So you don't miss a thing. Hi there! A number of you have recently subscribed to The Weekly Chronicle . Of which I appreciate. Here's the list of past volumes. So you don't miss a thing. . . . ~T.K.K Volume 36: Dream. Execute. Repeat. Volume 35: 20 Lessons from 2024 Volume 34: A Top 1% Skill Volume 33: It Takes More Effort than You Think Volume 32: Life Lessons from a 60-Year-Old Friend Volume 31: Thanksgiving Volume 30: Work = Creating Output Volume 29: 13 Lessons in 13 Months - Lessons from my Early Career Volume 28: If You Don't Know What to Do With Your Life Volume 27: Seasons Volume 26: Rule of 26 Volume 25: You Are Your Own Competition Volume 24: Do It Scared Volume 23: Build II Volume 22: The Overthinking Paradox Volume 21: You are the Goal Volume 20: What Goes Into a Minute Volume 19: Don't Sacrifice Quality Volume 18: Happy Birthday Uncle Warren 🎊🎉🎈. Volume 17: Letter to my 18-Year-Old Self Volume 16: Luck Doesn't Exist Volume 15: Build Volume 14: Be Good. Be Ethical. And Be Honest . Volume 13: The Meaning of a Newsletter Volume 12: Write Volume 11: The ROI Mindset Volume 10: Doing Meaningful Work Volume 9: The Weekly Chronicle Special - A Quintuple Series 9.1: Part I: Intro 9.2: A Meaningful Goal 9.3: The Journey Between 9.4: The Journey is the Destination 9.5: Rounding It Up - Goal Setting Volume 8: The Rule of 36 Volume 7: Meeting Jordan Peterson Volume 6: The Art of Mini-Tasking Volume 5: Stop Trying Too Hard Volume 4: The Nothing Week Volume 3: Do It for Yourself Volume 2: " I don't have to - I get to " Volume 1: Welcome

20 Lessons from 2024. 2024, like previous years, had its lessons. And I'm glad I learned most of these. Will I practice them? I hope so. Regardless, here they are: Have a plan Learn to rest Stay learning Health is wealth Know your place Move with speed Nothing beats family Take that leap of faith Have visionary friends Building is a meta-skill Leadership is admirable Play to your imagination Visualization is a big tool You are your biggest critic Things can work without you Underestimate not your impact Preparation is vital - So is execution Invest in your personal development You are the reward of your hard work Abundance Mindset > Scarcity Mindset And many more I might have forgotten. Nonetheless, Let's dive right in. I might end up writing an almanac with these. We'll see. Have a Plan ➢ I learned late last year and this year the importance of having a plan. ⇝ Because: The plan bridges you to the goal. ➢ I used to choose between " having a plan " and " going with the flow. " The difference was whether I would accept the results of each. ⇝ With a plan, I knew what I'd get myself into and would instantly accept its result, whether in or out of my favor. ⇝ By going with the flow, I accepted that " whatever happens happens. " ➢ However, everything clicked when I learned that... Having no plan is still a plan. ➢ So, in everything I do, I have a plan, even if the plan is doing nothing at all. Bottom line: Always have a plan. Learn to rest ➢ Once a hustle-culture fanatic, I got fried like a Kentucky Fried Chicken - Story for un otro dia . ➢ Regardless, rest is part of the process. ⇝ You demand energy whenever you engage in activities demanding of your physical, mental, and emotional faculties. ⇝ Meaning, when you're done working, you have low energy, like an empty battery. ➢ Plus, it's pointless working on low-energy - ⇝ You aren't just tiring yourself more - Your work becomes crappy. ⇝ As a car can't function on 'E,' so can you. ➢ Give yourself time to rest, recharge, relax (Triple R), and unwind. ➢ Naturally, your best efforts come after blissfully relaxing. Take care of your body. Bottom line: Rest as hard as you work. Stay Learning ➢ Learning is a superpower. Stay Learning. Stay Curious. ➢ There is an unsurmountable wealth of knowledge for us to evolve. ( Thank you, Sir Internet. ) ➢ A Swahili Proverb I love is " Elimu ni Bahari. "   ⇝ Translated: " Education is an ocean. " ⇝ Learning is infinite - It never ends. Learning doesn't stop in school; It transcends throughout life. ➢ Learning is a transferable skill ( check no. 19 below ) that transfers across multiple settings. ⇝ You can learn a lot from school, your job, relationships, and other scenarios. Learn. Bottom line: Stay learning. Stay curious. Learning as a meta-skill coming soon. Health is Wealth ➢ I got sick on January 2nd - An interesting way to start the year. ➢ 'Couldn't work for two days, and I had an important meeting on the 4th - Good thing I was mostly healed by then. ➢ I read that a millionaire would give their millions away to be healthy again for one day…and that hits true. ⇝ Think about it: What's the point of having riches but no health to enjoy them? ➢ Take your health seriously: Proper nutrition, exercise, and constant medical checkups. ⇝ A -1-degree temperature dip or rise is a big deal. ⇝ And a healthy body is a well-functioning