🌱 The #1 cheat code to growth

Here’s your 3 insights in 3 minutes. 

🚢 Rising Tides

This is probably the #1 thing I learned working with Noah over the years: 

Interestingly enough, he attributes most of his success to being early to growing markets. Early to social (Facebook), early to personal finance (Mint), early to SaaS (AppSumo).

📈 Market = Growth

Sahil, founder of Gumroad, says the same thing: 

Pieter Levels agrees, going as far to say it’s even more important than your product. 

Here’s what a growing market can look like:

Other times it can be growing technology…

⚡ Healthy Paranoia 

Andy Grove, former Intel chairman & OG business builder, famously said: “Only the paranoid survive.”

But a better approach is what I’d call “Healthy Paranoia." 

Healthy Paranoia is the skill of turning fear into fuel.

It’s rooted in psychology and human behavior: 

• Loss aversion → we hate being left behind more than we love getting ahead

• The catalyst effect → Urgency catalyzes the start, excitement sustains it

• The progress principle → Even small wins boost motivation

You can point this anywhere. But as we learned above, the right market makes the biggest difference.

A clear rising tide is AI. The next 1,000 days will reshape more than most people can even fathom. 

The risk is waiting too long.
The reward is being early. 

Soooo where do you start?

Pick one real problem you have today and solve it with AI.

This way you: 

1. Fix something that actually matters

2. Learn AI by doing, not theory

3. Shift your identity into someone who solves problems. (most important)

If you’re stuck, prompt cowboy can help turn lazy prompts into great ones. (Not affiliated—just found it recently and thought it was useful for beginners.)

If you want more urgency, this thread on the next 1000 days of ai by Andrew Wilkinson will do it.

Of course there are plenty of other rising tides. Pick whatever feels right for you.

Salud,
Mitchell