there are no shortcuts

In 7 days, my friend Sam went from beginner producer to creating a full remix ft. Colombian pop star Dekko.

How?

A.I.

Jk lol. 

He found a mentor.

Mentors create shortcuts.

This email is about why shortcuts exist and are good.

We all know that mentors are important.

Yet we still find ourselves stuck, “grinding it out” on our lonesome…

This happens to me all the time.

I think: “how can I do this", instead of “who can help me do this."

Right now I’m trying to get better at saxophone since I have shows coming up.

Inspired by Sam’s progress, I found a sax mentor named Auggie Bello.

If you visit his IG, you can see that he absolutely rips.

Turns out he offers online lessons, so I booked on his website.

Also turns out I was the FIRST guy to ever book with him. 

I was his first student. He was stoked and so was I.

One lesson later and I knew exactly what to play at my shows.

It felt like a cheat code. It was a cheat code.

Now let’s get a bit philosophical, shall we?

What if “overnight success” is easier to achieve than we think?

Within the hustle-sphere, we are told: “there are no shortcuts”.

I find this belief both useful and shitty at the same time.

It’s useful because it sobers you up. Makes you ready to work.

It’s shitty because it can close you off to little itty-bitty miracles.

If you’re too in love with the grind, you’ll find ways to make an easy process hard.

Do you know anyone like this?

They are always “fighting” life. It’s an endless battle. Nothing ever comes easy to them.

To cope with the struggle, they form a shell.

They become tough but stiff. They are too serious and can’t have fun.

Life doesn’t have to be a battle. Why not make it a dance?

Hold the belief that you push through adversity no matter what.

But then also believe that everything you touch turns to gold.

When you believe these two things, you can’t lose.

Easy breaks will come often, but if not…

That’s fine too.

Some food for thought on this fine Thursday.

Talk soon,

Graydon

Cool things I found during my weekly internet stroll:

Cognition AI has announced a fully autonomous AI software engineer that can handle entire development projects end-to-end. Not available yet but I will be trying it out as soon as it launches.

Figure AI just released this insane demo of their humanoid robot. This company was founded in 2023 and is already worth $2B. 🫠 

Space X just launched the largest object into space ever.

Best tool I’ve found to supercharge Excel or Google Sheets with Chat GPT.

How spiritual people play basketball.

Served up by Spijker.

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