engine. Bottom line: Stay healthy. Know Your Place ➢ I mentioned this as one lesson from my early career - Applies to life too. ➢ In the grand scheme of things, you're a speck in the dust - A needle in a haystack. ⇝ This frame reminds me to ground myself and realize that I'm not as big of a deal as I think. (Reframed as " I'm not important. ") Helps me stay humble. ➢ Everything can happen with or without me. ( Check no. 13 ) ➢ Optimistically, however, knowing your place helps you analyze how it works and assess your contribution (Think: Value Proposition .) ⇝ This way, you approach situations humbly rather than having a " know-it-all " or " larger-than-life " mentality. Work your way up instead of being the instant talk-and-flop of town. Bottom line: Know your place. Assess, stay humble, then climb up. Move with speed ➢ Speed implies accomplishing something as fast as possible, optimized for efficiency and quality output. ⇝ Meaning, when you do something, you'll want to complete it quickly with optimal effort and the best quality. ➢ The opposite of speed, in my books, is haste. ➢ Haste involves doing things haphazardly as fast as possible, accomplishing the bare minimum, regardless of quality. ⇝ Haste compromises quality, efficiency, and the entire process itself. More haste, less speed. ~John Heywood ➢ Codie's quote below gets me everytime... Move with speed. Bottom line: Optimize for speed. Nothing Beats Family ➢ In the past decade, I made two decisions on leaving my family to pursue my dreams: ⇝ 2017: From Kenya to the United States. ⇝ 2022: From Seattle to Pittsburgh. ➢ I often wish someone invented a teleportation machine to transport me to my family in five minutes - Good thing social media ( sort of ) makes up for that. ➢ Depending on family dynamics, family remains family, whether by blood, marriage, or adoption. ⇝ And from my experience, I can vouch for more time with family - Or at least I miss mine. ➢ Work stays. Friends come and go, but family will always be family. Cherish them. Bottom line: Cherish your family. Take that Leap of Faith ➢ It's a Leap of Faith because you don't know what will happen once you jump, but you believe in the best outcome happening. ⇝ And faith , by definition, is the belief of what is unseen. ➢ You know something good is out there for you, but you can't tell with 100% certainty. It's only by jumping that you will ascertain. Have faith. ➢ And more often than not, it ends up being rewarding. Bottom line: Take the leap of faith. Have visionary friends ➢ Having friends with the same vision of the future implies that you are not a lone wolf but a pack united in mission. ➢ When you find these friends, cherish them - No guarantees you'll find them elsewhere. ➢ These relationships are best built when young and transcend throughout life. Play long-term games with long-term people. ➢ Build a camaraderie with these people. The Camaraderie of Success. Bottom line:   Find friends with the same mission and vision as you. Building is a meta-skill ➢ Building is a stupendous skill to have. ⇝ Building is a collective skill that combines many others to create something. ⇝ And these skills include creativity, strategy, planning, resourcefulness, consistency, vision, etc. ➢ Think about it: You're building something every day: ⇝ At work, you're building your career. ⇝ In the gym, you're building your body. ⇝ Saving and investing build your finances. ➢ You're likely building something somewhere without realizing it. ➢ Everything changes when you reframe your actions as building. ➢ I discuss more about building as a meta-skill here: ⇝ The Art of Building ⇝ Building Thyself Build. Bottom line: Build. Subscribe to The Weekly Chronicle Newsle tter  for weekly motivational insights in under a minute. Leadership is admirable ➢ The world needs leaders. ⇝ It's run by those who take the initiative to lead, uphold responsibility, and provide direction. ➢ People look up to and emulate leaders. Hence, leaders inspire. ➢ Find an opportunity to lead, whether a project or a team. Lead with Vision. Bottom line: Take charge and be a leader. Play to your imagination ➢ Your mind has infinite possibilities from its subconscious. Manifest. { PJ's my mentor btw. } ➢ And the way to manifest your imagination into reality is through action. ➢ When I imagine something, I visualize it from the end (" What could it be?" ) and then reverse-engineering it to my daily actions. ( Check no. 13 below . ) ➢ My imagination comes together piece-wise like a jigsaw puzzle through my tiny actions. ➢ It's more abstract than it seems ( I'll write a separate piece on this someday ), but until then, if your mind visualizes something, you can manifest your desired result. Bottom line: Play to your imagination. Visualization is a big tool ➢ By visualizing, you imagine the end-result and picture it in your mind. ➢ With this end-in-mind process, you ask yourself: ⇝ " What does success look like? " ⇝ " What would it take me to get there? " ⇝ " Who do I have to become to achieve that? " ➢ And the best part is reverse-engineering the process to its current state - Today. ➢ Visualization changed my life recently as it's helped me play to my imagination numerous times ( No. 12 above ) and discover the unimaginable, further proving my thesis that the mind has infinite possibilities. Bottom line: Visualize and reverse-engineer your goals. You are your biggest critic ➢ When something goes south, it's natural to blame yourself. ⇝ But the funny thing is that no one cares. ⇝ And even funnier: No one's watching. ➢ We end up criticizing ourselves more than others critique us ( if they do. ) ➢ I have a personal saving grace: Hold yourself accountable. Blame yourself for the outcomes...but also give yourself grace. ➢ There's a good chance you did your best, and remember that you blame yourself the most when it fails. ➢ If you think it's a big deal, it likely isn't; You're exaggerating scenarios in your head. Bottom line:   You are your biggest critic. Remember that when you think it's a "big deal." Things can work without you ➢ I had a reality check in March when I attended my first NSBE Convention outside of NSBE Leadership - Bittersweet experience. ⇝ Bitter because they planned a conference without me. ( Being extra here. Guilty. ) ⇝ Sweet because NSBE thrived without me. ( As it always has. ) ➢ This reality reinforced the underlying belief that you are not as important as you think and the world can move on without you. ( See no. 5. ) ⇝ All the more reason to remain humble. ➢ Better yet, if you wish to sustain something, realize that its continuity should be independent of you. ⇝ At some point, you must relinquish control. ⇝ Besides, legacies outlast their owners. ➢ Everything is temporary - Build something until it runs independently; then, you can watch it from the sidelines or pivot to another endeavor. Bottom line:   Things can work without you. Underestimate not your impact ➢ You'll never know your impact until you share it. ⇝ Your "dumb" idea might save the company $17 million. ⇝ Your question might be the missing piece to a bug update. ⇝ Your compliment might save someone from suicide. ➢ Your influence could be impactful if you give it a chance. ➢ You fearing sharing what you have is a sign that the world needs it right now the most - Double down on it. Make an impact. Bottom line: Don't underestimate your influence. Preparation is vital - So is execution ➢ I initially believed execution trumps preparation. ➢ However, as of lately, I admit that preparation and execution are equally vital - Or rather, I include preparation in my execution strategy. ⇝ Execution with little preparation will take you somewhere but that's about it. ⇝ On the other hand, executing with proper preparation trains you to be more intentional and resourceful. This also improves your preparation strategy, leading to better outcomes overall. Proper preparation makes all the difference. ➢ Reminds me of the Agile way of working : Two days of planning, two weeks of execution, and a retrospective at the end. ➢ For now, I stand on preparation being just as vital as execution - Just don't overprepare. Bottom line: Prepare. Execute. Repeat. Invest in your Personal Development ➢ A rule of thumb I've held closely: Do not think twice when investing in your personal development. ➢ I learned from Alex Hormozi that you are the best investment. ⇝ Investing $X,000 into the S&P500 gives decent returns, but the same $X,000 invested in yourself ( i.e., S&ME500 ) can bring outsized returns. ⇝ And these investments manifest through skills, experiences, and habits . ➢ By viewing yourself as an investment, you become intentional with your resources, actions, and what you consume. Bottom line: You are the best investment. You are the reward of your hard work ➢ No hard work is ever lost. ➢ When working on something, at least one of two things happens: ⇝ You achieve that something. ⇝ You become a better person. ➢ And the more you work, the more you maintain the essence of hard work. ⇝ Since you know what hard work feels like, you transfer that idea to other endeavors. ⇝ Take an elite marathoner wanting to become a prominent entrepreneur, for example. The traits of discipline, perseverance, and grit from preparing for marathons can transfer to raising profits for his business. Skills transfer over. ( Image generated by Copilot. ) ⇝ You work hard on Project B as you would on Project A because the magnitude of hard work is equal on both projects. ➢ All effort is transferable, whether or not you work on the right things. ⇝ I have experience working in the retail, admin, nonprofit, and finance sectors - I can vouch that many skills are transferable: Communication, strategy, client-centricity, organization, problem-solving, etc. ⇝ I know of a Starbucks