Better Today Than Yesterday

Hosted by by Kelly Vohs

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Aug 2026

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Hey! Join me as I share my lessons about life, leadership, and the peaceful pursuit of Better Today Than Yesterday. kellyvohs.substack.com

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September 13, 20265 min

Our Way of Proceeding

I take a little camp chair to a hill near the house some mornings. I call it pond hill. There is a pond. And a hill. Not my best branding but it's stuck now. The pond is full of frogs (or toads?) during the summer. Well, I guess they are there in the winter too. Writing out highlights from books I've read is one of the ways I get my mornings going. Up on that hill, in the city, or wherever. Here’s one: "Self-awareness, ingenuity, love, and heroism. Not four techniques, but four principles forming one way of living, one modo de proceder." That's from Heroic Leadership by Chris Lowney. A book on how the Jesuits were built and why they lasted. Religion isn't the point here. Whether you agree with them or not, they built something that lasted five hundred years. That's the point. After writing that, I stopped and said, "Wait a second. This word heroism. That's a big word. That means a lot to me. Did it mean something less in the 1540s?" Turns out heroism didn't mean something less, it meant something more. Today, our use of the word hero has flattened. We apply it to athletes or someone who returns your lost wallet. Back then, a hero sat somewhere between human and god. A demigod. So what else might have been lost in translation in that quote, intentionally or not? Lowney was modernizing the ideas. That's okay, but I wanted to understand what Loyola said. What were the principles he wanted for the culture of the Compañía de Jesús? I’ll give you Lowney's word first, then what Loyola actually wrote (translated from Spanish). Self-awareness: "Inward knowledge of yourself" (conocimiento interno) He means self-knowledge, which only comes through daily self-examination. Unlike other orders where monks would spend hours in reflection, Loyola thought a quarter of an hour two times a day was enough. Sit down and examine what is going on with you. This is the core of my mornings. Sometimes handwritten, sometimes typed. What's happening around me now? What's going on in my head? Where am I holding on too tight? Or too loose? For some reason, when it's out I can process it more rationally. A kind of hard drive defrag, for those of us who remember that. Ingenuity: "Make ourselves indifferent" (hacernos indiferentes) Ingenuity is Lowney's word. Indifferent or unattached is more accurate. Searching for the right way. Not callous, not uncaring. Ready. Curious. "Always keep one foot raised." Step in the right direction when you know. Commit, but give yourself freedom to move. To adjust as the facts change, or the world does. It makes me think, "When do I get stuck on my ideas?" Because they are mine. Love: "Love shows itself more in deeds than in words" (el amor se debe poner más en las obras que en las palabras) The early Jesuits described what held them together as mutual affection. Unity of hearts. I'd go further. Maximum mutual affection. Maybe a new way to use the acronym MMA. When you have it, you can feel it. Heroism: "Distinguish yourself in all service" (señalarse en todo servicio) He is advocating service. Not heroism. We should reserve that for real heroes. Usually they aren't around to thank after. It’s what we practice, not say, that becomes our way of proceeding. What you believe deeply ends up being how you make your way. Or don't. Here's what I'm taking with me. Self-knowledge: Reflect. Daily. Try to understand yourself. Indifference: Curious. Unattached. One foot raised. Ready to move. Love: Actions. Maximum mutual affection (MMA). Service: Distinguish yourself through service, not words. Those are principles that built something that lasted five hundred years. And we don’t need to be heroes. The mission doesn’t need to be grand. Sometimes there’s work to do and people to love. And that’s enough. Take care. Be good. -kv P.S. I looked it up. The frogs are on the bottom of the pond. Breathing through their skin. The toads dig down below the frost line in the woods. Both slow way down when it’s time. Maybe there’s a lesson there too. Nature is so cool. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

