Find Your Genetic Gifts or Cope - Up to You. Also a Note on Generating Luck

Level 1 - NGMI

Welcome Avatar! In the spirit of the Olympics its a good time to review the most controversial topic of all time: genetics. While there are always “exceptions to the rule” the chances are slim that exceptions apply to you specifically. If you look at professional athletes, their kids are typically quite athletic. When you look at wealthy business owners, it is common for their parents to be successful business owners, doctors, lawyers, bankers etc. This is just how the world works.

Genetic Gifts: Is anyone surprised that twin bothers Cameron and Cayden Boozer are related to.. Carlos Boozer an ex-NBA All Star (source). Is anyone surprised that Stephen Curry and Seth Curry are related to Dell Curry who happened to be a highly accurate 3-point NBA shooter (source).

While everyone focuses on the biggest names such as Jordan/LeBron, if you follow the general trend - highly athletic people will have a higher chance at having athletic kids.

Think it stops there? Nope. Warren Buffett is regarded as one of the best investors in history… and his father was? Howard Buffett an American businessman, investor, and politician (source)

We’re not going to argue this topic anymore. People saying they could “become elite” if they focused on it are coping. This is probably the #1 sign of cope if we’ve ever seen it. In the 21st century, the world is globally competitive.

This means if you’re truly elite at something, you will be plucked out of the group and instantly moved in that direction. It is too obvious to be ignored at the top 0.1% level. Once again, to believe otherwise is cope, seethe and at best mid-wit IQ.

Part 1: Using This to Stop Wasting Time

For base level items, you’ll find your talents/skills pretty quickly. If you’re fast you’ll know it at age 7-8. If you’re strong you’ll know it at age 7-8. If you are quick with math, english etc… you’ll know it by the same rough range. In fact, you can even spot leadership/extroversion/introversion by this rough range as well.

Looking at the Family Tree: Before our entire comments section is spammed with racism, your tree is going to give you directions. If you are not the son of LeBron James it doesn’t mean you’re doomed to a life of un-athletic mediocrity.

If you want an example take Su Bingtian (you have a much higher chance at being fast) and if you’re related to Manny Pacquiao (source), you should probably try something related to fighting.

Don’t mess this up. It is not related at all to more cope “diet and nutrition”. Elite people can eat/drink whatever they want with no real impact to performance until past age 28 or so. You are 100% coping if you think 12-15% body fat is hard while the elite guys eat gummy candies and Popeyes while remaining at 10% with ease. (Fries, Apple Pies and Chicken Nuggets - diet for world record holders!)

In Simple Steps (Physical):

• Measure out the basic body parts: arm length, leg length, wrist thickness, ankle thickness, hand and fingers and size of big toe on foot

  • Arm length long? Better for throwing, tennis, and other whipping type motions. Hand length is likely related to long arms

  • Wrist Thickness? If extremely thin likely high metabolism and smaller frame suited for something like tennis, distance running (Usain bolt was exception here) and maybe volleyball. Will depend on their speed/jump test results

  • Ankle insertion and calf size, long and slim is more for running. Typically means legs are longer than their torso (short torso + longer legs is an obvious sign of leg strength). While thicker/wider calf sizes would be seen in olympic power lifting

  • Larger big toe is suited for explosive leg activity. Large big toe = more force on the ground.

  • If you wear a medium shirt but large shorts, it means you are lower body dominant (better leg strength). If you are quickly gaining muscle in your arms and back, you are upper body dominant.

• Limbal Ring Test - This is later in life around age 16 and again at age 21. If the person looks extremely young (acne issues thick limbal ring, no lower eyelid hair) it means they are going to improve even more as they go to college/early 20s. Likely have not fully matured height/weight wise

  • If the person has a lot of facial hair, lower eyelid hair, thick skin with no glow - it means they are maturing faster and are likely only performing well due to *bad* genetics. They hit maturity much faster than they should have.

In Simple Steps (Mental):

• Even at that same age band, maybe expand to 7-10 years old, you can see this developing as wells: 1) ability to do basic math problems quickly, 2) enjoying/not enjoying puzzle solving and 3) ability to consistently surprise adults with off the cuff comments.