employee who became a Meta Technical Program Manager. During the interviews, he played to his strengths in communication, attention to detail, leadership, and collaboration. ➢ And whether or not you achieve your goal, you were the goal all along - You became someone worth achieving goals. Bottom line: You are the result of your hard work. Abundance Mindset >>> Scarcity Mindset Abundance Mindset Scarcity Mindset Believes that there are enough resources and opportunities for everyone Believes that resources and opportunities are limited. Sees opportunity in everything. Sees detriment in everything. Views its desires in massive abundance, creating no lack of opportunity. Views the lack and problems in everything Characterized by optimism, positivity, willingness to share and collaborate, focus on growth and opportunities, and gratitude and appreciation. Characterized by pessimism and negativity, the reluctance to share and collaborate, focus on limitations and obstacles, and the fear of loss and insecurity. "There is always a way." "Something MUST go wrong somewhere." ➢ Winners are optimists who possess an abundance mindset. Bottom line: Think in abundance. Conclusion So...yeah, That's it with my 2024 Reflections. And that was a good year too. Hopefully some of them resonate with you. ( Curious to know which ones. ) As for me, I'd rate my 2024 at 80%. My target for 2025? 85%. What's the 5% difference? More ideation , implementation , and execution ; Story for another day. Will I hit that? Only one way to find out. We'll see. Until then, God bless you. Stay safe. And see you in 2025. Peace, . . . ~T.K.K Subscribe to The Weekly Chronicle  for weekly motivational bangers in under a minute.

08/14/2024 I celebrated my one-year job anniversary just shy of a month and some change ago. Needless to say, August 2024 was my best August yet:  Birthday  and  back-to-back conferences . And my job-versary was the barbeque gravy. A lot has happened since  this date a year ago . So, without further ado, Let's dive right in. 13 Lessons from My Early Career We begin. 1. Know your place ↠ To thrive in a particular setting, it calls to know where you stand in the grand scheme of things and learn how you contribute to the grander picture. ↠ This takes time as a new environment has its own circumstances and challenges, so you'll also have to adjust. And adjustment, too, takes time. ↠ Knowing where you lie can help you cultivate your  value proposition  depending on what you do there. ACTION:   Just like you thrived in school, learn the workplace too. Then, learn how to flourish in it. 2. Master your communication OBSERVATION:   No one is a good communicator until they learn how to communicate with others accordingly. ↠ Eloquence and tact are one thing together, but if your message can't get across to your team, miscommunication occurs, leading to misunderstandings. Personal revelation:  Changing how I spoke - not what I spoke - to the recipients of my message was the greatest improvement in my communication. ACTION:   Learn how to communicate so your colleagues understand; Tweak your speech for them to interpret well. 3. Cultivate empathy ↠  Empathy  is seeing situations from others' POVs or " being in someone's shoes. " ↠ You will work with colleagues with conflicting ideologies - I mean, they learned their thought processes elsewhere, and so did you. ACTIONS: Understand that your colleagues, too, want to succeed, and their actions reflect their career goals. So do you. Understand where they are coming from and why they reason the way they do. Take nothing personally when conflict arises. In a conflict, tailor your proposals from "I'm right" to "What can we do to achieve this?" Everyone wants to win. { I touch on empathy  here . } 4. Corporate and school are different environments ↠ " The Real World " vastly differs from college. ↠ From dealing with peers and agemates, you now deal with colleagues and workmates, creating a dichotomy of characters and personalities.  ACTION:   Take your time to learn your new environment and the people in it, and adjust accordingly.  ( Refer to #1 . ) 5. Take your time to learn ↠ Learning on the job differs from in school primarily due to the discrepancy in feedback loops. ⇒For instance, in school, your feedback is immediate, as seen in tests and assignments. ⇒At work, however, your feedback is delayed because you must first learn the job ( which takes a while)  and then do the job itself, whose results might not manifest for the first X months. ↠ It's partly why many new hires feel lost and unsettled as they're unsure of what to do during the first X months of their job. Personal rule of thumb:   It will take you 6-8 months to settle into your role - four if you're fast. Take your time to learn. 