exposure

oxygen is good for you (but not too much)

Things can turn out to be favorable or unfavorable, appear positive or negative. They might be comfortable or uncomfortable, sometimes even hinting the outcome beforehand. Whether the outcome will be the ones foreshadowed, we do not know. I enjoy running. It’s something I do in the winter, when the temperature outside will be close to 0 Celsius, as well as in the summer, where it’ll peak nearly 40 Celsius and that being under shade. When I run, my body produces heat through a process called thermogensis. My body needs warmth to survive. But the very heat that keeps me alive can also overheat and kill me.

the iphone, a black swan

There are more subtle forms of exposure as are those in the financial markets. You can back or bet against a stock, index, or commodity and you can get exposure that cuts both ways. Depending on whether you believed the iPhone will take over the world in 2007, you could have made or lost a fortune. Usually, industries where the current incumbent has been dominating the field for the past 10 years, are the ones with the most chances of a disruptor to appear.

don’t get up from your seat

The unfortunate thing with exposure is that it doesn’t work its magic if you’re only interested in short-term betting. The first 30 minutes of the movie will never be enough. You might catch your big break at 70, like Colonel Sanders, or in your twenties, like Zuckerberg. The key is to keep showing up where outsized opportunities exist. Every good investor who has been a startup founder before gave me the same advice: business is like running a marathon. I’ve ran a business and I’ve ran a marathon. In both, I had to learn how to handle the blisters. In high-risk, high-reward arenas, you should remain present until luck and timing finally meet.