#166 – Small Talk & Yachts

Good morning everyone,

Hope you’re having a great week!

Here are 5 things I found interesting over the past few days, along with an important update on the future of Five to Thrive.

Let’s jump in.

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#166 – The Rundown:

• Update: The future of the newsletter.

• Quote: Why are you in such a rush?

• Podcast: The inner scorecard w/ Pico Iyer.

• Article: The true cost of owning a yacht.

• Hack: Do this next time you meet someone new.

• X: A great rule of thumb for sales.

Newsletter Update:

The Future of Five to Thrive

As I approach the final semester of my law degree, I have taken the opportunity during this break to reflect heavily on how I spend my time.

And in doing so, not only have I forced myself to analyse the components that make up my calendar, but also come to terms with some bigger, more meaningful questions about my goals, many of which I alluded to in my recent piece on sustainable victories, such as:

What is my why? What is actually important to me? What do sustainable victories look like to me? What is my optimal version of balance? What are the buckets of time and attention that I need to fill? Do I need to simply redistribute water, or start removing some of the buckets?

So, after some very candid and consultative deliberation, I have come to the decision to reduce the frequency of the newsletter from weekly to monthly moving forward.

Why am I doing this?

When I started this newsletter over 3 years ago, I was a 20 year-old entering the third year of my uni degree.

A commerce student who was consuming copious amounts of self-development and business-related content from books, podcasts, videos, and newsletters, with no meaningful way to document all of the things I was learning.

I was ‘taking in’ a lot of really great info, but didn’t feel like I was actually ‘taking it in’.

Enter Five to Thrive.

The newsletter became my vehicle to:

1) Consolidate the most interesting things I was learning;

2) Share them with like-minded people; and

3) Keep myself accountable to continue learning new things each and every week

And while those three pillars remain fundamentally true today, I believe that the way I learn has, rightly, evolved with my journey.

Originally, it was all about “more”.

More quotes, more podcasts, more books, more articles, more tweets, with the idea of cramming the top five into a weekly bundle delivered to each of your inboxes every Thursday morning.

After a certain time, I began to slowly notice (and can now confidently recognise) that my learning is less about “more” and increasingly about “deeper”.

I’m finding that as I’ve been building these nodes of knowledge over a period of years, I am becoming progressively drawn to the types of learning which are longer-dated, less algorithmic, less fleeting, and more layered.

Moving from foundational blocks to building blocks.

And I know this because it’s my favourite type of content to write about (and often the content which I receive the most positive feedback in response to sharing).

Some of my favourite examples are my pieces on sustainable victories, Sydney housing, Australia’s hidden solar crisis, and the 3 levers young people can pull to get ahead.

The thing that each of these write-ups have in common is that all of them took longer-than-usual to compose and, perhaps most importantly, resulted from conversations, research, and contemplation which stretched beyond the usual 7-day period.

While a more strenuous university/career-related workload has been the catalyst to consider this decision, the evolution in my learning style has ultimately been the key driving factor.

Hence the move from weekly to monthly.

How will the monthly newsletters work?

The next edition of the newsletter will arrive in your inboxes at 7am on Thursday 6th of August, and the first Thursday of every month thereafter.

At this stage, I am planning on maintaining the same format that I’ve always followed, but will see how the new cadence goes. Very much open to any and all thoughts/comments/feedback as well.

Thank you as always for your support, it means more than you know.

Dimi

Quote:

Why Are You In Such A Rush?

This was a really beautiful line contained within an exceptional piece by Sahil Bloom reflecting on the following question: Why are you in such a rush?

Which is actually a great segue into a podcast I listened to this week…

{h/t Sahil Bloom}

Podcast:

The Inner Scorecard w/ Pico Iyer

In this Richer Wiser Happier themed episode of The Investor’s Podcast, host William Green is joined by renowned author and essayist, Pico Iyer.

Pico is a fascinating character.

He is of Indian descent, born in Oxford, raised in California, and has lived the past 30 years of his life in a small apartment in Kyoto, Japan.

Since 1991, he has completed over 100 retreats at a small Catholic monastery in the Californian hills, during which time he has come to appreciate the power of silence and contemplation.

While I certainly don’t share in all of the views held by Pico, I did find the discussion a strikingly thought-provoking platform for me to consider how I can make more room for intentional stillness in my own life.

Some of my favourite insights:

1) Humans were never designed to live at a pace determined by machines, and the only way we could do that is if we become machines ourselves.

2) Once the clutter of the mind is taken care of, the clutter of the world is much easier to deal with.

3) The challenge in life is working out exactly what your values and priorities are, given that they’re probably not always the same as society’s.

4) You must define how you’re going to operate in the world in a way that suits your temperament, your skills, and your priorities.

5) If we find ourselves saying, “I don’t have time,” then it is proof that our lives are outside of our control.

Listen on Spotify, Apple Podcasts, or YouTube.

[Duration: 2 hours 12 minutes]

{h/t Charlie Selth}

P.S. I made a Spotify playlist with every podcast I’ve ever recommended. I hope they bring you as much value as they’ve brought me.

Article:

The True Cost Of Owning A Yacht

Really enjoyed this article by Kubera on the true cost of owning a yacht.

Some interesting takeaways:

1) Annual operating costs commonly run between 10% and 20% of the vessel’s value once crew, maintenance, dockage, insurance, fuel, management, and refits are included. Add depreciation, taxes, and eventual selling costs, and the true financial commitment rises further.

2) For a high-net-worth individual (HNWI) buyer, the sharper question is not "What does the boat cost?" but "What does five years of cash flow and balance-sheet exposure look like?"

3) Purchase price scales with size, but not neatly. As a broad orientation from current brokerage listings and market reports: production boats under 50 feet often range from roughly $300,000 to $2 million; 50-to-70-foot yachts commonly run $1 million to $5 million; 70-to-100-foot vessels frequently sit between $4 million and $20 million; and yachts over 100 feet begin around $10 million and reach into the hundreds of millions for large custom builds.

This in particular was a really cool breakdown:

{h/t Mr Family Office}

Hack:

Do This Next Time You Meet Someone New

We’ve all been in those situations where you meet someone for the first time and, without anything better to say, you blurt out the old “What do you do for work?”

Here’s public speaking coach Vinh Giang on what to do differently next time you’re at a family gathering or professional networking event and meet someone new:

And here’s psychologist Adam Grant to drive this one home with an alternative option:

{h/t Vinh Giang & James Clear}

X:

A Great Rule Of Thumb For Sales

Thanks for reading! Grateful for your support.

In case you missed it, last week’s newsletter covered the new venture capital model, the next sports docuseries to watch, the true test of emotional intelligence & more.

If you enjoyed this edition, it would mean the world if you could forward it to a friend or send them my website.

This goes a long way to helping me reach more people :)

See you in the next one,

Dimi

P.S. the best ways to get in touch with me are via email or LinkedIn