Curiosity Chronicle

Over the weekend, I made what has become an annual pilgrimage to Omaha, Nebraska to attend the Berkshire Hathaway Annual Meeting. The event, which is nominally a business update on Warren Buffett's famed holding company, has become a staple in my annual calendar, mostly due to the incredible density of deep thinkers who drop into the midwestern city for a short window of time. Every year, I seem t...

We all fall into the same trap: measuring what's easy instead of what's meaningful, clinging to routines we know instead of adapting ones that work, and asking the questions we can answer instead of the ones we're avoiding. In this podcast, I break down the street light effect — the tendency to search where there's light rather than where there's truth — and share how it showed up in my own career...

When I was 12 years old, I tried out for a baseball all-star team in our area. I really wanted to make this team. The tryouts were my first adventure beyond the confines of my small town. An opportunity to see how I stacked up against kids from all around the state. When the results came out, the coaches called my house. They were taking 16 players for the team...and I was the 17th on the list. I...

The most famous sculpture in history was almost never created… In 1464, the Opera del Duomo—the committee overseeing the cathedral in Florence—commissioned a massive statue to adorn the cathedral’s roofline. They sourced a single, 17-foot block of marble from the quarries in Carrara, Italy. A sculptor named Agostino di Duccio began work on the project, but after a short stint, he backed out... •••...

A few weeks ago, I had the unique opportunity to attend a small author’s retreat hosted by Atomic Habits author James Clear. To be honest, it was a bit of a ”pinch-me” moment. I was in a room with a group of 15 authors I’ve long admired, who had collectively sold tens of millions of books and left an indelible mark on the world with their ideas and insights. We were each asked to share something t...

A group of kindergarteners outperformed the CEOs, lawyers, and MBAs. The way they did it has a lesson I've never been able to forget. While in college over a decade ago, I watched a ​TED Talk​ by a famed designer named ​Peter Skillman​ about an experiment he conducted in which groups of participants were given a challenge... ••• This episode brought to you by: DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, e...

My entire life changed when I realized that I would never want to trade lives with the people I read books about. Allow me to explain with a story about the richest man who ever lived. In the early 1500s, an enterprising German financier named Jakob Fugger rose to prominence on the European continent... ••• This episode brought to you by: DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remov...

A few weeks ago, I shared a piece on my ​Anti-To-Do List​ and the general merits of using inversion to improve your life. The idea was straightforward: Write down what you want to avoid doing. Avoid doing those things. I've gotten a lot of value from using inversion like this as a tool to provide clarity on my actions and avoid painful mistakes. As the late Charlie Munger famously said, "All I wan...

A few years ago, I came across a beautiful story written by a woman named Pam Kearney in a local newspaper. I set a calendar reminder to re-read it every single year. Take 6 minutes and give this a listen. Trust me, it's worth your time... ••• This episode brought to you by: DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your personal data online.  Origin Financial - Your personal AI...

For the last decade, I've had a recurring nightmare that I can trace back to my days as a Division 1 baseball player at Stanford... I'm on the mound in a critical situation. All eyes are on me. The entire stadium waits for my pitch. But as I start my motion, I realize I've completely forgotten how to throw the ball. My body moves like it's stuck in mud. Completely paralyzed. Inevitably, I wake up...

It's hard to believe that we’re already 25% of the way through 2026. This is an important time of year. The excitement and motivation of your new year planning has likely worn off. You’ve faced the realities of life, probably encountered a few challenges and storms, and developed in your thinking. The ultimate life hack is the ability to reset and adjust. You have new data. New experiences. New in...

The 85% Rule says that you can achieve more by pushing less. Carl Lewis won nine Olympic gold medals with this strategy. And as it turns out, the general principle here is one that has been recognized throughout history... ••• This episode brought to you by: DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your personal data online.  Origin Financial - Your personal AI Financial Adviso...

In 1888, Alfred Nobel was best known as the inventor of dynamite. He had been issued over 300 patents and his business had built more than 50 explosives and armament factories all across Europe. That year, while traveling in Cannes, France, Nobel's brother, Ludvig, suddenly died of a heart attack. A French newspaper misreported the incident, penning an article that claimed Nobel himself had died....

