I get really angry when I get behind a slow driver and people always tell me to calm down. They don’t get where the rage comes from. It comes from not being able to understand how someone can be so devoid of purpose or direction that they not only lack urgency in their own life, but they actively impede others who know where they want to go.

It seems to me that the worst thing you could ever say about someone is “You’re not just mediocre, you’re contagiously mediocre.” We all have problems, areas where we are objectively bad at things, but to drag others down–either via obliviousness or malice–is about the most evil act one can engage in.

Since the redesign I have seen a big influx of traffic, so if you’re new, this is for you. Or a bit of review for everyone else.

Greatest Hits

The Business of Running

-Why you have set your own pace and stick to it. If you don’t, you let others define you and ultimately doom your chances of success.

On the Spartans and the Perfect Paper

I was hesitant to write this but then after I posted it, it went viral on three separate occasions and continues to be my most popular post ever. (It is doing really well on StumbleUpon–and for all of you that voted for it before, the URL has changed and it’d be great if you could vote again)

Of all Virtues…Energy

I wrote this sitting in the office one day after remembering the Von Clausewitz quote–sort of stream of consciousness–but I’m really glad I did.

Why We Could Eliminate the A-List Bloggers and Be Smarter for It

Everyday the head of the Long Tail gets less and less relevant. This post was big for me too, I ended up discovering a lot of latent agreement from big people that didn’t want to admit it publicly.

Well son, what do you want to do with your life

I’m still not exactly sure, but I’m a lot closer to figuring it out. The comment section on this did really well.

Important Pages:

The Reading List (read them, they won’t let you down)

Book Quotes and Passages (almost 15,000 words at this point)

About Me (work in progress)

Ryan on Rudius

Ryan on TMMB

Ryan on Myspace

Ryan on Facebook

Ryan on Digg

Ryan on Del.icio.us

One last thing:

And even though the design is awesome, the site really is easier to read via RSS. If you subscribe you’ll get all the updates within minutes of them being posted–and you won’t have to deal with ads, or load times or partial feeds, or any of that other stuff. I suggest Google Reader. If you want to subscribe to my feed, click here. I’d appreciate it if you would.

Tim Ferriss is promoting a new charity idea that he is working on called LitLiberation.

It’s not really my thing but I think it would be really cool if a charity announced a partnership with WheresGeorge.com, the money tracking site. All charitable donations would converted to cash before they were deposited and then their serial numbers would be entered into the database. For the rest of that bill’s circulation, as it was tracked by its exchangers, the donation giver’s name would show up as the originator and labeled as “charitable.” But more importantly, they could trace its path all over the world, seeing the “good” that it is doing–maintaining ownership in a way that keeping it would have never really touched. And here’s the thing, it looks like the ultimate transparency, a truly open charity. But it’s really since it all goes to the bank, they aren’t significantly more accountable then they are now. Wouldn’t every other charity have to do the same thing? I know where I would put my money.