September 6, 20265 min

Frag Out

I remember the first time I threw a hand grenade. It was a clay hole in Fort Benning, Georgia. There was a Staff Sergeant standing right next to me, and he walked me through every piece of it: how to hold it, when to throw it, what to say, what to do after. I was nervous. I threw it. He grabbed the back of my vest and yanked me down into that hole. I was glad he was there, helping make sure I didn't go boom. That's the thing about micromanagement. Whether it's help or not depends on why it's happening. Sometimes it's because your boss doesn't trust you. That's mostly a you problem, not them. They haven't seen you do the thing they consider important, and if it goes wrong it lands on other people. Insecure bosses worry about it landing on them personally. Secure bosses worry about it landing on the team. Sometimes it's you're just the new guy. New in the role, or haven't done something before. Having someone ride alongside is welcome. That was me in the hole. And sometimes they say they trust you, but don't really. The voices in their head are too loud. Too much fear to let go. Maybe their job is on the line and the stakes are high for them personally. It doesn't excuse it. It's just worth knowing, because you might find yourself doing it. Leaders like to talk about delegation. If you've worked with me you've heard me say "delegate and elevate." I think that's right, and I'm also working to not use that buzzwordy phrase again. But delegating does elevate. It takes something you are accountable for and gives it to someone else. It pushes them to do something new. That something used to be your job. Now it's theirs. That's how you train someone to take your job. Which is what we should all be doing. That's the healthy form. There's another one. The professional delegator. They delegate everything. Somewhere along the line they went from someone who does the work to someone who shuffles the work around. And with that went understanding. You can delegate accountability, but you can never delegate understanding. The micromanager can't let go of the work. The professional delegator lets go of the work and the understanding with it. Different ends of the same problem. Both break trust. I've done this. And whether I got lazy or overwhelmed, same result. There's so much to know, so much to try to understand, and you start going so fast that you rationalize away what you truly need to know. There are always more emails. Always more meetings. So you start to delegate understanding. First it's the small items. Get those wrong and it can be fixed easily. Do this long enough, you wave at the big ones as they go by. Suddenly you don't understand the things that matter. “If you lose your voracious curiosity about tactical details, if you lose passionate interest in people and how they are feeling, if you insulate yourself in the protective cocoon of executive comforts, you may well wake up one day to discover your company has already entered a doom loop of decline.” Jim Collins, BE 2.0 Sometimes the best use of your time is to slow down and dig in. Not to do someone's job. To understand what they're wrestling with. What's hard about it. What could work. What might not. Good leaders are trying to understand the truth. That's empathy. Walking around in someone's skin. Seeing reality through their lens. It doesn't mean they are right, but it is how they see the world. If you sit on high and move work around and make decisions without understanding, that's when things break. Most importantly, you break trust. Then things go boom. So for you micromanagers out there, take a look. Why do you do it? Because someone needs you to and welcomes it? Because you're afraid of what happens to you when it goes wrong? Micromanaging done for the right reasons has a name. It's called help. If you're holding the grenade for the first time, someone standing next to you who understands the mechanics of that little baseball of death is helpful. Done for the wrong reasons, it destroys trust. Almost no one wants to be managed. People want to be supported, helped, loved, listened to, led and understood. I know that's what I want. And that's what I'm trying to do. Sometimes well, sometimes not. Take care. Be good. -kv This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

August 30, 20260 min

Funny, But Not Funny

Funny, but not funny, how it's easier to see something good when it's gone.How much of your today is what you wanted yesterday but you're too focused on tomorrow to see it? Take care. Be good.kv This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

