I just finished re-reading 1984.

I love dystopian stories that expose the dark side of humanity.

In Orwell's world, the state controls the people.

They have their own language (Newspeak), brainwashing (the 2 Minute Hate), and if you think individually (Thoughtcrime), you’re whisked off to be tortured, pacified, or killed.

I don’t believe we’ll get to this point (although my friend tells me us Brits aren’t doing too great).

But governments aren’t the real threat.

We are.

The issue?

The pull of incentives

“Man is born free but everywhere he is in chains.” — Jean-Jacques Rousseau

Charlie Munger once said to understand behaviour, understand incentives.

Incentives are things we stand to gain.

For example, as I write this, there’s a box of cookies in the kitchen. I wish I didn’t think about them. Because now there’s a high chance I’ll make a cup of tea and devour them after this email.

Short term gain, long term pain.

Now, not all incentives are bad. But it's human nature to do bad things to acquire the best rewards—we always want the hack, the shortcut, the cheat code.

But the best things cannot be rushed.

Consider attention—the ultimate box of digital cookies.

The reason writing is so powerful is because you can reach the world.

But how you earn attention is more important than how fast.

It’s not something we should binge on, but slowly enjoy. If you want a durable business, quality is more important than quantity.

This is hard for our monkey-minds to compute. We’ve never had so much dopamine so freely available.

Just take a look at social media.

Everyone sounds the same.

Growth gurus give boilerplate tactics promising rewards of fame. But follow their advice for a year and you realise you’re building on foundations of sand. And there’s a tidal wave of noise incoming to wash away commodity creators.

Now, I'm no saint.

I've smoked my fair share of the digital dopamine crack pipe.

But algorithms are like 1984’s overlords. They’re creating a society devoid of uniqueness. Clones without creativity.

But online, you’re not killed for standing out.

You’re rewarded.

Don’t follow the crowd. Follow your curiosity.

The quality of your writing is directly related to your ability to resist temptation.

Because the path of least resistance leads to the place of most difficulty:

The noisy middle.

This is why Magnetic Writers follows their curiosity, not the crowd. They focus less on what they ‘should do’ and more on what they want to do.

Your uniqueness should permeate through the content you create, the ideas you pursue, and the offers you build.

At first, you’ll be punished for this pursuit.

You’ll see peers catapult ahead as they ride the next trend. But you’re heading to a better destination. Your tribe is out there—waiting to feel the pull of your passion.

Let’s wrap this up.

Your north star

Tim Ferriss once said to get better answers, ask better questions.

When you think about what to write and build, don’t ask what the crowd asks:

• Will this go more viral?
• Will this give me more status?
• Will this make me more money?

Ask:

What makes me most curious?

Online, the most selfless thing you can do is build selfishly.