Stop Trying to Fix Your Weaknesses. That's How You Stay Average.
Mainstream self-improvement tells you to be humble, practice stoicism, and correct your flaws. A top psychologist to billionaires explains the radical performance upside of ignoring that advice.
We recently had Brian Koppelman on the pod. Brian co-wrote Billions, a show about NYC hedge fund billionaires.
Wendy Rhoades is one of the best characters on the show. She’s a psychologist and performance coach who helps billionaires get out of their heads so they can execute.
Today, we’re talking to the person the Wall Street Journal called the real-life Wendy Rhoades.
Dr. Julie Gurner is a psychologist who works with the 0.01% to help them achieve world-class performance in fast-paced, high-pressure, extremely competitive environments.
Julie and I talked about mindset shifts that separate the very top from the merely successful. Much of her advice goes against the feel-good stuff from the self-improvement world. That’s because she cares about what actually works—and the improvements she gets are measured in millions (and billions).
I particularly loved her pushback against Stoicism, thoughts on unspoken social rules that hold the rest of us back, and why you should leverage your quirks and stop doing stuff you suck at.
Watch the episode
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Show notes
Dr. Julie Gurner’s Substack: Ultra Successful. Read it. Your life will improve.
A few of my favorite posts on Ultra Successful:
Julie’s Twitter feed (one of my favorites), with gems like this:
My Biggest Takeaways From the Episode
As a reminder, this new section is for Members only. Below are 8 of the highest-impact, most actionable takeaways from the episode, including:
Why “be humble” is some of the worst advice you’ve ever been given
The trait that lets the top 0.01% skip steps the rest of us grind through for years
The negative emotion most people bury, and how the ultra-successful turn it into rocket fuel (anti-Stoicism)
One question that dissolves the fear keeping you stuck
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