Category: Book Review Actions

1. Read ASAP! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Philosophy · Psychology · Self Improvement

BR 317: The Courage To Be Disliked by Ichiro Kishimi and Fumitake Koga

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Comments: I found the book to be revelatory. In retrospect, it is because it unified ideas that have resonated strongly with me under one roof. Adler’s approach is at the heart of the many powerful ideas that have changed my life and that I’ve shared on this blog over the years.

Insights that resonated:

(1) The overarching theme in Alfred Adler’s approach is that “life is simple.” By this, his philosophy asserts that freedom, happiness, and meaning are all within reach. We don’t need to over complicate this. Our problems are not one of ability but of courage.

(2) You have the means to choose your life path. You’re not controlled by your past, trauma, or environment — only by the meaning you assign to them. You are free to choose goals that help you go where you want to go.

(3) All problems are interpersonal problems – use problems as a trigger for growth. Most of our issues — anxiety, anger, insecurity — come from how we relate to others. We typically react by over-compensating for what we think we lack with bouts of inferiority or superiority. Use such moments as a trigger to strive for learning and growth.

(4) Freedom arrives when we summon the courage to be disliked. You must be willing to live by your values, even if others don’t like it.

(5) Cultivate “horizontal relationships” and embrace “separation of tasks.” Vertical relationships assume someone is in a position of relative authority or power. They typically involve attempts to control the other person.

Horizontal relationships involve mutual respect and a focus on controlling ourselves – including accepting our normal self. Horizontal relationships thrive on a “separation of tasks” – where we do what’s in our control and empower others to do what’s in their control. We can lead a horse to water but cannot make it drink.

(6) Happiness comes from contribution. Not from being praised or special, but from feeling useful to others and connected – this is described as community feeling or “Gemeinschaftsgefühl“.

(7) We keep life simple by keeping a bright spotlight on the present. When we’re on stage and see a bright spotlight, we can’t see much else. If we have dim lights on the other hand, we will be able to look beyond what’s around us and attempt to see our past and present.

1. Read ASAP! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Business · Entrepreneurship

BR 316: Starbucks – with Howard Schultz (The Acquired Podcast)

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Category: 1 – Read ASAP! (All Categories are 1 – Read ASAP!, 2 – BUY it!, 3 – SHELF it, 4 – SOMEDAY it)

Comments: This episode of the Acquired podcast was both wonderful and educational.

Insights that resonated:

(1) When Howard Schultz first raised $1.6M for Il Giornale (which would eventually become Starbucks), he pitched 242 investors. 217 said no – a 90% rejection rate.

Good perspective for the next time we feel discouraged about things not going our way.

(2) Starbucks founder Howard Schultz told a fascinating story about his return to the company in 2008. For a collection of reasons, Starbucks was in disarray and was months away from being insolvent.

During this time, he was introduced to Steve Jobs and he began telling Steve about some of his problems over a call. Steve asked him to come over to Cupertino so they could take a walk and talk it over.

During the walk, Howard laid out all the problems he was facing and what he was planning to do about it. After listening to it all, Steve practically screamed – “You know what you should do? Fire your executive team.”

Howard’s response was along the lines of “C’mon, I can’t do that. Who will do the work?”

To this, Steve shared that he thought they’ll all be gone in the next 6 months anyway.

9 months or so later, there was one person from that team left. When Howard next met Steve, he told him his prediction had come through. And Steve just pointed out that he could have saved himself from time.

(3) There was a lovely moment when they discussed the Starbucks mobile app.

Howard’s reflection was that while the mobile app was undoubtedly seductive, the trade-off is that it has significantly hit the Starbucks experience. It replaced that intimate connection between barista and customer with a connection with the app.

There was a moment around then when one of the podcast hosts said – “I look at the mobile app and see which Starbucks around me is accepting mobile orders. If a store isn’t accepting mobile orders, I don’t go there.”

“That breaks my heart.” was Howard’s pithy response.

I was struck by this discussion and reflection. Every growth strategy has trade-offs. I’m sure the numbers from Starbucks’ app made the strategy feel trade-off free. Higher utilization, record usage, and so on.

