Author / Nathan Coumbe

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Posts by Nathan Coumbe

My mission is to learn, inform, inspire, and improve. I am a passionate teacher, an avid writer, a leader of people, and a strategic thinker. Wherever I am, whatever the work I am called to do, my goal is the same: make my little corner of the world better for everyone in it. To do this, I ask better questions and solve more interesting problems for those I serve. Think deeply. Think often. Keep exploring. Always be curious.
by Nathan Coumbe

What are trophies for?

Why do we award medals and trophies to athletes who compete at Olympian levels?

Why do we build statues to great leaders and war heroes?

Is it to immortalize their achievements, or something greater than that?

The great orator Demosthenes said:

“Reflect, then, that your ancestors set up those trophies, not that you may gaze at them in wonder, but that you may also imitate the virtues of the men who set them up.”

They don’t exist for us to stare with admiration. The point isn’t so our children will say “gee, whiz, Mom, that’s really cool what you did.”

These monuments to great achievement exist to move us to even greater ones.

Don’t just admire others’ work and success—aspire to be that same kind of person. Do work that others will look upon in awe and seek to emulate or surpass 50, 100, or 1,000 years later.

Don’t erect monuments for your own glory. Instead, use them to inspire others to surpass you.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Hit the buzzer before you know the answer

The secret to winning Jeopardy?

Hit the buzzer before you know the answer

If you wait until you know the answer, that split second hesitation lets the other person get ahead of you.

If you hit the buzzer first, you’ll at least have a chance of getting it right.

But if you wait, the opportunity to succeed instantly passes you by.

(H/t to Seth Godin for reminding me of this principle.)

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by Nathan Coumbe

We don’t control the world around us…

Here’s a quote worth writing down:

A Stoic believes they don’t control the world around them, only how they respond—and that they must always respond with courage, temperance, wisdom, and justice.

I believe the same thing applies to all humans, not just those of us who practice Stoicism.

Write it down (and check out the author’s post).

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by Nathan Coumbe

“You’re not sick… You don’t get a day off”

I’ve had a migraine all day long… I’ve been so miserable it’s been tough to get anything done.

And yet, in the back of my head, I’ve heard Seth Godin’s voice from one of his best podcast episodes:

“You’re not sick… You don’t get a day off.”

Sadly, when we’re creators, artists, people trying to change the world—essentially, because we’re human—we don’t get a day off from our responsibilities.

It would be so easy to use something as a reason not to do the work I desperately need to do for myself and others.

But I don’t get a day off from being human. So I put in the time, however small or insignificant the progress might seem.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Make people better

What’s the purpose of a leader?

If you subscribe to Ryan Holiday’s “Daily Stoic” newsletter, you’ve probably seen he’s done a week-long feature on leadership and Stoic philosophy.

One email he wrote earlier this week stood out to me… I’ve been able to think of little else since. It’s about the sole purpose of being a leader. Here are some of the quotes used in the email:

“Happy is the man who can make others better, not merely when he is in their company, but even when he is in their thoughts. —Seneca

Another one here from Seneca:

“Nobody can live happy [sic] if he cares only for himself, if he turns everything to his own benefit: you have to live for others, if you want to live for yourself.”

Then, near the end of the email, he sums up an idea from Marcus Aurelius:

“As Marcus Aurelius writes in Meditations, people are our proper occupation. ‘[My] job is to do them good.’ When we make others better, he writes elsewhere, ‘we perform our function.’“

Summing up his newsletter, he makes this statement:

Leaders make people better.

We’re all leaders. And we’re all philosophers.

So let’s make other people better.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Are you an innovator… or one of the others?

Here’s one of the most enlightening things I’ve heard this week (and it’s 30+ years old).

It’s a quote by Denis Waitley from his audio program “The Psychology of Winning“:

“Victims are inactive, waiting and dreading… the survivors are reacting, and hanging in there… the dreamers are in the shower, active but nonproductive… [but] the innovators are out of the shower, dressed, ready, and proactive in the market. 

The innovator for the 21st century has the visionary’s ability to look ahead…

The philosopher’s ability to learn from history…

The inventor’s ability to employ breakthrough concepts…

And the entrepreneur’s ability to deliver those concepts profitably and effectively to the marketplace.”

Right now, if I’m honest, I’d say I’m somewhere between dreamer and innovator. What’s holding me back? My failure to take action when I think I should.