  • “Kids say the Darndest Things” was a show that many didn’t understand - the ones consistently funny/punchy should have become writers. If they have a knack for getting an emotional reaction from adults at age 7-10… that’s a talent if it is done on purpose

• Separate being interested and being good. If someone likes to make sculptures out of play-doh and they all look horrendous, this isn’t something to encourage. You’d have to check the family tree quickly to see if there is a builder in the family. If there is and it is related to say home construction, then you’d probably get complicated lego sets and see what happens

• Figure out the type of problems they are able to solve quickly. Is it related to spacial reasoning, complex math, geometry? This will give you a much clearer picture of what the building block is.

  • Spacial reasoning might apply more to designing say a phone/computer since you’re figuring out the best layouts

  • Geometric might apply to building new types of machinery

  • Complex math is probably some NASA/Space level stuff we wouldn’t even understand since going beyond advanced calculus seemed pointless

• Logic puzzles related to being out of place are likely separate entirely. The various IQ tests that require you to spot which item is incorrect. This would likely apply to someone looking to troubleshoot/find errors in something (perhaps code or looking for design flaws in architecture)

All of this is going to give you a lot of trends to spot in your family tree. If the majority worked in construction we’d bet more on your ability to build a business there than say software (and vice versa). If it isn’t that black and white you’re going to have to find similarities. Construction would be more similar to plumbing. Software would be more similar to e-com. Writing is more similar to copywriting. Speaking is more similar to in person sales.

In short, don’t make life harder than it needs to be. You should be most interested in being the best at something, not trying to be good at something you’re terrible at. The idea of leaning into weaknesses is mainstream cope.

Part 2: Try to Do Your Own Research

We’re sure all the conspiracy people will say that you should never get your DNA tested. That’s fine. For those that realize the government already has this information if they want, it’s for you.

Go ahead and trace back your DNA a few generations. Here are some general *trends* that typically occur.

If you are the first child you are more likely to have genetic disposition related to your Dad than your Mom. This is a general guideline and is not “fact”. It is probability based.

If you are the second child, you are more likely to have a genetic disposition related to your Mom. This is also a general probability based guideline. After that (3 kids or more) there isn’t enough consistent information to say which genetics are more prevalent.

Note: go ahead and do this anecdotally. Take a look at photos of brothers/sisters and see how much the first child resembles the dad and the second child resembles the mom. This isn’t just a physical comment but personality traits, cognitive traits etc.

Go Back on the Tree: Realistically, looking back about 2 generations is good enough. Your mom/dad their parents. Most people already know what their parents are good/bad at. Therefore, you’re going to research your grandparents the most. If you are the first child, your dad’s side. If you are the second child, your mom’s side.

After this, you can also go back a few generations and simply look up occupation. You’ll probably see a trend in there. Could be construction, could be math based, could be musical. Who knows. You will eventually find a general trend.

There is a reason why each country/region *generally* has a specialization of talents. While the media loves to focus on the exceptions vs. the rules, the rules are most important. Similar to the meaningless discussion of hard work.

Finding talent is step one. Hard work yields nothing if you’re working on the wrong thing. Like taking a 6’ 7” guy and making him do gymnastics. Good luck!

Before the Complaints Come In - Some Observations

Say you have a bad history. Looks like a laundry list of failures. There is still some hope!

If you’re a good trend spotter, you’ll notice a lot of the most successful people come from families burdened with drug, alcohol, and other vice addictions. The reason for this is actually genetics.

Addictive Personality: Generally speaking this is one of those traits that creates extreme upside or extreme downside. If you look at success cases there is a common thread of drug/alcohol abuse and even psychological issues in the family tree. This might be startling to some but there is a thin line between crazy and genius.

That thin line is largely based on how the dopamine is being generated. If the person cannot find a topic/skill to obsess over, they end up going down the drug addiction rabbit hole. Once you see this over hundreds of examples (actors/actresses; CEOs/CFOs) you simply cannot unsee it. If you’ve been around wealthy families, there is at least one or more outcasts doing drugs since the family couldn’t solve for their skillset.

