Subscribe to AVC
AVCSleep
I got an Oura ring a couple of years ago and have been working on improving my sleep and sleep habits ever since. For much of my adult life, I have been a poor sleeper. I have always been able to fall asleep quickly, but I have been plagued by two sleep issues. The first is waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to get back to sleep. The second is waking up early, like 4:30/5am, and being wide awake. So I’ve been working on those two things. I still wake up in the middle of t...
AVCMirror
I have written many times here that it is important to me that I control the platform that I publish on. I use the open-source WordPress software for my content management system and run that on a hosted server. I use my own domain, AVC.com, to locate my writings on the Internet. That has served me well. No matter how horrible I become, nobody is going to take me down. But we can go even further down this path of controlling our destiny. We can decentralize the entire thing; the content manag...
AVCOpen Office Hours at NYC Tech Week
NYC Tech Week is next week. It will be a week filled with events for the tech sector to engage and connect with each other. A particularly great part of tech week is VC Open Office Hours. There are over 100 VC investors signed up to participate next week. Here is how it works: 1/ you select four investors (out of more than 100) that you want to meet 2/ you get up to four twenty minute meetings 3/ you discuss your idea with the investor in hopes of getting them interested enough to take anothe...
AVCSleep
I got an Oura ring a couple of years ago and have been working on improving my sleep and sleep habits ever since. For much of my adult life, I have been a poor sleeper. I have always been able to fall asleep quickly, but I have been plagued by two sleep issues. The first is waking up in the middle of the night and not being able to get back to sleep. The second is waking up early, like 4:30/5am, and being wide awake. So I’ve been working on those two things. I still wake up in the middle of t...
AVCMirror
I have written many times here that it is important to me that I control the platform that I publish on. I use the open-source WordPress software for my content management system and run that on a hosted server. I use my own domain, AVC.com, to locate my writings on the Internet. That has served me well. No matter how horrible I become, nobody is going to take me down. But we can go even further down this path of controlling our destiny. We can decentralize the entire thing; the content manag...
AVCOpen Office Hours at NYC Tech Week
NYC Tech Week is next week. It will be a week filled with events for the tech sector to engage and connect with each other. A particularly great part of tech week is VC Open Office Hours. There are over 100 VC investors signed up to participate next week. Here is how it works: 1/ you select four investors (out of more than 100) that you want to meet 2/ you get up to four twenty minute meetings 3/ you discuss your idea with the investor in hopes of getting them interested enough to take anothe...
Share Dialog
Share Dialog
>500 subscribers
>500 subscribers
I am returning to a topic that I have talked a lot about on this blog.
A number of years ago at our annual CEO Summit, we had Angela Duckworth speak to our portfolio about Grit, the topic of her excellent book on the subject. In Angela’s research, she determined that the single greatest determinant of success was not talent. It was grit.
I was reminded of that last night as I watched Derrick Rose lead the New York Knicks to a must win in game two of their series against the Atlanta Hawks. The Knicks were a mess for the first half of the game and Derrick Rose singlehandedly kept them in the game.
Derrick Rose was the first pick in the 2008 draft and by 2011 he became the youngest NBA player to win the Most Valuable Player award, something he accomplished at age 23. A year later he tore his ACL and he has struggled with injuries ever since.
In the middle of this season, the Knicks acquired Derrick Rose from the Detroit Pistons and soon thereafter he came down with Covid and missed several weeks.
But after Derrick Rose came back from Covid in the last seventeen games of the season, the Knicks won thirteen of those games and landed in fourth place in the East.
And last night, he was the heart and soul of the Knicks. He kept them in the game until his teammates woke up, and he led the team in scoring in a must-win.
Derrick Rose will never be the player he was at 23 when he could beat anyone off the dribble and score at will. He could have called it quits many times in the last nine years since he won his MVP. But he hasn’t quit, he’s worked his way back and he is leading an NBA team in the playoffs. It is really something to behold.
Not everything goes the way we are expecting it to go. We get dealt bad hands and have to play them. That is way things are in life. There are people out there, like Derrick Rose, who show that you can make the best of a tough situation, keep going, and win anyway. That’s grit.
I am returning to a topic that I have talked a lot about on this blog.
A number of years ago at our annual CEO Summit, we had Angela Duckworth speak to our portfolio about Grit, the topic of her excellent book on the subject. In Angela’s research, she determined that the single greatest determinant of success was not talent. It was grit.
I was reminded of that last night as I watched Derrick Rose lead the New York Knicks to a must win in game two of their series against the Atlanta Hawks. The Knicks were a mess for the first half of the game and Derrick Rose singlehandedly kept them in the game.
Derrick Rose was the first pick in the 2008 draft and by 2011 he became the youngest NBA player to win the Most Valuable Player award, something he accomplished at age 23. A year later he tore his ACL and he has struggled with injuries ever since.
In the middle of this season, the Knicks acquired Derrick Rose from the Detroit Pistons and soon thereafter he came down with Covid and missed several weeks.
But after Derrick Rose came back from Covid in the last seventeen games of the season, the Knicks won thirteen of those games and landed in fourth place in the East.
And last night, he was the heart and soul of the Knicks. He kept them in the game until his teammates woke up, and he led the team in scoring in a must-win.
Derrick Rose will never be the player he was at 23 when he could beat anyone off the dribble and score at will. He could have called it quits many times in the last nine years since he won his MVP. But he hasn’t quit, he’s worked his way back and he is leading an NBA team in the playoffs. It is really something to behold.
Not everything goes the way we are expecting it to go. We get dealt bad hands and have to play them. That is way things are in life. There are people out there, like Derrick Rose, who show that you can make the best of a tough situation, keep going, and win anyway. That’s grit.
No comments yet