Happy Saturday,
I am coming to you from a rainy New Year’s Eve in San Francisco after taking the past two weeks off from writing this newsletter. I am re-energized and wanted to recap 2022 with what I enjoyed reading and listening to.
This holiday season the family spent six days in the Bahamas with my mom and her good friend ahead of the Christmas rush and then two days back here on the west coast with Whitney’s family in Nevada City. It was my first time in the Caribbean islands after spending 30 years of my life on the east coast. I was missing out.
The weather in the Bahamas was not perfect, although I spent most of my time by the pool. It was windy on some days and we did get some rain but it beat a lot of the alternatives of what my east coast friends are enduring and even what has been an abnormally cold December in San Francisco.
This week’s newsletter will recap:
The top Stretch Four posts of the year and confirm that more long four posts are high on the priority list for 2023
Health and fitness recaps and where I will look to improve in 2023 with the help of my trainer
The good, bad, and ugly of parenting and how sleep has been changed forever by having Cain
My top five books from what I read in the year
The top podcasts I listen to weekly and the top episodes individually for 2022
Let’s dive in.
Quote of the Year:
“You cannot create more wealth simply by creating more money and credit. To create more wealth you have to be more productive.” - Ray Dalio, The Changing World Order
Chart of the Year:
Tweet of the Year:
Top Stretch Four Posts
Based on Substack’s data, these three post did the best as far as engagement. The key learning is more long four posts. Drop me an email at matt@stretchfour.co with any interesting companies, trends, or general people that you think are interesting that I can write about.
I got some great feedback from some subscribers and I am already planning to go deeper into some areas that I have written about in the past few months.
Long Four Issue #2: Health & Wellness Edition: A Day in The Life of Founders Part 1 (Self-interview)
Stretch Four Insights Volume 44: Founder secondaries, VC exposure to crypto, and Twitter takeaways
Long Four Volume #1: Neo Tax: Disrupting Hell Week For Accountants and Small Businesses
Fitness
I completed my second year on the Future app.
This year I nearly surpassed 300 workout days for the year.
I crossed 250,000 total calories burned on the app in the year
2023 goals
Complete another full year on the app
Hit 320 workout days on the app
Cross 200k calories burned in 2023. In other words, I will need to average 625 calories per workout
Run a half marathon — this is a goal that I started working on a few months back and I plan to kick it off again in 2023. I would love to know any half marathon recommendations for the middle or back half of 2023 on the west coast.
Join me on the journey at Future with the link below
Lifestyle, wellness, and eating habits
Sleep Struggles
Having my son had a drastic impact on my sleep and I was already not the greatest sleeper.
I highly doubt I will ever sleep the same again, and in 2023 I plan to revisit some key principles that I abandoned after Cain was born
Even with a full-time nanny share, the responsibilities of having a kid in a place like San Francisco are daunting from a financial perspective and a work-balance perspective so I am still learning how to optimize my time.
There are so many learnings becoming a new father I am just scratching the surface. More to come here in 2023.
Reading
This year was mostly about nonfiction reading. I look forward to diving more into fiction at some point in 2023. I mixed reading between Audible and hard copies this year and Whitney got me a Kindle for Christmas so I am hoping to spend even more time reading in 2023. But overall, I consumed a lot of books in 2022 and finished 31 all while having a kid.
Top Podcasts
Podcast consumption is something I am still learning how to manage. There is so much content out there it is hard to find value in everything and find a mix of enjoyment and be entertained. This year I discovered Cal Newport’s productivity podcast as well as an entertaining one from The New Yorker.
One of the missing areas for me is on managing health, wellness, family, and running high-growth startups. I think there are tons of interview-style podcasts that focus on running a business but the other areas are fairly taboo. I am working on something here so stay tuned.
What were your favorite podcasts of this year?
As far as episodes I really enjoyed so many this year that it is hard to narrow it down but here are five that I think I listened to all the way through, meaning the episodes were too good to pause. I think these five have different traits that make the perfect podcast episode.
What’s Next
Well, that is a wrap for 2022.
I hope you all are having a great New Year’s Eve; I will be at home this year as we spent 8 days on the road in December and our son is crying out for a normalized routine.
As always, I would love your feedback especially if you are new please email me at m.att@stretchfour.co. Also if you have found value in the newsletter share it with one other person, it would make my day!
Happy New Year!
Back to the trenches.
Best,
Matt