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Farnam Street (FS) helps you master the best of what other people have already figured out.

Our weekly newsletter is packed with timeless insights and robust principles from a wide range of disciplines. The goal is simple but not easy: think better, perform better, and live a better life.

Our readers include students, teachers, CEOs, coaches, athletes, artists, leaders, followers, politicians, and more. They’re not defined by gender, age, income, geography, or politics but rather by a shared passion for living a meaningful life, doing good, and avoiding problems before they happen.

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Recent Articles

You’re Only As Good As Your Worst Day

December 07, 2020

We tend to measure performance by what happens when things are going well. Yet how people, organizations, companies, leaders, and other things do on their best day isn’t all that instructive. To find the truth, we need to look at what happens on the worst day. “Anyone can steer the ship when the sea is […]

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Explore Or Exploit? How To Choose New Opportunities

November 30, 2020

One big challenge we all face in life is knowing when to explore new opportunities, and when to double down on existing ones. Explore vs exploit algorithms – and poetry – teach us that it’s vital to consider how much time we have, how we can best avoid regrets, and what we can learn from […]

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Mental Models for Career Changes

November 23, 2020

Career changes are some of the biggest moves we will ever make, but they don’t have to be daunting. Using mental models to make decisions we determine where we want to go and how to get there. The result is a change that aligns with the person we are, as well as the person we […]

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The Great Mental Models V2

This is the second book in The Great Mental Models series and the highly anticipated follow up to the Wall Street Journal bestseller, Volume 1: General Thinking Concepts.

We tend to isolate the things we know in the domain we learned it. For example:

  • What does the inertia of a rolling stone have to do with perseverance and being open-minded?
  • How can the ancient process of steel production make you a more creative and innovative thinker?
  • What does the replication of our skin cells have to do with being a stronger and more effective leader?

On the surface, these concepts may appear to be dissimilar and unrelated. But the surprising truth is the hard sciences (physics, chemistry, and biology) offer a wealth of useful tools you can use to develop critically important skills like:

  • Relationship building
  • Leadership
  • Communication
  • Creativity
  • Curiosity
  • Problem-solving
  • Decision-making

The second volume of the Great Mental Models series shows you how to make those connections. It explores the core ideas from the hard sciences and offers nearly two dozen models to add to your mental toolbox.

You’ll not only get a better understanding of the forces that influence the world around you, but you’ll learn how to direct those forces to create outsized advantages in the areas of your life that matter most to you.


What People are Saying


I'm really glad this exists in the world and I can see that I will be recommending it often.

Matt Mullenweg

The Bible for better learning and decision making

Casey Herron on audible.com