“Geniuses have very limited toolsets — they have a hammer, and their genius is in looking for nails.”
– Adam Robinson
Adam Robinson (@IAmAdamRobinson) first appeared on this podcast in the “Becoming the Best Version of You” episode (#210) alongside Josh Waitzkin (chess, jiu-jitsu, investing) and Ramit Sethi (personal finance, entrepreneurship).
By popular demand, this is a dedicated episode of Adam’s stories and life lessons.
Adam Robinson has made a lifelong study of outflanking and outsmarting the competition. He is a rated chess master who was awarded a Life Title by the United States Chess Federation. As a teenager, he was personally mentored by Bobby Fischer in the 18 months leading up to his winning the world championship.
Then, in his first career, he developed a revolutionary approach to taking standardized tests as one of the two original co-founders of The Princeton Review. His paradigm-breaking — or “category killing,” as they say in publishing — test-prep book, The SAT: Cracking the System, is the only test-prep book ever to have become a New York Times bestseller. After selling his interest in The Princeton Review, Adam turned his attention in the early ’90s to the then-emerging field of artificial intelligence, developing a program that could analyze text and provide human-like commentary. He was later invited to join a well-known quant fund to develop statistical trading models, and since, he has established himself as an independent global macro advisor to the chief investment officers of a select group of the world’s most successful hedge funds and family offices.
In his spare time, he’s also become pen pals with Warren Buffett.
This is a wide-ranging conversation (aka conversational parkour) with lots of takeaways. I hope you enjoy listening to it as much as I enjoyed recording it!
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- Listen to it on iTunes.
- Stream by clicking here.
- Download as an MP3 by right-clicking here and choosing “save as.”
Want to hear another podcast with Adam Robinson? — In this episode, we discuss a variety of topics on business, wealth, and happiness, and are joined by Ramit Sethi and Josh Waitzkin (stream below or right-click here to download):
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QUESTION(S) OF THE DAY: What was your favorite quote or lesson from this episode? Please let me know in the comments.
Scroll below for links and show notes…
Selected Links from the Episode
- Connect with Adam:
- Becoming the Best Version of You (Adam’s first appearance on this show)
- What Smart Students Know: Maximum Grades. Optimum Learning. Minimum Time. by Adam Robinson
- You Can Be a Stock Market Genius: Uncover the Secret Hiding Places of Stock Market Profits by Joel Greenblatt
- Regulation Fair Disclosure
- Blythedale Children’s Hospital
- My 60 Memorable Games by Bobby Fischer
- Abandoned NY: Inside Grossinger’s Crumbling Catskill Resort Hotel by Pablo Iglesias Maurer, Gothamist
- Iocane powder is noted as being one of the deadliest poisons known to man.
- The Karate Kid
- Granny Smith apples
- Laurence Olivier’s To Be Or Not To Be soliloquy from Hamlet
- Seasonal affective disorder (SAD)
- The 3Bs of Creativity: Bed, Bath, and Bus by Jim Briggs
- Are Psychedelic Drugs the Next Medical Breakthrough?
- The Psychedelic Explorer’s Guide — Risks, Micro-Dosing, Ibogaine, and More
- Tao Te Ching by Lao Tsu
- More Money Than God: Hedge Funds and the Making of a New Elite by Sebastian Mallaby
- What is a hedge fund?
- Stoicism Resources and Recommendations
- What is Hedonism?
- The Tao of Seneca: Letters from a Stoic Master
- What is Epicureanism?
- The Essential Rumi, New Expanded Edition by Jalal al-Din Rumi
- Beeman’s Gum
- Laird Hamilton, The King of Big Wave Surfing (Plus: Gabrielle Reece and Brian MacKenzie)
Show Notes
- An anecdote about Warren Buffett’s day planner and thoughts on what Warren Buffett actually does. [06:51]
- Can you be a stock market gladiator? [08:36]
- Planning on investing? What is your edge? [10:48]
- Warren Buffett’s one-sentence secret to being a great investor. [12:52]
- How Adam turned a chance encounter on the street with his hero — the reclusive chess champion Bobby Fischer — into a lasting friendship. [14:51]
- On informed simplicity via Bobby Fischer, Picasso, and Oliver Wendell Holmes. [28:14]
- The limited toolset of genius. [30:47]
- The “read far and wide” genius of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger. [32:24]
- Looking for patterns and things that don’t make sense. [34:05]
- Adam’s decision-making process for choosing opportunities. [38:15]
- The last thing Adam’s father said to him before passing. [41:30]
- Adam’s nutritional odyssey: Granny Smith apples for optimizing function (and avoiding English institutional food). [44:31]
- The three rules for success. [53:03]
- On coping with depression and learning to focus on needs of others over needs of the self. [56:14]
- If you suffer from bouts of depression, become aware of the biochemical markers that forewarn of its onset. [1:01:12]
- The three Bs of creativity. [1:02:57]
- On hearing and paying attention to what the unconscious mind is trying to tell you. [1:06:00]
- Does Adam view himself as a risk-taker? [1:15:20]
- On hedge funds that don’t hedge. [1:17:22]
- Stoicism vs. Hedonism [1:21:13]
- Philosophers or thinkers Adam recommends. [1:27:03]
- How is the next day different when deciding to break from the past? [1:30:39]
- A gambler walks into a bar… [1:36:00]
- An example of magic and being one-upped as the world’s best gift-giver. [1:42:10]
- The fulcrum moment: “Now is the time to act.” [1:48:15]
- Accentuate the positive; eliminate the negative. Create delight. [1:49:45]
People Mentioned
- Josh Waitzkin
- Ramit Sethi
- Warren Buffett
- Bobby Fischer
- Molly
- Joel Greenblatt
- Charlie Munger
- Eleanor Roosevelt
- Forrest Gump
- Ferris Bueller
- Magnus Carlsen
- Samuel Reshevsky
- Kobe Bryant
- Stephen Curry
- Boris Spassky
- Muhammad Ali
- Dread Pirate Roberts
- Oliver Wendell Holmes, Sr.
- Pablo Picasso
- Rembrandt
- Abraham Maslow
- Sam Zell
- Tony Robbins
- Elizabeth Taylor
- Martin Polanco
- Dan Engle
- James Fadiman
- Woody Allen
- Marcus Aurelius
- Seneca
- Charles Darwin
- Lucilius Junior
- Epicurus
- Jalal al-Din Rumi
- Plato
- Gabrielle Reece