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A viral X post from late last year pitted images depicting two hustle-culture lifestyles side by side: tech bro hoodie and Notes app icon on one side, a business suit and a copy of Cal Newports Deep Work on the other side. Left guy will most likely beat the right guy, it concluded. Guy on the left makes more money but guy on the right is happier, one user commented. Whether its grind mode, routine maxxing or some other high-octane sleep when youre dead approach to work, the right specific approach within that umbrella is unclear. Its the question plaguing young founders and Silicon Valley types. Maybe some aim to lock in, grind away from 9 to 9 six days per week, fueled by White Monster, a laptop and a dream. Or perhaps the more effective rise-and-grind technique is to stick to some version of Patrick Batemans morning routine from American Psycho. Alarm at 3:55 a.m. Ice bath. Affirmations. Lift some weights. Supplements. Ready to stare at a three-monitor setup for the next eight hours straight, interrupted only by a wearable tracker reminding you to hit your ten thousand steps. One founder suggested the best combination is actually both. There’s gonna be weeks where you have specific deadlines that you just have to grind it out, and you’re not getting good sleep, and you’re not really taking maybe the best health approach to your work routine, explains Gannon Breslin, CEO of snowballapp.ai, in a recent TikTok post. He calls this pure grind mode. Its a case of simply getting done what needs to get done, however you can get it done. This grind mentality is increasingly common among a new generation of Silicon Valley upstarts. In fact, many job listings for AI startups leave no confusion about their expectations from potential applicants. “Please don’t join if you’re not excited about working ~70 hrs/week in person with some of the most ambitious people in NYC,” read the description for a role at Rilla, a New York-based tech business. Nobody ever changed the world on 40 hours a week, Elon Musk once said. The key, according to Breslin, is to balance this out when your business is in homeostasis. This is prime time to optimize. That’s when you’re really caring about your sleep pattern, making sure you have everything dialed in, he says in the clip. This is when workers might reestablish a sense of routine wake up early, focus on their nutrition thats been neglected while living and breathing the 996 lifestyle, and reduce any inefficiencies (or health problems) that emerged while in grind mode. And so it’s kind of this, like oscillating pattern between what state your company and business is in, Breslin concludes. If this all seems unsustainable, thats because it is. Burnout amongst workers is already at an all-time high. A 2025 report from online marketplace Care.com found, while companies believed 45% of their workers were at risk of burnout, in fact 69% of employees said they were actually at moderate to high risk. Luckily, theres also a secret third thing. Its called having a life.
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E-Commerce
If youve been dreaming of adding a mid-sized SUV to your cart alongside a bulk pack of granola bars and a new air fryerwell, were not quite there yet. But that day is getting closer: Amazon has officially rolled out its car-buying program. But before you prepare your driveway to make room for a two-ton Prime delivery, you should know that buying a car on Amazon isnt exactly like buying a Kindle. Heres the lowdown on how it works, who its for, and why you definitely cant return a Hyundai to Whole Foods. Whats for sale Right now, your options are limited. The main partner for new vehicles is Hyundai. If youre in the market for a Santa Fe, a Tucson, or an Ioniq, youre in luck. But if youre looking for a brand new Toyota or Ford, youre still gonna have to do things the old-fashioned way for now. For used cars, the selections a bit wider. Amazons opened the doors to certified pre-owned inventory from other brands and even some fleet vehicles. How it actually works Amazons essentially built a very slick, very familiar skin over the traditional dealership inventory system. Heres the process: Search: You go to the Amazon Autos section and filter by model, trim, color, and your zip code. Inventory: Youre looking at real cars sitting on real local dealer lots. Purchasing: This is the cool part. You can see the actual price, run a credit check, apply for financing, and put down a deposit directly through Amazon. No sitting in a glass office for three hours while a salesperson repeatedly “checks with the manager.” Handover: Once the digital paperworks done, you schedule a pickup or delivery. Returns: If your dealership participates in Hyundais Shopper Assurance program, youll have three days or up to 300 miles to decide if you want to keep the car or not. You can check if your dealership participates here. The catch(es) This isnt “Prime” Delivery. Dont expect a navy-blue van to drop off your Elantra. Youre actually buying this car from a local dealership, not Amazon. Amazons just the matchmaker. Youll either drive to the dealership to pick it up or, if youre lucky, the dealer will drive it to you. The closest one to me only offers pickup and the car wouldnt be ready for a few days. And the paperwork isnt 100% digital yet. Depending on your states laws, you might still have to sign a “wet” signature (real ink, real paper) when you take possession of the car. Were living in the future, but the DMVs still living in the 20th century. You might not have a ton of dealerships participating in your area, either. Where I live, near Boston, the closest dealership is 17 miles away which, given the absolutely atrocious traffic around here during normal business hours, might as well be on the other side of the planet. The bottom line Is this the revolution we were promised? Yes and no. If you hate negotiating and want to see transparent pricing without leaving your couch, buying a car through Amazon is a massive upgrade. It forces dealers to display real prices and cuts out the haggling. However, if you were hoping to bypass the dealership model entirely, were not there yet. Youre still buying from a dealer; youre just using Amazon as a buffer to keep the sales pressure at bay. For now, its a pretty good way to buy a Hyundai without spending your entire Saturday at the dealership.