August 23, 20266 min

Decay

You might have a decay problem at work. Life is often described as a stool with four legs. Health, family, work, faith/spirituality. Get one of these wrong and the whole thing tips over. What about at work? Here's three: Leg One: Results This is why we're here. If you run a business, that means making money. What you do with that money is up to you. Reinvest it, give it away, give it back to investors. When you decide what good results look like, you build a dashboard. You show up weekly, monthly, quarterly, and you look at it. Are we delivering? Yes or no. So, this leg gets most of the attention. It's easy to see and measure. Ironically, this attention is often the reason for the decay. Leg Two: Culture Culture isn't five or ten values a founder or exec team wrote on a whiteboard at an offsite in Napa. It's what the humans actually do in the real world. This is worth slowing down on. Culture is the sum of our actions. Actions are what produce results. Combine a good culture with a good strategy, you get good results. Culture is hard to measure and harder to be honest about. Especially if you're in charge. If you're paying attention to the small things people do, you'll know. Then, it's about whether you have the courage to say it and something about it. Remember, those with the most power have an outsized impact on culture. Leg Three: Development It's easy to talk about what we do for people in a recruiting deck, but when you stop and look at your week, how much of it is focused on this leg of the stool? Intentional development of your people. Do you spend 20% of your time? A day a week? What's the right number? Andy Grove put a number on it. "Training is, quite simply, one of the highest-leverage activities a manager can perform. Consider for a moment the possibility of your putting on a series of four lectures for members of your department. Let's count on three hours of preparation for each hour of course time—twelve hours of work in total. Say that you have ten students in your class. Next year they will work a total of about twenty thousand hours for your organization. If your training efforts result in a 1 percent improvement in your subordinates' performance, your company will gain the equivalent of two hundred hours of work as the result of the expenditure of your twelve hours." Twelve hours in. Two hundred back. What if you saw a 1600% return in your 401k? Would you spend twelve hours a year on it? Or do you hand it to HR? Grove answers that one too. "Training must be done by a person who represents a suitable role model. Proxies no matter how well-versed they might be in the subject matter cannot assume that role. The person standing in front of the class should be seen as a believable practicing authority on the subject taught." Not the best presenter. Not whoever has room on their calendar. A believable practicing authority. Training doesn't have to be a slide deck and a talking head. Mostly it isn't. We're developing the people around us every minute by how we behave and the actions we take. But it requires intentionality. It's pulling someone aside and saying, here's what I'm thinking and here's why. Or slowing down to tell the entire organization how you're thinking and why. Or admitting when you got it wrong or don't know the answer and asking for help. It can be as simple as saying please or thank you to someone. Especially when they’re three layers down. Or the opposite, ending every email with ASAP. Or not even responding to the email. Or showing someone what it really looks like to be listened to. This can be jarring. Most people aren't used to it. All of this, development and culture. Those two, with the right strategy, get you results. In life, when a leg of the stool breaks, you know. You get sick. You get fired. The marriage cracks. The stool goes over fast and loud, and you go fix it. Eat better. Sleep. Go for a run. Spend more time with your person. At work, it fails slowly. Maybe the results leg gets thicker and stronger. The other two thin out. We say yes to things we should say no to. We let the jerk stay. Nobody says anything. You still get the bonus and the promotion and the accolades. Then one day, long after you're gone, the thing tips over. The culture stopped producing results. Nobody was developed to carry it. Decay. Then, death. Peter Drucker said it very cleanly in 1966. "Every organization needs performance in three major areas: It needs direct results; building of values and their reaffirmation; and building and developing people for tomorrow. If deprived of performance in any one of these areas, it will decay and die." Sixty years. And we're still paying attention to one dashboard. Take care. Be good.-kv This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

August 16, 20266 min

Heel, Toe

My mornings are broken. I'm working on fixing it. Some combination of coffee, reading, writing, exercise, personal hygiene, then work. They started feeling like a bowl of Greek yogurt where I pick out the best blueberries. Negotiated mornings end up with me doing what I want to do. I leave the must-do berries in the bowl. I'm good at that. The routine. The rituals. Or the process. It matters. Maybe you're nodding right now because you agree or your finger is drifting to the close button because you've heard this before. Me too. What I hadn't considered was this. The process matters more than the outcome. When I was in my early 20s I read something like, "you should tell everyone your goal. Be loud about it. If you do that, you'll have more motivation to get it done." I did that once and just thinking about it makes my head shake back and forth automatically in embarrassment. Most people who hear about my time in the military think it happened right after 9-11. It didn't. That was two years later. After 9-11 I went to the Marine Corps and started the process to become an officer. I'd join them for PT every week as we moved along. And I told everybody. At work. Personally. Anyone who would listen. I bought a sticker, "United States Marine Corps," and put it in the back window of that black Audi A4 so I could tell everyone behind me too. Red text, yellow outline. I can still see it. I went into the future, grabbed an identity I hadn't earned yet, and brought it back. I was rewarding myself with an identity before the work. We shouldn’t keep it all to ourselves. "They want to be on the journey with you," Princess Buttercup taught me. She's right. We should bring our closest people along. Big changes, dreams, failures. Your people deserve to know. And you might need them. But not everyone is your people. When we kidnap a future identity and apply it to ourselves today, it makes us less likely to do the work that earns it. A couple years later I did the complete opposite, which I also don't recommend. I enlisted in the Army and didn't tell a soul. Equally embarrassing. A few people needed to know I was going in the Marine Corps. The rest needed to hear it when I earned that sticker and could call myself a Marine. I brought the outcome forward because it let me enjoy the mental sugar high without doing the work. I fell in love with the outcome and identity, not the process. If you want to be a runner, don't go around telling people you're a runner. Tell the people closest to you that you're trying to be one and that you've been doing five runs a week. Ask them to check in on you. Help you push through. Some things are worth sharing widely. You can bring a group of people in behind you and they'll hold you up. Building a company is one of those. Two people close to me are building their own companies. Both hitting their stride. So good to see. Profitable. I've watched them both work the thousands of things it takes to build a profitable company. Not the commercial people put on LinkedIn but the documentary: payroll, SEO, closing the books, firing, hiring, down websites, working capital, and conflict. I've never heard either one of them, not once, talk about the identity or the outcome. Sure, they talk about getting profitable but NEVER about an exit or Inc. Magazine cover story or anything remotely close. They're too busy doing the work. They're in the process. They've never introduced themselves as an entrepreneur, founder, or CEO. They don't talk about the thing they are building in the future sense. They talk about goals, but not an end state. They have a vision, but they are too experienced to say they know for sure. They know they are just making it up as they go. They do talk about what they are doing today and next week. They talk about the problems they're chewing through. Then they wake up and solve them. They ask for help from the people closest to them, work the problems with their team, and things get better. Then they hunt for more problems. They are hunters in the truest sense. Sensitive, aware, connected. In the woods. Quietly stalking along their path. Heel, toe. Heel, toe. No accolades, no pomp, no future identity brought back to today. Just the work. I've watched both of them get better. Big problems a couple years ago are three minutes of work today. Or an eye roll. I don't know if they love building, but I do know they aren't in love with some outcome, some future identity. They haven't put the sticker on their car. Much of what we do will not end up where we want. We try things. They go right and they go wrong. That's the whole reason the process matters more than the outcome. If you get good at the process, the failures aren't because you didn't do the work. They end up being something external. Ideally. The older I get, the more comfortable I am with that. And even enjoy it. Rarely in the moment, usually looking back. Eventually, I recognize it as part of the process too. Why didn't I become a Marine? The most generous answer is the universe was conspiring to have me do something else. The more accurate answer is I didn't want it bad enough. Why didn't I want it bad enough? Maybe because I'd already brought the identity forward. The process wasn't what I loved. I loved the sticker. I loved the idea. My ego wanted that eagle, globe and anchor on the car. Or maybe on my back. I was too immature to recognize what I was doing then — bringing the identity forward. Chasing the outcome without actually doing the work. Hopefully, I won't make that mistake again. Today I'm just trying to be the quiet professional who loves the process, silently making my way toward something I want, or think I want. Keeping my people close to me. Heel, toe. Heel, toe. Take care, friend. Be good. -kv This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

