Think Like a Rocket Scientist: Simple Strategies You Can Use to Make Giant Leaps in Work and Life

by Ozan Varol

In every annual letter to Amazon shareholders, Jeff Bezos includes the same cryptic line: “It remains Day 1.” After repeating this mantra for a few decades, Bezos was asked what Day 2 would look like. He replied, “Day 2 is stasis. Followed by irrelevance. Followed by excruciating, painful decline. Followed by death. And that is why it is always Day 1.”11

The rocket-science mindset requires remaining in Day 1 and repeatedly introducing color into the monochromatic world. We must keep devising thought experiments, taking moonshots, proving ourselves wrong, dancing with uncertainty, reframing problems, testing as we fly, and returning to first principles.