(4) Fascinating bits of business trivia –

  • At a time when Howard Schultz was almost screwed over by a famous Seattle businessman, the person who saved him was Bill Gates’ father. It’s a great story – one that even Bill Gates never knew (a testament to the grounded nature of the man).
  • The original owners of Starbucks took over Peet’s coffee just as Il Giornale (by Howard) took over Starbucks. That was a fascinating story.
2. BUY it! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Novel Concepts and Interesting Research · Psychology · Relationships · Self Improvement

BR 315: Supercommunicators by Charles Duhigg

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Category: 2 – BUY it! (All Categories are 1 – Read ASAP!, 2 – BUY it!, 3 – SHELF it, 4 – SOMEDAY it)

Comments: Solid book with a nice combination of stories and research about great communication.

Insights that resonated: 

(1) What kind of conversation are we in: Does the other person want to be helped, hugged, or heard?

(2) Effective communication often comes down to our ability to match the mood and energy of the person we’re communicating with. 

(3) The most powerful thing we can do to show that we are seeking to understand and not to be understood in a tense conversation is to: (a) take the time to wait for the person to finish, (b) then play back what we understood and, (c) check if what we understood was what they were trying to say.

(4) “While there are many factors that determine if a romantic relationship succeeds or flounders, one key factor is whether makes the people in it feel more in control of their happiness or less in control of their happiness.”

In detailed examinations of conversations among unhappy couples, researchers found that the partners tended to focus on trying to control the other person. For example, they might say “don’t go there” or “don’t use your voice against me” or “you always do this all that.”

Happy couples instead focused either on controlling themselves or the environment. For example, they’d talk slower and make sure that they kept that cool. The key with happy couples was focusing on things that they could control together and ensuring that they kept an argument as small as possible, instead of letting it expand into other areas and throwing “the kitchen sink” at each other.

(5) Social identities have a noticeable impact in our behavior. For example, without any intervention, studies with graduate level students found that women consistently performed consistently worse than men in math tests. That’s because, by default, they were aware of a stereotype that women are worse at math than men.

However, in tests where these women were reminded of other identities, e.g. that of a puzzle-solver or a successful sportsperson, the performance differences disappeared.

These identities matter a ton in communication because conflicts escalate when they move from being about the topic to being perceived as threatening the person’s identity.

That’s where motivational interviewing comes in. With tricky issues, motivational interviewing focuses on asking questions to help a person understand both sides of an issue and why they might be for against it.

The goal isn’t to persuade – it is to simply understand both sides of the issues and reinforce that there are other identities they could choose. He made the point with fascinating examples involving polarizing issues such as gun rights and vaccines.

(5) From 7 decades of data from the famous Grant study, the people who were most satisfied in the relationships at age 50 were the healthiest and happiest at age 80. One researcher put it bluntly – “The most defining factor for happiness and satisfaction of life is love, not romantic love, but the love and connection with our friends, family, coworkers and their community.”

1. Read ASAP! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · History · Novel Concepts and Interesting Research · Technology

BR 314: How Innovation Works by Matt Ridley

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Comments: Matt Ridley’s “How Innovation Works” was rich with insight. A great book.

Insights that resonated:

(1) “The main ingredient in the secret sauce that leads to innovation is freedom. Freedom to exchange, experiment, imagine, invest and fail; freedom from the expropriation or restriction by chiefs, priests and thieves. Freedom on the part of consumers to reward the innovations they like and reject what they don’t.”

This note from the final chapter is a point Ridley makes again and again. History has repeatedly shown free societies to be more innovative.

(2) Innovation works better bottoms up vs. tops down and when there is less burden of regulation. Example after example demonstrates how empires resist innovation (and even outright ban it). And, for a simple example of how burden of regulation kills innovation, we can look at how Europe’s regulatory changes over the past decade have only resulted in incumbents getting more entrenched and in the citizens of Europe getting access to sub-par technology.

(3) Regulation hobbles innovations because it increases the cost of learning. When learning costs go up, it is hard for us to iterate. Nuclear energy is a stand out example of this.