In the mid-19th century, a physician named Dr. Ignaz Semmelweis was working as an assistant in Vienna General Hospital when he noticed something curious. The hospital had two maternity clinics right next to each other, one staffed by doctors and medical students, the other by midwives. The mortality rate of mothers at the clinic staffed by doctors and medical students was a shocking (even for the...

Last week, I got an email from a reader that stopped me in my tracks: Dear Mr. Bloom, My name is Parker and I am 17. I am reaching out because I would like some advice. I have had a goal and dream since I can remember, being rich and owning some sort of business but I do not know where to start. I don't want to be rich for the wrong reasons. I want to use my money as freedom for myself and to use...

In this episode, I explored a framework from Nir Eyal's new book, Beyond Belief , called the Motivation Triangle. Most people think motivation is about behavior and benefit—the actions you take and the outcomes you want. But that misses the most critical component: Belief. Without it, the other two collapse. The lesson? Take a few minutes this weekend to audit your core beliefs about who you are a...

Six weeks ago, I shared an embarrassing confession​ on my phone addiction. It all began at my ​Think Week​ retreat in January, when I pondered a single question: If you were the main character in a movie of your life, what would the audience be screaming at you to do right now? The answer, in this case, felt blindingly obvious: Get off the damn phone... ••• This episode brought to you by: DeleteMe...

I feel like I need to say something... Over the last few weeks, it seems like I can't go ten minutes without having a new "AI Doom" story hit my feed. The extraordinary virality of the AI Doom narrative is notable. It spreads rapidly to every corner of the internet. It's shared, talked about, and clicked on, millions upon millions of times. And as it turns out, cognitive science shows us why... ••...

It's tempting to view the world in black and white. Everyone wants you to do that. It's easier to do that. It's more comfortable to do that. But the world is more complex than that . Many of life's most powerful truths appear entirely contradictory on the surface. They are paradoxes. Seemingly absurd or self-contradictory ideas that, when investigated or explained, prove to be true. Over the years...

Carlos Alcaraz is a tennis phenom. The 22-year-old is the number one player in the world, having won 25 singles titles and 7 Grand Slams in his career. He is the youngest player in history to have completed the Career Grand Slam, winning all four major championships. If you're a fan of the sport—or just spend enough time on the internet—you've undoubtedly seen clips of Carlos Alcaraz doing complet...

In the 19th century, a German mathematician named Carl Jacobi developed an interesting insight: Many hard math problems become easier to solve when you flip them around and work backwards. He famously preached to his students, "Man muss immer umkehren." Translation: Invert, always invert. As it turns out, this idea echoes across history, showing up in a variety of places before and after Jacobi......

This is one of my favorites: "If more information was the answer, then we'd all be billionaires with perfect abs." - Derek Sivers Humor aside, it's a critical idea for modern life: Dopamine from information gathering is a dangerous drug... ••• This episode brought to you by: DeleteMe - DeleteMe makes it quick, easy, and safe to remove your personal data online.  Origin Financial - Your personal AI...

In the 10th century B.C., a young king was called upon to settle a seemingly impossible dispute. Two women stood before him with a single child, both claiming to be its rightful mother. There were no witnesses. No evidence on which to base a judgment. After hearing their case, the young king spoke... ••• Mel Robbins called my first book "a powerful wake-up call that will push you to rethink everyt...

In his 2019 book, Alchemy , legendary British advertising executive Rory Sutherland offered an interesting lens on the perils of automation: Imagine you are the owner of a five-star hotel and you hire a consulting firm to come in and propose opportunities for efficiency improvements. The consultant observes the operations of the hotel and suggests that the role of the doorman can be automated. He...

The Think Week (or Day ) is a ritual that will change your life. The concept was first popularized by several world-renowned entrepreneurs and innovators in the 1980s and 1990s, but its underlying foundation has been around for thousands of years. History’s greatest leaders, thinkers, and builders have all believed in the power of space to create asymmetric outcomes. It allows you to slow down, zo...