Eric Mathews

Fear Has a Direction. Courage is not available for purchase in advance in quantities large enough to cover the full journey. You only need courage for the first step. mathews-mindset.beehiiv.com/p/fear-has-a-d…

My next Mathews Mindset post elaborates on a diagnostic question my friend Scott Brown (@rsbrown) gave me twenty years ago. It is one of the simplest and most revealing questions I have ever been asked, and I think about it to this day. Here is a taste: your body answers the burnout question twice a day, every day, before your brain has a chance to spin it. You just haven't been paying attention to the answer. It drops Tuesday. Don't miss it. Subscribe to the Mathews Mindset newsletter here: mathews-mindset.beehiiv.com/?modal=signup

#SanFrancisco friends, I'm in town this Thursday and I want to see you. We used to host happy hours like this pre-pandemic and it's time to bring that energy back. Hoping this kicks off more regular gatherings for our friends and community out here in SF. Why am I coming? Why happy hour? I'm the incoming board chair of Code Crew, a Memphis-born 501(c)(3) that has reached over 16,000 students with hands-on computer science, coding, and AI education and built real pathways into tech careers. The impact is going national, and we're in the middle of a $7.5 million capital campaign to make that happen. Jillian Friot, Meka Egwuekwe (Code Crew's CEO and co-founder), and I are hosting a happy hour this Thursday, April 23rd from 4:00 to 6:00 pm at the San Francisco Wine Society. Wine and food are on us. If you care about the future of tech talent and who gets access to it, come through. If you don't still come so we can hang out and catch up. Donate what you can. Bring someone who should be in the room. Thank you!!! RSVP: cdcrw.us/HappyHourSF #Memphis #HH #HappyHour #SanFranciscoTech #impact

"Profit is the measure of how well we work together." - David Packard

One of the strangest things about modern life: We spend a lot of time inside the minds of far-off strangers. Their ideas shape our attention, beliefs, tastes, fears, and ambitions. Choose your inputs like your life is being formed by them. Because it is.

“We can only see a short distance ahead, but we can see plenty there that needs to be done.” — Alan Turing

“The successful leader must be willing to assume responsibility for the mistakes and shortcomings of his followers.” —Napoleon Hill

No one in leadership is too busy to think about the future.

Strong companies are built deliberately. They do not emerge by accident. Start Co. is currently running the **Virtual Entrepreneurship Series 2026**, a six-part leadership and sales program designed to help founders build scalable organizations and repeatable revenue engines. This is a multi-state program funded by Empower California and open to qualified entrepreneurs in: Arizona, California, Colorado, Connecticut, Delaware, Hawaii, Illinois, Maine, Maryland, Massachusetts, Michigan, Minnesota, Nevada, New Jersey, New Mexico, New York, Oregon, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington. We kicked off on February 11, but it is not too late to join the remaining sessions. Over the next sessions, founders will learn how to: • Strengthen organizational structure and culture • Establish governance and board discipline • Validate and sharpen their “sell” • Modernize their sales funnel • Scale with financial clarity and operating discipline The program is fully funded. There is no cost for qualified participants. Registration and completion of the intake form are required to determine eligibility. If you know founders in any of these states who are serious about building durable companies, send this to them. Apply here: docsend.com/view/nzezmimqs…

Two months of silence. Two weeks of fire. I took a step back from the Mathews Mindset newsletter at the end of last year. Sometimes the best thing a leader can do is pause, reflect, and come back sharper. That's exactly what happened. Starting this month, I've got a run of essays coming that I'm genuinely excited about on resilient transformation, the real edge in leadership, and what it takes to build something that lasts. Subscribe now so you don't miss any of them: mathews-mindset.beehiiv.com/subscribe

Learn about Morningside Brands, Inc. the creator Alma Del Jaguar Tequila and Duck Club Bourbon straight from the founder, McCauley Williams on this cool podcast, Assorted Crackers: open.spotify.com/episode/1Y5TeH…

If you don’t give your life a direction, the world will give it a distraction.

Are you going to Drift or are your going to Build? Worth remembering, this break is not about rest alone, it is where Builders prepare while others drift. Drifter The Drifter treats the break as an escape hatch. They consume, snack, scroll, and tell themselves January will be different. Momentum is deferred to a resolution instead of built through action. By February, nothing has changed because nothing was prepared. Builder The Builder understands how people behave and plans accordingly. They do not expect deals to close or decisions to happen during the holidays, so they turn inward and work on what does not require permission. They research, think, clarify, and quietly advance the real problem in front of them. When January arrives, they are not starting, they are already in motion and the runway is clear. Made it this far . . . Learn more: mathews-mindset.beehiiv.com #Builders #LongGame

“Friendship based upon business is a good deal better than business based upon friendship.”
— Napoleon Hill

This bodes ill. Readers used to outnumber non-readers 2 to 1. Now non-readers outnumber readers 3 to 1. It's hard to imagine a change of that magnitude not having significant effects.

“Real life is junior high. The world that you're about to enter is filled with junior high adolescent pettiness, pubescent rivalries, the insecurities of 13-year-olds, and the false bravado of 14-year-olds.” — Tom Brokaw via @tferriss

“Without continual growth and progress, such words as improvement, achievement, and success have no meaning.” ― Benjamin Franklin

Those Who Cannot Take Direction Graciously Should Not Be Giving It -Napoleon Hill

I was recently asked in an interview to talk about my past before entrepreneurship. It brought me back to earlier in my career where I worked in academic research focused on AI, e-learning, cognitive psychology, and human-computer interaction. I collaborated on studies of how people learn in digital environments, how feedback systems shape performance, and how adaptive technologies can support individual growth. I looked back at my Google Scholar profile today and noticed the work has now been cited way more than I would have expected. The long tail of those citations reflects the strength of the team I worked with and the relevance of the questions we explored. It is a small academic footprint, but it represents an important season of intellectual curiosity that influenced the way I think, build, and solve problems today. If you are curious, the profile is here: scholar.google.com/citations?hl=e…