Monthly roundup: best book, movies, most useful video, the skill I worked on, a hypothesis, a habit, and the month's key insight. February 2025.
1) Best book
“Tiny Habits” by Dr. Fogg. An interesting model for managing yourself and your own state.
Also decided to reread Remarque’s “Flotsam.”
2) Movies and shows
Nastya and I discovered documentaries as a genre together. “Live to 100” on Netflix was genuinely useful.
Of the feature films, I really got into “Escape from Alcatraz” (1979).
Of the shows, I liked “The Count of Monte Cristo.”
3) Most useful video
The latest Alex Hormozi podcast on the Diary of a CEO YouTube channel. It led me to make several strategic changes in my work — more on that in point 7.
4) The skill I worked on
Resting and switching off.
At the start of February, right before my birthday, I caught a virus, then got dehydrated, and then developed arrhythmia on top of it. An ambulance took me to the hospital for a day of IV drips.
After that, I just spent two weeks lying in bed watching my favorite teenage show, One Tree Hill.
Found a lot of interesting parallels between those old storylines and my life right now.
5) A hypothesis I tested
This happened more by necessity than by choice, but here it is anyway.
The idea is: if you don’t want to rest voluntarily, your body will happily force a rest on you — one that also costs you a lot of money.
Better to rest ahead of time than wait for surprises like that.
6) The habit I was building
I kept digitizing every process in my life and my work. It’s an interesting experience when everything you do starts speaking to you in numbers:
- how many courses were purchased;
- how many consultations happened;
- every metric behind follower growth.
It’s very easy to make good decisions when the data is right in front of you. The right call practically suggests itself.
7) Key insight of the month
Outstanding results come to people who stick with one business for 10 years or more.
Good results usually start showing up in years 4-6 of continuous growth within a single field.
Every time we get bored and start a new project, we basically reset that 10-year timer back to zero.
The result is mediocre outcomes across several areas, instead of one truly great achievement in a single field. Focus is everything.
That’s an idea from the Alex Hormozi interview I mentioned in point 3.
I’ve decided that for the coming years, I’ll grow only within the info-business space and won’t get distracted by other side projects, no matter how appealing they look.
Sometimes you have to leave a bit of easy money on the table so all your time and attention can go toward the big, scalable results.