Also, regulation changes incentives. Instead of people spending energy to invent new things, they spend their energy in making friends with the government to bend the rules.

Iteration is key – it is what has saved millions of lives from diseases like whooping cough and malaria.

(4) “Innovation happens not within but between brains.” The “great man” theory is one we’ve created out of convenience and due (more recently) to intellectual property law.

Innovation has consistently arrived because of humans who chose to build on the work of their rivals and predecessors and combine existing ideas in interesting ways.

Crucial innovations are often thought to have been accelerated by war. However, most innovation has happened incrementally and has been driven forward by many people.

Innovations come when their time comes – regardless of the people involved.

(5) Growth never needs to stop. The nature of growth is such that we first figure out how to produce more. Then we learn how to produce more with less. Until our efficiencies far outweigh our appetite.

Light is a great example. Once the cost of light goes down, more people leave their lights on. However, the efficiency of LEDs mean we’re more efficient than ever before.

(6) Every innovation has been resisted. Politicians in India and Pakistan resisted the Green revolution. Europe was prejudiced against the humble potato.

These are examples of innovations that made their way through (most good ones make it over time). However, there are examples of innovations that haven’t – in multiple places because of successful smear campaigns.

Then again, there are others that were delayed. For example, Dyson fought a decade long battle to get its innovative bag-less vacuum cleaner approved in the EU (crazy, I know).

In effect, there is no such thing as a no brainer. As long as incentives to resist something exists, resistance will exist.

(7) “The main theme of human history is that we become steadily more specialized in what we produce, and steadily more diversified in what we consume: we move away from precarious self-sufficiency to safer mutual interdependence.”

Beautifully put.

1. Read ASAP! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Health · Self Improvement

BR 313: Built to Move by Kelly Starrett and Juliet Starrett

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Comments: Built to Move by Kelly and Juliet Starrett is built on a simple thesis – our body is built to move and the quality of our lives are dependent on making sure we’re allowing our body to do what it does best – move. They focus on 10 habits based on 10 vital signs –

  1. Getting up and down off the floor
  2. Breathe easy
  3. Extend your hips
  4. Walk
  5. Future-proof your neck and shoulders
  6. Eat healthy
  7. Squat
  8. Find your Balance
  9. Create a movement-rich environment
  10. Sleep

Each chapter has an assessment and a physical practice. And the book has had a life changing impact in the sense that I’ve adopted those physical practices as part of my week.

Insights that resonated:

(1) Don’t ice injuries. Ice makes it worse. More here

(2) There’s a great argument that our brains exist to help us move. More here with the story of the sea squirt.

(3) Changes I’ve made in my life

First, I’ve added 10-12 minutes to my morning workout routine to focus on the exercises laid out in the book. Specifically,

  • Mondays: Floor exercises – Sit and rise, various floor sitting stretches
  • Tuesdays: Hamstrings – mobilization, lockout, hip openers
  • Wednesday: Hips – extension, isometric, split squat
  • Thursday: Neck + shoulders (and some balance) – Airport scanner, rotations, wall hang

These workouts are all described in the book. While I carry the list with me on my phone, I keep the book near my workout mat so I can use it like a mobility manual of sorts.

Second, I’ve adopted a few of the small tweaks from the book – e.g., eating while sitting on the floor, balancing on one leg while I brush, and so on. These are easy and fun.

Third, a key part of building a movement rich environment is not sitting for more than 6 hours per day. I was definitely exceeding this regularly. Since the start of the year, I’ve made changes to ensure this happens – including defaulting to a standing desk and standing during meetings.

Fourth, thanks to both Built to Move and Good Energy, I’ve increased how much I walk and have lifted my daily average to 10,000+ per day. This has meant making tweaks too – e.g., parking 1000 steps away from the building where I work.

My final reflection – my lifestyle has changed dramatically in the past 15 months or so. It started with some significant changes after reading Peter Attia’s Outlive, accelerated significantly with Casey Means’ Good Energy, and then leveled up further with the Starrett’s Built to Move. These 3 books combined have changed my life.

In retrospect, I think “Good Energy” and “Built to Move” are the 101 books that I can’t recommend enough to anyone interested in these topics. They lay out the basics and lay out the path for a significantly healthier lifestyle. “Outlive” is the 201 book once you’ve made those changes.

