You don't have to travel, but I find extended travel to be a helpful tool for reexamining yourself and the constraints you've artificially placed on your life. It's easy to believe everything has to be done one way if you're always in one place around the same people.

I really feel like knife skills - not just in the kitchen, but in life - are really critical.

I think about willpower almost never. I realize for myself, trying to be more disciplined is pretty nebulous and it's often a slippery target. For me, I've just thought about incentives.

The downstream effects are unknown. Do your best and hope for the best. If you're improving the world-however you define that-consider your job well done.

Role models who push us to exceed our limits, physical training that removes our spare tires, and risks that expand our sphere of comfortable action are all examples of eustress—stress that is healthful and the stimulus for growth.

The decent method you follow is better than the perfect method you quit.

The way we measure productivity is flawed. People checking their BlackBerry over dinner is not the measure of productivity.