In short, history of addiction or strange psych issues can actually be a blurry line between genius. Try to tap into addiction and apply it to whatever task you are skilled at.

Regarding Overlap: This section is more observation than science. Don’t get upset or offended.

• Assuming your family tree doesn’t have a long shelf life and develops faster, this means you want to maximize all your physical attributes early. If your family tree hits puberty early and develops early, try to get scholarships in the 16-17 age and don’t look back. Likely an uphill battle

  • This is quite easy to see, thinning limbal ring, fast facial hair, breast development for women, eyelid hair - lowers, baby fat going away with a faster muscular jawline

• If you are good at math? Here are some typical items: likely music, high probability of spacial reasoning and also a high correlation to competitive video games outside first person shooters (army based games for example)

• If you are good at writing? You’re likely going to be creative since that represents good writing. You should go into online sales, in person sales, copywriting and maybe even comedy depending on what type of writing you do.

• Good at speaking? This is likely reserved for some dreaded roles like HR. It could also be speech writing, stand up comedy/drama and sermons at a church

• High endurance athlete? Have found these types excel in corporate world. Once you see the connection between endurance obsession an corporate, you can’t unsee it.

  • Nothing to cry about, having a good career is usually step one in success anyway (outside pro athletes and extreme CEOs like Zuck). If you are an endurance athlete you will likely do well in the competitive corporate world simply because you can sustain more pain

• Faster Twitch Athlete? Have found they are more risk loving. This is a double edged sword as they are generally unwilling to put in long hours or fight through the dreaded down months/years. Usually jumping from biz to biz giving up after 3 years of flat trends. Vast majority quit around year three - not sure why but it’s by far the most common year.

All of this should take you down a decent path and avoid wasting time on things you’re not going to be good at anyway.

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Part 3: Getting Luckier - Side note

On a completely unrelated note, for those that remember the humorous PitchBook put together (source), there was a short slide on how to create luck (below)

After further trend spotting we’ve finally found a way to describe what lady luck rewards. This is printed below.

It really applies to everything from starting a biz, to dating to your career. Generally speaking the vibe is “Ain’t no way this working but i’m gonna do it anyway for the laughs”. Elaborate business plans, strategies and step by step guidelines like graduating public school? They don’t work.

If you want to maximize the chances that it works, you simply: 1) cannot care at all about the outcome, 2) don’t come up with an initial “strategy” and 3) do your best just to say you tried.

If you look back at your various breakthroughs we’re pretty sure this is how it goes. Someone says “hey you’re good at X try Y”. You have a laugh attack then say, you know what sure man i’ll at least give it a go. Then you end up going down some deep portal that changes your life.

“Ha no chance this works, sure whatever i’ll wing it!”.

Fast forward and the next 5-10 years of your life has changed for good.

Specific Example: For anyone who has started up a biz or watched other people start them.. how familiar is the below?

• Guy 1: Spends a ton of time thinking of the best website name. Then obsesses over the logo. Then obsesses over the colors. Then obsesses over the name of the entity. Then spends tons of time obsessing over the filing of LLC/S-corp. Then spends thousands on perfect design of all the above. Then finally launches. It fails.

• Guy 2: Sees something is trending and decides to just start selling off some trashy website that looks like Geocities. Grand total of $50 invested. Buys some basic ads and pushes some traffic to it. Within a month is already net positive. It succeeds.

  • Later on this guy has to spend money fixing the website, the name, the colors etc to improve conversions. Emphasis there. It already makes money, but after a lot of basic improvements conversion rates make it more profitable from both a revenue and operating margin standpoint

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Can go ahead and ask anything related to your genetic tree or our observation on luck.

All other comments/questions can wait for the monthly Q&A on Wednesday.

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Disclaimer: None of this is to be deemed legal or financial advice of any kind. These are *opinions* written by an anonymous group of Ex-Wall Street Tech Bankers and software engineers who moved into affiliate marketing and e-commerce.

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