Either way, I’m grateful to these authors for creating these books – they really are the user manual for my body that I didn’t know existed.

1. Read ASAP! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Health · Novel Concepts and Interesting Research

BR 312: Good Energy by Casey Means

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Comments: When I reflect on books that have had the most profound impact on my life, this book is likely #2 on the list after Stephen Covey’s 7 Habits.

Insights that resonated:

(1) The conventional medical system is good at dealing with any acute issue that requires urgent attention. For anything chronic, it is useless.

(2) It is useless because it focuses on treating symptoms in silos rather than understanding the body as a whole. Dr Means makes the case that most chronic issues have the same underlying cause – metabolic dysfunction. When our metabolism works well, our cells are able to process all the energy we ingest and produce “Good Energy.” When it doesn’t, it leads to “Bad Energy” and this shows up with all sorts of chronic ailments and longer-term issues like diabetes.

(3) To clean up our act, we need to do 3 things.

First, we need to eat stuff that results in good energy. In simple terms, this means staying away from anything processed and eating a diverse collection of foods.

Second, it means respecting our biological clock. Sleeping well, respecting our circadian rhythms by getting enough sunlight and eating timely meals so our digestive system has time to do its work.

Third, it means doing things that modern lifestyles have taken away – movement, exposure to varying temperatures, and non-toxic living. Our bodies do better when they’re exposed to varying temperatures and, of course, the less toxins/more organic materials we use, the better.

While this is the high-level summary, I think Casey Means’ book excels in the detail. For all fellow fans of Peter Attia’s Outlive, I think this book is a great complement that outdoes Outlive in a few respects.

The single biggest takeaway from Outlive is the importance of exercise. Specifically, focusing on stability/mobility, then more time in Zone 2, then improving our grip strength, and growing our V02 Max by working out at high intensity. This takeaway alone has had a profound impact on my life.

Next, it emphasized the importance of protein and sleep. Those changed how I approached things too.

My only gripe with the book was that Peter Attia often recommended expensive scans and rushed to treatment (e.g., strong recommendations for statins) the moment he saw a symptom trending in the wrong direction.

Casey Means, on the other hand, takes an approach that feels closer to first principles. She focuses on lifestyle changes first. That resonated.

Since reading this book, I’ve been on a mission to “clean up my act.” Here are a few changes I’m working on:

(1) Sleep: I haven’t needed any convincing on the importance of sleep and generally sleep 7-8 hours daily, and longer on weekends. However, I still did a 6 hour day once every 2 weeks. I’ve been doing a better job at holding the line at 7 hours minimum.

(2) Movement: Casey Means did a good job explaining the importance of movement throughout the day. One small change has been targeting 7000 steps every day. I notice I don’t hit this when I’m working from home – so there’s more work to do here.

I’ve been more religious about the morning run once the sun rises to get light. And I’m working on adding 20 push ups every day.

(3) Nutrition: My morning protein shake used to have spinach and fruits. I incorporated seeds (Flax, hemp, chia) recently. I’ve added a scoop each of plant protein and whey as well.

I’ve become more disciplined about salad, nuts, and such during the day. And I’ve switched from white rice to (traditional) red rice and have reduced quantities over time. I’ve grown up as a rice eater – so this is a big change.

(4) Meal timing: The next big change is eating closer to 2 hours before bed. This is a no-brainer move – and way better than my previous average of 15 minutes. The other related change is going for a 15 minute walk after dinner most days to aid digestion.

(5) Next on the roadmap: I plan to go back to trying a CGM/continuous glucose monitor in the new year. I’d first tried one a few years ago and didn’t make the most of it. I know better now and I’m excited to try it and then follow it up with a few blood tests to see if these changes are taking effect.

(6) What I don’t intend to do: It is also worth calling out what I don’t intend to do. First on that list is cold water/ice baths. I’m all for naturally exposing my body to varying temperatures. But this feels like punishment I’d love to avoid unless absolutely necessary.

