#24 - Life is Poker
Keep it simple, how hard can it be, and the good life
Last week I taught my housemates how to play poker. Well, that was the plan.
It didn’t play out as I’d hoped. 40 minutes in and I was all in with nothing but an Ace high.
Don’t call, don’t call, don’t call.
Call- said Anna, playing her first ever game of poker.
Fuck.
We turned over the cards- her pair of Kings were in good shape against my lone Ace.
One card to come.
An Ace. Phew. I got lucky. A quick chuckle and a line about how it was inevitable. Crisis averted.
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Keep it Simple
I’m a fan of poker. Thanks to years of half-hearted effort I’m more than capable of taking some money off my friends; but I’ve never managed to take the step up. I can tell you how one can become a good poker player but, up until now, I’ve been too lazy to go through the process myself.
You can get a long way by sticking to a simple strategy. The number one mistake beginners make is playing too many hands. Despite years of playing I get it wrong to this day. It’s childishly simple: you are much less likely to lose if you only play when you have certain (good) cards
Ex-pro Annie Duke tells a great story about learning to play. Her brother, a top player, gave her a list of hands she could play- everything else she must fold. And that was it. She stuck to it. She found out months later, to her surprise, that hands not on the list could be played after all. By this point she was a decent player because she kept it simple. I’ve never sat down and devised a simple strategy. My play is erratic. As a result I have not made the jump to being a decent player.
The reason keeping it simple works in poker is because so many people fail to do so. This is even more relevant in the startup world. Startups very rarely die from competition, they die because they self-destruct.
How Hard Can it Be
It all seems so simple in the beginning. For us, it was launch a cabin > get feedback > launch more cabins > hire people to scale it. What could possibly go wrong? Everything, it turns out.
All startup problems are people problem. If you’re one or two people, pre-launch, everything is simple. You’re synced up, you have big plans for how you’ll do things differently; the world is your oyster. Post launch, things are complicated by the addition of customers, suppliers and, eventually, new team members. Communication starts to falter. It’s not so easy to keep everyone updated any more.
At this stage things seem wildly complicated. But they’re not. A startup is just a group of people working together to achieve a vision of the future. It may look messy day to day, but zoom out and it all becomes simple.
I’ve been thinking this week about what my role is. While Unplugged used to be mine and Ben’s project, it’s really not any more. It’s now out in the world and we’re simply working on it. We’re just two pieces of the puzzle. It belongs just as much to everyone involved. From the guests who come and stay to our partners who build the cabins.
My role, really, comes down to defining a strategy, finding the money and people to make it happen, and supporting those people to that end. We’re already working with people who are (fortunately) far better at getting it done than me.
I’m not so naive as to think it will be easy, but I do believe that keeping this simple idea in mind will help along the way. There are times when I begin to feel frustrated. It might be at a mix up with a supplier or a job not done. When I do, it’s soothing to remember that my job is to support. Shit goes wrong in startups. I have to be there to help when it does. No room for judgement or frustration.
The Good Life
All the advice is out there for living a good life. Be nice to people, be present, live in moderation… You know the drill. And yet… It’s not so easy. A busy week at work and we’re a little less present, we seek comfort in food or at the bottom of a bottle. The next day we’re not feeling so good, we snap at a friend or partner. We’ve all been there.
I’m afraid I don’t have the magic formula. Which is a shame, because if you’ve read this far you deserve it. But there’s a lot to be said for keeping it simple. Like Annie Duke with her poker hands- could you be a little nicer each day? Be a bit more present? I’m sure I could.
When it all seems overwhelming- which it often does, remember: keep simple.
My Week in Books📚
“The Hard Thing About Hard Things” by Ben Horowitz
Re-read this- perhaps the greatest book on startups ever written. Horowitz is a genius. So candid and so enlightening. Couldn’t recommend more highly to anyone involved with startups.
“The Happiness Hypothesis” by Jonathan Haidt
A wonderful book. Remarkable considering it was written in 2006- well before the current crusade for happiness began. Haidt’s ideas have aged well and the book provides a great holistic review of happiness. I thoroughly enjoyed it.
Thanks to my Mother for recommending.
I’ll be updating the books I’ve read this year here. Any recommendations? Let me know!
A Final Thought 💡
“Make everything as simple as possible, but not simpler.”
- Albert Einstein
What a beautiful, honest post. Thank you for sharing ❤️