Principles of Thinking.

Think in first principles, not by analogy.

Think like a principal, not an agent.

Think in systems, not in isolation.

Think in specific, not general.

Think simply, not complexly.

Think independently, not conventionally.

Think in action, not abstraction.

Think in judgment, not just knowledge.

Think in intuition, not just checklists.

Think probabilistically, not with certainty.

Think in relatives, not absolutes.

Think directionally, not specifically.

Think approximately, not precisely.

Think deeply, not shallowly.

Think in breadth, not narrowness.

Think across time, not at a specific time.

Think long-term, not short-term.

Think of ups and downs, not smoothness.

Think of pain from struggles, not the comfort of ease.

Think in exponential compounding, not linearity.

Think in asymmetry, not symmetry.

Think in scalable leverage, not labor or time.

Think in power laws, not normal distributions.

Think in tails, not just averages.

Think about the big things, not the small things.

Think about things that move the needle, not those that don’t.

Think in expectations, not predictions. 

Think in terms of incentives, not intentions.

Think in business narratives, not price narratives.

Think positively, not negatively.

Think skeptically optimistic, not cynically pessimistic.

Think of scarcity, not abundance.

Think in creation, not consumption.

Think positive sum win-win, not zero-sum win-lose.

Think in anti-fragility, not just robustness.

Think about things that truly matter, not those that don’t.

Think about things that you can control, not those you can’t.

Think of taking responsibility, not criticizing, blaming, or complaining.

Think in sovereignty, not approval.

Think of hard things, not easy things.

Think of the highest integrity, not shortcuts.

Think in peace, not pleasure.

Think in attention control, not distraction.

Think of impacting, not hoarding.