A $50 book about wetsuits made me want my job back

Last weekend, in a rental house in Portugal, I found a $50 book about wetsuits. Tomorrow we fly home to Austin and I go back to work.

It was not the endless summer. We brought our baby to Barcelona and it was harder than I expected. I kept thinking how lucky I was in my 20s: single, no family, nothing to do besides work, try to get rich, and prove people wrong. If you’re a parent with a day job, I have a lot of respect for you. Your dream has to be strong enough against your daily resistance.

It’s kind of crazy. We’re living in Spain, we have a nanny, and a lot of the time we wanted to be back in America. When I tell people we’re in Spain I feel like such an ass. Why can’t I enjoy it more? But it’s okay that it’s been tough. We don’t have to fake it.

I was in the hot tub today with a friend and he brought up a Charlie Munger speech. Munger said, I don’t know a lot of things, but I can tell you how to guarantee you’re miserable: compare yourself to other people. I had some jealousy this summer. I have a friend at a very hot company, making good money, and he looks at the people who joined earlier and thinks, if only I’d been here then. Zoom out. You’re doing pretty damn well. I’m ending the summer in peace with where my life, my business, and my family are.

It’s always summer on the inside

The book is by Jack O’Neill, the founder of O’Neill. Wetsuits, surfboards, the glasses now. It’s called It’s Always Summer on the Inside, one of their old slogans.

He was surfing in San Francisco, freezing, and at an army surplus store he found a type of insulation nobody was using. He put it on, everyone laughed at him, and he was warm in the water. He got a little surf shop and sold them. Moved to Santa Cruz, kept improving the wetsuit. Booties, then the full wetsuit, then dry suits, over a 20 year period. He brought his sons in and went international.

Even their ads. Beautiful 1980s ads with a lot of text and one image, a naked woman putting on a wetsuit, and the line: it’s always summer on the inside. It pushes the edge. Ads today are about optimizing everything to the thousandth AI-tested version. The fundamentals haven’t changed. Have you made a great product people want, and can you make an ad unique enough that people say, dude, that’s cool? A great ad for a shitty product doesn’t work. Both together is such a cool combo.

His story was never about revenue targets. It was curiosity and solving problems he was excited about. I bought the book and sent it to a friend who surfs. I don’t surf at all.

Then I looked at AppSumo. Our integrity, our honor, the craftsmanship and quality of the work we’re doing. I really question it. How am I building my asset? How am I making it better and better and better?

The light was green

Today I was waiting to cross the street. The light turned green and the other people just stood there. Are they going to go? Well, it’s green. So I went.

That’s what I see in business, in investing, and in our lives. We look to others for permission, which you don’t need. I do it too. This guy’s not buying crypto, should I buy crypto? See where you want to go, check if it’s good to go, and go. Numerous times this year I told someone, I want to do this thing, and they said, I don’t know if that’s a good idea. That is literally what people told me when I started AppSumo 15 years ago. I tell people that too, and I wonder how much it discourages them.

Last night I spoke at Backstory, an English bookstore in Barcelona. Most people asking a question already know the answer. I used to tell people “that’s a stupid idea.” I’m right and they’re wrong, obviously. But who the fuck am I to say?

This kid Daniele makes YouTube videos for Italians who want to work abroad. A year in, five customers paying $100 each, and he asked if he should keep going or quit. If it were me and I’d spent a year on something and made $500, first I’d be proud of myself. Five people paying is real validation. Then I’d quit, 100%, unless I could see it gets bigger, or I enjoy it and don’t give a shit what it makes. But who am I to discourage him? So I asked, what do you want? He said, I want to keep doing it. Then we can do that, man.

The older I get the more I realize it’s really hard to change our own minds, and even harder to change someone else’s. A lot of people buy a book to get validated that the direction they’re already going is the right one. Are you waiting for approval on anything?

All of life comes down to effort

The bookstore thing happened because a friend told me my book was there. I went in to ask if I could sign it, they asked if I wanted to speak, I said yes and followed up with Victoria from Backstory. The high school talk before it happened because a teacher, Martina Guzman, hit me up on Instagram. I teach at a really cool school in Barcelona, want to speak here? I’ll buy books for the kids. She’s a hustler. She showed up last night too.

You want to get rich, put in effort. You want a relationship, put in effort. If you’re putting in the effort you’re going to get it. If you’re not, either say okay, I don’t want it that much, or put in the effort. My dream to not have a day job and to prove people wrong was so strong that I never stopped until I got there.

I’ve had about a one year sabbatical. AppSumo has had a lot of challenges this year and a lot of opportunity to promote cool products. I feel called to go back and see where I can help. That feels right.

Summer, 8 out of 10. Wasn’t the best ever, wasn’t the worst ever. The highlights were time with my daughter and time with my wife. Her happiness is the baby, my happiness is her, so I need to make sure the baby is happy. Cycling. And being out here made me appreciate America. Team America and Team Europe, both good. One tip: don’t take a baby in an RV to the Tour de France.

You have four months left in the year. Go make something you’re super fucking proud of and excited to tell people about. The things I’m most proud of are always the hardest. Tomorrow I fly home and get back to work on mine.

From episode 379 of my podcast, Noah Kagan Presents. Listen on Spotify or Apple Podcasts.