Dec 16, 2022 5 min read EGD News

Annual Review 2022

Sent on December 16th, 2022.

If you aren’t a subscriber to EGD News, you can subscribe here.

Human existence is an infinitely unfolding process of remembering, forgetting, and remembering again.
— Jonny Miller

The year was tremendous, and I explored tons of new things in work and life. In 2022, I did self-reflection and became more aware of where my head is at, my values, and how I want to live.

Elite Game Developers keeps growing. It’s the compounding effect of putting in the work daily and challenging myself with new topics. I think the challenging part feels like play. That’s what I’m the proudest about.

I’ve previously written annual reviews. Here are the links to the 2020 and 2021 reviews.

This year, I continued using Steve Schlafman’s annual review template, which Steve had updated for this year. You can get this template by going here.

Here’s what my annual review for 2022 looks like:

What went well this year?

People pay for what they do, and still more, for what they have allowed themselves to become. And they pay for it simply: by the lives they lead.
— James Baldwin

The big news for me this year was on the company I co-founded, Next Games, which got acquired in April by Netflix. I’m proud of the work put into the company. It’s good to find closure to loose ends.

In 2022, I invested in 16 companies, ten with my angel syndicate and six with personal cheques. I had one exit when Savage Game Studios was sold to Sony in September.

I believe that 16 new investments a year is the maximum amount that makes sense so that I will still have time to help companies. I have 35 companies in my angel investment portfolio, and I feel like I’m learning a ton about investing. Every month something new comes up.

What new skills and habits did I develop?

There are two that stand out.

1) My eyes opened to a new vista of things I don’t want. I was reading Ryan Holiday’s book Discipline is Destiny while traveling in South East Asia in October. The combination of being in a new place, and reading that particular book, made something click for me. With newfound clarity, I started to understand what kind of behavior was hurting me. Mind you that it’s still a work in progress, but I could see some new things: I’m responsible for myself, and I control how I react to things.

2) How to give feedback. I can only listen and ask questions from other people; they are on their own path. Hopefully, my questions will reveal what they are feeling, and through the questions, I can influence them to realize things that were there but weren’t surfaced.

What didn’t go so well this year?

The difference between me and an ETF is an ETF is a basket of securities, and I am a basket of insecurities.
— Evan Harp

What goals didn’t I accomplish? What got in the way?

I wanted to complete three online courses. I only got through one online course, Nat Eliason’s Crypto course.

The reason for not completing more was two-fold: I spent time looking for good online courses but didn’t find anything that made sense to me. But on the other hand, I didn’t want to commit to uncomfortable courses, i.e., public speaking courses, drawing courses, and learning a new language.

To improve things, I will make individual professional and personal goals for 2023 so that it’s more apparent to me that I should have both sides covered.

What habits or interests held me back?

I’ve been so focused on writing the newsletter in 2022 that I feel like my habit of producing content has eaten away at becoming an even better investor. I’ve become a better writer at the expense of becoming a better investor.

The same goes for not making progress on my book. If I had better systems in place to follow my progress on annual goals, I would have made lots of progress on the book side.

Also, I realized I should tone down the amount of input I’m taking and focus on output. This means that I won’t be aiming to read sixty books in 2023, but rather thirty books, and to produce more from what I’ve already consumed and connect dots on previous learnings.

What did I learn this year?

Below are the sub-questions to define what I learned this year.

What were my top lessons learned?

Acknowledging bad habits. I can remove bad habits, but I need to fill the vacuum they are leaving.

I went back to therapy and it felt great. I can now and make it a routine. Plus, I could start a group therapy initiative for entrepreneurs. Ping me if you are interested.

I can explore new investor projects and not worry too much if they never lead to much value. I have the syndicate, which is going great, so I can experiment with things. Those experiments should be worth it if I focus on providing value to founders.

How do you describe this year in 3-5 keywords?

Continuous compounding and opening new cans of worms. Some chaotic processing, but also sobering.

What am I most thankful for?

I’ve stayed calm with everything happening to me and around me.

What is my purpose for 2023?

Beware of looking for goals: look for a way of life. Decide how you want to live and then see what you can do to make a living within that way of life.
— Hunter S. Thompson

In 2023, I want to continue compounding. In all areas; on EGD, on investing, on relationships.

What 2-3 goals do I want to accomplish? What’s important about them?

First, I want to get results and significant findings from therapy. I think it will help in all aspects of life.

Second, make substantial progress on book 2, meaning an early draft. It’s a project I started in 2021 but have not yet written a single page.

Third, to significantly improve my investor work (e.g., creating content for portfolio companies, a newsletter for portfolio companies, a newsletter for syndicate investors, EGD facelift, and community for portfolio companies)

The steps that need to be taken to achieve goals more efficiently: figure out what to improve and how to go about it. Then, start executing improvements with weekly allocated time on my calendar.

Finally, what do I need in 2023?

I need to stay calm with everything happening to me and around me.