Why Michael Jordan should play poker

Here’s a question for you:

If you wanna be good at the thing (a sport, work, music, writing, pick what you want), should I do the thing, or do something else?

Stupid question, you might think…

Of course, if you wanna be Jordan you can’t play poker all day.

Sure, but hear me out.

Yesterday, I watched a trailer for a documentary about Ralph Lauren.

Good looking guy!

And here’s a few quotes from Ralph in the trailer:

“I never thought I was in the fashion business… no, I hate fashion”

“My father was an artist, but I didn’t have his talent… the artistry came another way.”

Then actor, Jessica Chastain, says something:

“You have to have a full life to be able to create. You can’t create from emptiness.”

Let that sink in.

You can’t create from emptiness.

Then I remembered a few other things I read.

The first one is from email copywriter Ben Settle.

“Going at your market or client with just tactics’ll get you killed.

It’s like a guy with a boring personality using some PUA* tactics he learned in a $17 eBook sold on Gumroad to get a date, only to creep the chick out or turn her off when she quickly finds out he’s got nothing else but a few lines written by someone who does have a personality.”

(*PUA is techniques to pick up partners)

The second one is a life lesson from writer Morgan Housel:

There’s as much to learn about your field from other fields than there is within your field…

And…

Once you see the roots shared by most fields you realize there’s a sink of information you’ve been ignoring that can help you make better sense of your own profession…

So, let’s try to pull all this mambo together.

Again, sure, if you wanna be Jordan, make sure to play a lot of basketball.

But if you wanna stand out or be creative on court, playing a few hands poker might do you good.

And that goes for fashion, picking up a date, and life.

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