August 9, 20261 min

Swinging Buckets

I used to follow this guy on Instagram. He would fill a bucket with paint and swing it from a rope that was tied to the ceiling. Maybe you’ve seen him. He had pink hair. The bucket swung over giant canvases, usually black, sometimes white. He’d hold the bucket off the edge of the canvas and then let it go. It turns out paint pouring out of a swinging bucket lands in patterns. Symmetric. Beautiful. Then he figured out how to put a bunch of colors in the bucket. Things got better. And his studio was a mess. Paint on the walls, the floor, and on him. A proper artist’s mess. I think that’s what work looks like. He just swung buckets till he got it right. Making a mess along the way. When we were kids, making a mess was okay. At some point, we made it not okay. We stopped ourselves, mostly. The best artists make a mess. The best craftsmen make a mess. They aren’t sloppy. They’re making. Making makes a mess. And maybe the best lives come out of what looks like a mess. Someone making. Trying. Failing. Learning. Less perfection. More making. Unapologetic making. Let’s go. Swing some buckets, friends. Take care. Be good. -kv This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

August 2, 20263 min

One Big Blaster

"When faced with deficiencies instead of strengths and inclinations, this is the strategy you must assume: ignore your weaknesses and resist the temptation to be more like others." -Robert Greene, Mastery He's writing about Temple Grandin, the Colorado State University professor who was diagnosed with autism as a child and has been a beacon of what is possible. And Greene's advice is this: direct yourself toward the small things you're good at and keep working on them. His point, and it's worth restating: our tendency is to focus on what went wrong or where we are weak. That's the mistake. We are all unique. One of one. Literally nobody else in the world with your combination of DNA and experiences. And when we spend our time on our "deficiencies" or our "weaknesses" we are wasting our time. It's our strengths that matter more. I'm not the first person to say this, but unfortunately, as a world, I'm not sure we're paying attention. We need to move those strengths to superpowers. Then work on the next thing. And the next. Leaders need to be cautious here. We can fall into the trap of trying to make people versions of ourselves. We find the deficiency or weakness. Likely, because we are good at it, it's easy for us to point out the flaw. Then we commit a leadership crime. We try to make you a version of us. That's not what we want. We want people to find their superpowers. To cultivate them. To give them permission to work on the one or two things they can be best in the world at. And then we need those brought into the team. That's the whole point. The same happens in the hiring process. Our bias for people like us is strong. We see people with strengths that we value. Absent those, we think less of the candidate. Why do we do this? Fear mostly. It's very human. We are worried about what can go wrong. Instead we should be spending our time on the strengths. Make sure they are a cultural fit, no jerks allowed, but understand their superpowers, or their potential superpowers. If they're still young, what superpowers lurk that they haven't found yet. Can you create the conditions for superpower cultivation? We have teams for a reason. Puzzle the people together. Yes, I made puzzle a verb, and I really like it. Puzzle them together like power rangers. Volume isn't what matters here. The number of rangers isn't what we're after. We're after the right mix. Red, Black, Blue, Yellow, Pink, and then Green (eventually White). All different weapons. And personalities. Disciplined, serious. Or fun and energetic. Or timid but genius. Or the thoughtful and grounded one. Bring their superpowers together and you get one big blaster. Power rangers. That's what we want. Take care. Be good.-kv This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