6. Learning is a superpower ↠ Learning is essential for professional development, and most employers provide free employee training. ↠ Most CEOs, executives, and career-glittery successes attribute their success to continuous learning and applying their lessons in different career stages. ACTION: Stay curious. Be a lifelong learner - It will take you places. Learning does not end with a degree - It is eternal. Stay Learning. Stay Curious. 7. Job satisfaction = Liking what you do + Who you do it with ↠ I invented  The Law of Job Satisfaction  that I use to gauge how much I like my job ( which I do ): Carerra's Law of Job Satisfaction ↠ If you like what you do, that's the equation half done. ↠ If you like who you do it with, that's almost all of it completed. ACTION:  Balance both - Liking what you do and who you do it with. You have some work to do if there's an imbalance on one end.  Subscribe to The Weekly Chronicle for weekly insights in under a minute. 8. Hone in on competency, resourcefulness, and reliability ↠  Competency  is knowing your stuff. People love someone who knows their stuff. When you master competency, you become indispensable to your team and a role model to colleagues wanting to learn from you. ↠  Resourcefulness  is using the resources at your disposal to garner a particular result. Use the tools in your arsenal to craft the best outcome possible, after which your creativity shall skyrocket once blessed with more resources. ↠ By  reliability , your team can count on you to show up when needed. Starting out, you won't have much to show apart from your eagerness to help. Assist your team members wherever you can, and learn some skills to fill their gaps in the process. Challenge yourself to come in as clutch as often as possible. ACTION:  Hone in on competency, resourcefulness, and reliability. 9. Leadership is impressive ↠ People like leaders. They like someone who can usher a team on specific tasks when the need calls for it. ↠ And in   every team, anyone can be a leader. ACTION:   Cultivate your leadership early in your career. Shadow acclaimed leaders and take on projects where you can lead; Your late twenties will thank you. 10. Your Job is your Job ↠ Put frankly, no one cares who you are outside your job. ↠ You could be an Olympic Gold medalist, an acclaimed tuba player, or a nonprofit founder...but at your job, they want results first. That's what they're paying you for. ↠ This is not to discourage you from pursuing extracurriculars but rather to provide a reality check that you are compensated for your work at your workplace; All else is secondary. ACTION:   Know your place.  ( Refer to #1 . )  Understand that your job is the level playing ground to cultivate your results - The rest is trivial. 11. Be Teachable ↠ As a twenty-something-year-old, you have much to learn in your career and life - Inclusive of any achievements you've had in college. ACTION:   No matter your status, stay humble and be teachable. Most mentorships start this way, and life-changing opportunities follow. Refer to points #5 and #6 . 12. You Will Mess Up ↠ Failures are inevitable - You will mess up at some point. Everyone has such moments. ↠ No one expects you to master your craft five weeks into your job. Learning takes time, and mistakes expedite that. ↠ Your mess-ups can be career lessons for you to learn, shape yourself up, and get you on your feet towards succeeding in your job. ( Story for another day: My biggest mistake that was my wake-up call and steered my career forever. ) ACTION:   Learn from your mistakes. Note how they occurred, and remedies for next time...because a mistake avoided is better than one solved. 13. Master Personal Finance ↠ Today's education system underemphasizes personal finance skills to thrive in today's economy; Only  22.7% of US high schoolers can access personal finance courses . ↠ Once in a job, the income windfall is tempting for someone earning considerable chunks at a go. Effects include lifestyle inflation, lavish spending, taxes, and eating out, etc. ↠ And as of December 2022,  51% of six-figure earners live paycheck to paycheck . ↠ I often quote myself: Just because you have a job doesn't mean you have money. ACTION: Money management and personal finance can help you control your income and cashflow, as does  Maslow's Hierarchy of Financial Needs . Start with opening a Traditional 401K with your employer, a Roth IRA, and employing the 50-30-20 rule. Plug: I have a friend who emphasizes money mastery and wealth-building (probably the next Dave Ramsey? Idk. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯ ). Follow my guy John Henry - Millennial Wealth - for wealth-building insights. 'Hope this article helped you. If you're starting your career, I wish you nothing but the best of luck and massive success in it. Go ace it - You've got this. Peace, love, God's blessings, and success, . . . ~T.K.K Subscribe to The Weekly Chronicle for weekly bangers in under a minute.

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