Focus on the things that don't change

In a world that changes every day, it's easy to get distracted by shiny toys. But if the rate of change is increasing, that means most tools and platforms we can engage with are going to be irrelevant tomorrow. Our ability to make good judgments about what to spend time learning and mastering is more important than ever before.

If you fell asleep for fifty years and woke up in a vastly different world, what knowledge and which skills would remain relevant? This is the question I like to ask when I'm thinking about how to invest my energy.

Tools and platforms will fade away and give place to others. From ChatGPT, to iOS, to Instagram to Figma. Foundational disciplines and principles are more likely to stay:

Clear thinking. Good writing. Principles of microeconomics. Statistics. Understanding of human behavior and psychology. Mathematics. Elements of visual design.

If you're learning how to program and if your time is scarce, focusing on understanding how to break down problems into smaller parts, and being able to identify patterns and extract relevance is a better bet than learning how to use the latest Javascript framework.