What about you? Where do you fall within these categories?

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by Nathan Coumbe

Infinity makes your career difficult

“Infinity” overwhelms us. We aren’t wired to understand or cope with it.

When we humans are faced with a seemingly infinite number of choices, most of the time we make no choice at all.

We freeze up, afraid to make the wrong one…

Or we just walk away…

Or, sometimes, we just go with whoever or whatever happens to be #1 that day—the “industry leader”.

And today, we have an infinite number of career choices. We grow up being told we can be anything… and in many cases that’s true. Most of the gatekeepers are gone.

But we’re also pushed to develop competence in many areas, rather than expertise or remarkability in just one or a few. We have to get Bs in everything, rather than an A+ in our favorite area and some Cs in the others.

This need to be good at everything, combined with too many choices, paralyzes us. Because we don’t want to pick the “wrong thing”. We don’t want to dedicate years of our lives and massive amounts of money to something that might not be a good fit.

So we don’t pick at all… Or we just pick the one that has the highest possible salary, the best job prospects, or the most security.

We don’t consider who we are, how we’re wired, what we love, what changes we’d like to see in the world…

We just go with whatever comes our way… but we can do so much better than that. We can contribute so much more.

But we have to choose what we’re going to focus on… and what we’re going to quit.

So what do you do? How do you overcome the paralysis of analysis? The overwhelm we experience when faced with too many choices?

Tell me your thoughts in the comments.

(H/t to Seth Godin for inspiring this post)

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by Nathan Coumbe

Can you get rid of household chores?

I just finished reading Michael Hyatt’s latest blog post: “3 Ways to Create More Margin in Your Personal Life” and absolutely loved it.

I’ve been a follower of his advice for a few years now, but I’ve always just applied his stuff to my work life.

Today’s blog post showed me that I could easily apply his “Delegate, Automate, Eliminate” philosophy for things I do around the house.

Most interestingly, his advice is to find what you both enjoy and do well at home that also needs to be done.

For me, that’s cooking. I enjoy doing it, making menus, crafting yummy healthy meals, and serving it to people I love.

But most of the other things I have to do, I either hate doing or just don’t do well. The two that first came to mind were cleaning and lawn care.

But for whatever reason, I never thought to eliminate, automate, or delegate any of these things. So what did I do?

We’ve already hired someone to handle our lawn care from now on. The next step is to hire someone to help us keep our home clean.

That way, we’re helping someone else make a living, creating more margin in our free time, and focusing on what we enjoy and do best.

Check out the article here:

3 Ways to Create More Margin in Your Personal Life

Once you read it, let me know in the comments what you’re planning to eliminate, delegate, or automate. I’d love to see what you’d like to focus on instead.

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by Nathan Coumbe

First, put wood on the fire

Here’s one of my favorite quotes from Earl Nightingale:

“It’s foolish to sit in front of the fireplace and tell it ‘first give me some heat. Then I’ll give you some wood.’“

Of course, it’s a little foolish to talk to your fireplace at all. But that’s not the point.

Why would you expect the fire to warm you up with no wood? That’s as foolish as thinking people will buy from you before you’ve created value for them.

You have to help people before they’ll give you money…

You can’t get warm if you don’t put wood on the fire.

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by Nathan Coumbe

Your day begins at sunset

In traditional Jewish & Orthodox Christian cultures, the new day begins at sunset, not sunrise.

Even God, in the book of Genesis, began his work days building the universe in the evening.

Yet we base all our work, plans, and decision-making around what time we wake up. And we end the day with (often inadequate) rest and sleep.

What if we flipped this idea on its head?

I’ve been listening to Michael Hyatt’s latest book, Win at Work & Succeed at Life. In it, he has an entire section dedicated to this topic and its importance.

But what interested me the most was the inverted way he looks at work and rest.

He made me realize that rest isn’t a reward for hard work…

In fact, rest is the vital precursor to doing excellent work day after day.

Think about it: in the ancient world, everyone worked long, hard days building, crafting, and farming. Without adequate rest, their bodies would have broken down, and their work would have suffered.

The crop might have failed, the buildings might have crumbled… Their creations would have worn out and broken. So their days began at sunset, which means they started their days with rest, relaxation, and sleep.

Most of us do knowledge work these days, but the same principle applies. We have to prioritize rest if we hope to succeed at work.

Can you change your mindset and start your days with rest?

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