How to Make a Comeback, AI in 2025, Consumer Trends and Hard Questions for Founders

Courage is in shorter supply than genius.

Good morning

Every year, I take one and only two-week break from the newsletter, so the new edition will come just after New Year’s. Happy holidays to each of you and your families, and best wishes for a great 2025.

In today's edition, among other things:

• How to Make the Greatest Comeback of Your Life

• AI in 2025

• Hard Questions Every Founder Should Ask Themselves

• Consumer Trends 2025

• How To Read a Book Using AI

• How to Cope with Technology FOMO

• Big Ideas in Crypto 2025

• The Best Growth Advice of 2024

Onwards!

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How to Make the Greatest Comeback of Your Life

Oftentimes you will fail, but then you can either dwell on this and make it consume you or you decide to make a comeback. But for many people, the comeback they need doesn’t come from failure but from living a scripted life. For many, it’s a predictable script:

• Wake up uninspired, commute to a job you’re indifferent to, and end the day numbing yourself with distractions.

• The feeling is entrapment — you’re conditioned to follow the “safe” path, only to find that it’s neither secure nor fulfilling.

The most significant transformations start with rejecting this scripted narrative. Via Dan Koe:

The greatest skill you can develop is the ability to figure it out.

Why most people feel trapped:

Narrow Conditioning

You’re trying to achieve freedom with a mind that was conditioned to be a servant.

That’s like trying to put a square block in a circular hole. It will never work.

Our culture trains us to specialize—to identify ourselves by narrowly defined roles that often feel confining. While specialization can offer security, it may limit creativity and adaptability.

Fear of Mistakes

"You aren’t where you want to be because you’re afraid of making mistakes.

Mistakes are not setbacks; they’re signposts.

The issue isn’t failing—it’s the fear of stepping outside pre-approved paths.

The “One True Path” Illusion

If there was one true path, everyone would be rich, happy, and healthy by now. That’s not how reality works.

Koe argues that humans are natural generalists. Our ancestors thrived by adapting to diverse challenges. Today, we’ve replaced adaptability with hyper-specialization, leaving many ill-equipped for life’s unpredictable demands.

All of this is leading up to say one thing:

You aren’t where you want to be because you’re afraid of making mistakes.

I cannot express that enough.

If there were one true sentence in which to orient your life, that would be it.

Mistakes are nature’s compass.

If happiness can’t exist without sadness, success can’t exist without failure.

It is a universal law. A pattern of reality. A phenomenon that has been around since the first sign of life, because something can’t exist without nothing.

"Do what you want without permission from someone else." By constantly seeking approval, you become enslaved to others’ expectations. Independence starts with small acts of defiance against the norms you’ve internalized.

The most interesting part is the framework he proposes.:

The how.

You must fabricate a mental rock bottom. Write down everything you don’t want in life. The stupid mind. The sluggish energy. The dead-end relationships. Reject them.

(…)

Give yourself 3 months, not 2 weeks. You need enough time to invest the right amount of energy."

And this I cannot emphasize how important this is:

The best decisions I’ve made are ones most people see as stupid.

Every best decision, personal, investment, work - every time most people said to me that what I’m doing is a bad or a stupid decision. It doesn’t mean recklessness. It means you can identify controlled risks that excite you.

Growth often stems from high-stakes experimentation. You cannot max out life without discomfort. Lean in.

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AI in 2025