You Can Win Anywhere

Shaan Puri believes that while you can succeed anywhere and in any situation, certain strategic choices dramatically increase your probability of success. The key is understanding that most competition isn't actually serious, and positioning yourself in the right networks and opportunities can transform your odds from seemingly impossible to surprisingly favorable.

Key Points:

• Most People Aren't Actually Competing:

  • At a conference with 10,000 attendees, only about 50 people actually believed they could win
  • You're not competing against 10,000 people - you're competing against the 50 who are serious
  • This changes your odds from 1 in 10,000 to 1 in 10
  • Most people aren't seriously trying to do anything meaningful

• Network Value Trumps Incremental Dollars:

  • Some networks are extremely powerful, others are weak
  • Moving to San Francisco might cost $2,000 more in rent, but the network value is worth exponentially more
  • Moving away just for tax savings is foolish - you save 10% but lose out on 10x more money from being in the "white hot center"
  • Earlier in your career, network value compounds more because you have more time
  • If you're good, you should be in good networks - if you're bad, you won't get value from them anyway

• Optimize for the Work Itself, Not Future Payoffs:

  • Simple rule: Am I doing this for a result, or because I like doing it?
  • No longer do things where you're suffering today for some hypothetical future payoff
  • The work has to be the win - the reward is doing the thing itself
  • When you work this way, you win-win: you enjoy the process AND might get results
  • Spent 10 years doing things only opportunistically ("if this worked it'd be amazing") - when they didn't work, it felt like wasted time

• The Flywheel Effect of Enjoyment:

  • When you enjoy something, you do it all the time
  • Because you do it all the time, you get really good at it
  • Because you get really good at it, you do get the results
  • Would have been further ahead by focusing on enjoyable work earlier
  • Would have found the things more enjoyable sooner, creating the flywheel faster

• Understanding Opportunity Cost:

  • Your biggest cost isn't taxes or expenses - it's opportunity cost
  • The opportunity cost is what else you could have been working on
  • Once you understand this, you have to think differently about every choice

• Self-Selecting Into Better Networks:

  • Your info diet matters - you'll "dollar cost average" into the thoughts of your network
  • If you consume the same content as everyone else, you'll have the same thoughts
  • Differentiate your info diet, the people you hang out with, and what you do with free time
  • These are upstream decisions that affect all downstream results
  • Examples: Twitter, TikTok, subreddits, physical location - all are networks you're opting into

• Making Things Easier vs. Harder:

  • You can win anywhere, in any industry, at any time - but why not increase your odds?
  • It's about making things easier, not harder
  • There are no bonus points for doing everything the hard way
  • It's about trade-offs and probability, not guarantees
  • Like being surrounded by five people who go to the gym - it increases your odds of getting ripped