acres in the Okanagan and went back to farming. Featuring: Markus Frind, Annie Frind, Kevin Burton, Frank Giustra,...
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The Estimation Trick I Use to Start Moving | Daily Essay
Each day I ask one question: what's the one thing I can do that makes everything else easier or unnecessary? Putting a time estimate beside the answer forces a mental simulation before you lift a finger. Featuring: Sun Tzu Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover...
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The $1,000 Rule Behind My Trends.vc Reports | Daily Essay
When I wrote my first Trends.vc reports, I focused on density. Each good piece of content either makes you afraid to stop consuming or unable to stop consuming: the signal-to-noise contract or the escapism contract. Featuring: Flannery O'Connor Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you…
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The Pattern Behind Every System Collapse | Daily Essay
Habit systems, airline networks and 17th-century warships all fail the same way: not from a catastrophic shock, but under the weight of too many reasonable additions. Featuring: Hyman Minsky, Courtland Allen, Michael Santoro, Lyn Montgomery, Klas Fleming, Joseph Tainter Watch on YouTube Read the...
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I Chose to Be Worst at Replying | Daily Essay
Send me an email on Tuesday and you hear back the following Monday. That lag buys six days of unbroken focus, the same way Costco's 14% markup cap and Southwest's single aircraft type bought each company the thing it actually sells. Featuring: Thomas Sowell Watch on YouTube Read the full post...
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How I Stop Procrastinating | The Single Page Method | Daily Essay
Avoiding the work does not mean you are lazy. It means the step in front of you is too steep. Featuring: John Steinbeck Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when your competitors move. Before your customers do....
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Why Poker Pros Fold What Investors Buy | Daily Essay
Erik Seidel folds king-nine because a weak side card leaves you drawing to second-best. Warren Buffett skipped that fold in 1962, spent 20 years buying looms for a dying textile mill and put the bill at over $200 billion in forgone compounding. Featuring: Erik Seidel, Warren Buffett, Charlie...
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I Quit Daily Writing in My 20s and Regretted It for Years | Daily Essay
I gave up daily writing in my early 20s. Life got chaotic and the habit felt expendable. Featuring: Henri Frédéric Amiel Watch on YouTube Read the full post Brought to you by: Trends.vc: Discover new markets and opportunities. HeadsUp: Know when your competitors move. Before your customers do....
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Stop Wasting Your Off Days | Daily Essay
A packed schedule breaks from overuse. An empty schedule atrophies from underuse. Without a deadline tomorrow, tonight slips to midnight because of Parkinson's law: give a night no reason to end and it stretches. Meanwhile, stacking back-to-back commitments works like corporate financial debt…
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Habit Banking: How to Keep a Streak Without the Panic
Sugarcane farmers in India get paid once a year at harvest. Tested on cognitive puzzles before and after, the score gap matched a lost night of sleep or 13 IQ points. Daily habit streaks create the exact same bandwidth tax: the daily worry of missing a day creates dread that makes the habit feel...
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ABOUT THIS SHOW
One mental model each day in a few minutes. Habits, business, building products and thinking clearly. From Dru Riley, founder of Trends.vc.
HOSTED BY
Dru Riley
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Frequently Asked Questions
How many episodes does Dru's Notes have?
Dru's Notes currently has 209 episodes available on PodParley. New episodes are automatically indexed when they're published to the podcast feed.
What is Dru's Notes about?
One mental model each day in a few minutes. Habits, business, building products and thinking clearly. From Dru Riley, founder of Trends.vc.
How often does Dru's Notes release new episodes?
Dru's Notes publishes regularly with 209 episodes available. Check the episode list for the typical release schedule.
Where can I listen to Dru's Notes?
You can listen to Dru's Notes on PodParley by clicking any episode. We provide an embedded audio player for direct listening, and you can also subscribe via your preferred podcast app using the RSS feed.
Who hosts Dru's Notes?
Dru's Notes is created and hosted by Dru Riley.
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