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E-Commerce
This Presidents’ Day, Ive been thinking about George Washingtonnot at his finest hour, but possibly at his worst. In 1754, a 22-year-old Washington marched into the wilderness surrounding Pittsburgh with more ambition than sense. He volunteered to travel to the Ohio Valley on a mission to deliver a letter from Robert Dinwiddie, governor of Virginia, to the commander of French troops in the Ohio territory. This military mission sparked an international war, cost him his first command and taught him lessons that would shape the American Revolution. As a professor of early American history who has written two books on the American Revolution, Ive learned that Washingtons time spent in the Fort Duquesne area taught him valuable lessons about frontier warfare, international diplomacy and personal resilience. A young George Washington was thrust into the dense, contested wilderness of the Ohio River Valley as a land surveyor for real estate development companies in Virginia. [Image: Henry Hintermeister/Wiki Commons] The mission to expel the French In 1753, Dinwiddie decided to expel French fur trappers and military forces from the strategic confluence of three mighty waterways that crisscrossed the interior of the continent: the Allegheny, Monongahela and Ohio rivers. This confluence is where downtown Pittsburgh now stands, but at the time it was wilderness. King George II authorized Dinwiddie to use force, if necessary, to secure lands that Virginia was claiming as its own. As a major in the Virginia provincial militia, Washington wanted the assignment to deliver Dinwiddies demand that the French retreat. He believed the assignment would secure him a British army commission. Washington received his marching orders on Oct. 31, 1753. He traveled to Fort Le Boeuf in northwestern Pennsylvania and returned a month later with a polite but firm no from the French. Dinwiddie promoted Washington from major to lieutenant colonel and ordered him to return to the Ohio River Valley in April 1754 with 160 men. Washington quickly learned that French forces of about 500 men had already constructed the formidable Fort Duquesne at the forks of the Ohio. It was at this point that he faced his first major test as a military leader. Instead of falling back to gather more substantial reinforcements, he pushed forward. This decision reflected an aggressive, perhaps naive, brand of leadership characterized by a desire for action over caution. Washingtons initial confidence was high. He famously wrote to his brother that there was something charming in the sound of whistling bullets. The Jumonville affair and an international crisis Perhaps the most controversial moment of Washingtons early leadership occurred on May 28, 1754, about 40 miles south of Fort Duquesne. Guided by the Seneca leader Tanacharisonknown as the Half Kingand 12 Seneca warriors, Washington and his detachment of 40 militiamen ambushed a party of 35 French Canadian militiamen led by Ensign Joseph Coulon de Jumonville. The Jumonville affair lasted only 15 minutes, but its repercussions were global. Ten of the French, including Jumonville, were killed. Washingtons inability to control his Native American alliesthe Seneca warriors executed Jumonvilleexposed a critical gap in his early leadership. He lacked the ability to manage the volatile intercultural alliances necessary for frontier warfare. Washington also allowed one enemy soldier to escape to warn Fort Duquesne. This skirmish effectively ignited the French and Indian War, and Washington found himself at the center of a burgeoning international crisis. Defeat at Fort Necessity Washington then made the fateful decision to dig in and call for reinforcements instead of retreating in the face of inevitable French retaliation. Reinforcements arrived: 200 Virginia militiamen and 100 British regulars. They brought news from Dinwiddie: congratulations on Washingtons victory and his promotion to colonel. His inexperience showed in his design of Fort Necessity. He positioned the small, circular palisade in a meadow depression, where surrounding wooded high ground allowed enemy marksmen to fire down with impunity. Worse still, Tanacharison, disillusioned with Washingtons leadership and the British failure to follow through with promised support, had already departed with his warriors weeks earlier. When the French and their Native American allies finally attacked on July 3, heavy rains flooded the shallow trenches, soaking gunpowder and leaving Washingtons men vulnerable inside their poorly designed fortification. Illustration showing George Washington signing the articles of capitulation at Fort Necessity during the French and Indian Wars, on July 3, 1754. [Photo: Interim Archives/Getty Images] The battle of Fort Necessity was a grueling, daylong engagement in the mud and rain. Approximately 700 French and Native American allies surrounded the combined force of 460 Virginian militiamen and British regulars. Despite being outnumbered and outmaneuvered, Washington maintained order among his demoralized troops. When French commander Louis Coulon de VilliersJumonvilles brotheroffered a truce, Washington faced the most humbling moment of his young life: the necessity of surrender. His decision to capitulate was a pragmatic act of leadership that prioritized the survival of his men over personal honor. The surrender also included a stinging lesson in the nuances of diplomacy. Because Washington could not read French, he signed a document that used the word l’assassinat, which translates to assassination, to describe Jumonvilles death. This inadvertent admission that he had ordered the assassination of a French diplomat became propaganda for the French, teaching Washington the vital importance of optics in international relations. Lessons that forged a leader The 1754 campaign ended in a full retreat to Virginia, and Washington resigned his commission shortly thereafter. Yet, this period was essential in transforming Washington from a man seeking personal glory into one who understood the weight of responsibility. He learned that leadership required more than courageit demanded understanding of terrain, cultural awareness of allies and enemies, and political acumen. The strategic importance of the Ohio River Valley, a gateway to the continental interior and vast fur-trading networks, made these lessons all the more significant. Ultimately, the hard lessons Washington learned at the threshold of Fort Duquesne in 1754 provided the foundational experience for his later role as commander in chief of the Continental Army. The decisions he made in Pennsylvania and the Ohio wilderness, including the impulsive attack, the poor choice of defensive ground and the diplomatic oversight, were the very errors he would spend the rest of his military career correcting. Though he did not capture Fort Duquesne in 1754, the young George Washington left the woods of Pennsylvania with a far more valuable prize: the tempered, resilient spirit of a leader who had learned from his mistakes. Christopher Magra is a professor of American history at the University of Tennessee. This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
Category:
E-Commerce
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