July 26, 20262 min

Patio Bear

I was the product of a warrior culture. And I learned early on to suppress my emotions and respond to danger with great composure. I was never the plaything of greed or fear. -Xenophon Emotions exist for a reason. Use them. Understand them. This is a translation of something written 2,400 years ago. I think Xenophon (ZEN-uh-fon) would use a different word than suppress. But his point is still true. They can't own you. Xenophon picks two of the most important. They jerk us around. Some little plaything for their amusement. I'd add envy. Fear, greed, envy. All designed for our survival but today they often do the opposite. Fear isn't real. Sometimes it is. The bear on the patio is real. Fear is helpful for patio bear. Honor her. But usually, it's just a projection of what we think will happen. It's not necessarily true. Maybe not even close. Greed. When is it enough? When are you enough? There is enough for everyone. The reason we have done well as a species is we banded together. If we'd kept wandering the plains by ourselves trying to hoard all the sharp rocks we wouldn't exist. And envy. Admit it. You have it. I do. That little twang that comes up. Yes, twang. Not twinge. Twang like the vibrations of a guitar string you can feel in your belly. Jealous vibrations. Wishing for something they have or are. Use it as inspiration, but never as your puppet master. Composure is what we're after. Take care. Be good. -KV This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

July 19, 20262 min

The Reality of Cherry Garcia

The only permanent solution to your problems is to go inside and let go of the part of you that seems to have so many problems with reality. Once you do that, you'll be clear enough to deal with what's left. -Michael Singer, The Untethered Soul Some problems aren't that simple. They don't go away when we "go inside." They are still there. Real and painful. That said, I know that some of "my problems" are truly "my problems." They aren't real. The world works one way and I think or want it to work another way. That makes finding peace or satisfaction difficult. Cherry Garcia (that's my third favorite ice cream flavor for anyone new here) has a propensity to accumulate right at my waistline. It turns that new summer bathing suit into a muffin holder. That's reality. Either I need to skip it, buy a bigger suit, or stop caring. Understanding reality doesn't make all of the bad things that are real go away. They are still there. Maybe we can do something about them, maybe we can't. Seeing things for what they are and aren't is the only way we understand what is in our control and what isn't. Getting what we want comes after figuring out the way the world actually works, not the way we wish it did. We say we want happiness or peace or satisfaction or money or whatever else. I'd settle for reality. From there, almost anything is possible. Without it, almost nothing is. Take care. Be good.-KV PS: If you use Readwise to save your book highlights, I’d love your help with something. I built an app called Dispatch . I wanted a quiet place to sit with what I’ve read: to make notes, to hear my favorite lines read back to me on a run or in the car, to send the best ones to people who’d love them. It’s on Mac and iOS, and everything syncs back to Readwise. I’m looking for a few friends and family to try it before anyone else. If that sounds like you, reply to this email and I’ll set you up. This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com

July 12, 20261 min

Report To The General

This is what I did today. This is how I fought to save the entire battle in my sector. These are the obstacles I found. This is how I plan to fight tomorrow. -Niko Kazantzakis I've written this in my notebook dozens of times since I found this a couple weeks ago. It feels so simply clean and fundamental. Some sort of clearing. An inventory. A reminder. What did I do today? How did I save the entire battle in my sector. The things I could control. What got in the way? Name it. Did I let them win or did they become the effort. What does the general need to know so I can make a plan for tomorrow? The things I got wrong too. Especially those. Distracted by things I don't control. The time spent worrying. Or regretting. Or what others say or do. Stay in the weather. A walk through. That's how I'm using it. This is what I did today.This is how I fought to save the entire battle in my sector.These are the obstacles I found.This is how I plan to fight tomorrow. Take care. Be good. -KV This is a public episode. If you would like to discuss this with other subscribers or get access to bonus episodes, visit kellyvohs.substack.com