Second, Casey Means is a proponent of removing all grain/rice altogether from my diet. One idea I’ve applied as I’ve made changes is to ensure I’m ensuring there is a feeling of joy vs. punishment. I love rice. I’ve come to realize I can eat a lot less of it and I can also switch to low glycemic index/more nutritious varieties easily. I plan to do that.

One of the central tenets of this blog is “to learn and not to do is not to learn.” Outside of shaping my synthesis on diet and metabolism, the number of changes I’m working on is testament to how it has inspired a profound learning experience. It is among the most impactful I’ve ever read.

And for that, I’m grateful.

3. SHELF it · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Novel Concepts and Interesting Research · Technology

BR 311: How Infrastructure Works by Deb Chachra

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Category: 3 – SHELF it (All Categories are 1 – Read ASAP!, 2 – BUY it!, 3 – SHELF it, 4 – SOMEDAY it)

Comments: I think a more accurate title would probably have been “Reflections on Infrastructure.” The title hints at a more systematic examination of infrastructure. This book wasn’t that. Instead, it was a nicely put together set of reflections about infrastructure. Still a very nice read – just not what the title might suggest

Insights that resonated: 

(1) The word infra means below or beneath. Infrastructure is a collection of the many systems below the surface that makes our life possible. It is, by nature, transparent. When it works, we just see right through it.

(2) Essential infrastructure goes from luxury to utility to a political right. The internet is a great example of this. It started as a luxury, then became a utility, and is on its way to becoming a political right.

(3) The challenge with addressing climate change until a few years ago was that our carbon emissions were directly tied to our consumption – more consumption meant more fossil fuels burnt. As societies advance, their energy needs grow. So, addressing climate change directly meant advocating a regression in lifestyle.

However, thanks to the incredible advances in renewables, we can now think of fossil fuels as a transition state. They were very useful while they were around. But we get to experience a future where energy is more abundant than ever before. <1% of the energy from the sun would comfortably meet all of humanity’s energy needs.

(4) The marvelous Dinorwig power station/electric mountain in Wales is a great example of how we are capable of creating elegant sustainable solutions for our energy needs. More in this post.

(5) “If you don’t schedule time for maintenance, your equipment will do it for you.”

1. Read ASAP! · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Career · Money

BR 310: The Algebra of Wealth by Scott Galloway

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Category: 1 – Read ASAP! (All Categories are 1 – Read ASAP!, 2 – BUY it!, 3 – SHELF it, 4 – SOMEDAY it)

Comments: I debated whether this was a category 1 or a category 2. I eventually went with category 1 because it had a lot of earned wisdom. Lots of great insight – a particularly good book for someone who is thinking about these early in their career. I wish I’d had the opportunity to read it in my 20s.

Insights that resonated: 

(1) Most people are going to get wealthy slowly as a function of their ability to deploy capital that compounds over time.

(2) Always watch your burn. A dollar saved is more valuable than a dollar earned (thanks to taxes). Being able to live simply goes a long way in our ability to accumulate wealth. And if there’s one personal finance habit that helps above all others, it is tracking our spending.

(3) To build a great career, don’t follow your passion. Follow your talent. Then work hard at it – being out of balance in your 20s and 30s often gives us balance in our 30s and 40s. Get into the office, do the work.

(4) Diversify. Start with ETFs that cover the stock market. In time, make sure you’re exposed to different kinds of risks. Scott advocates testing buying and holding individual stocks we have conviction in with <=20% of our portfolio. He is also a proponent of real estate investing if you can handle the overhead (property management, maintenance, etc.)

(5) Get off social media and anything that results in us comparing our wealth. Someone will always have the bigger boat.

3. SHELF it · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Business · Creativity · Management

BR 309: Sonic Boom – The Impossible Rise of Warner Bros Records by Peter Ames Carlin

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Comments: The is the story of Warner Brothers Music’s incredible thirty year run where they shaped the music industry via artists like Jimi Hendrix, Madonna, and Prince. I don’t know much about the music industry – certainly not much about the industry in the 70s and 80s. I also can’t remember how this book ended up in my collection. But I love scrappy origin stories – so maybe that explains it. This was an entertaining read.

Insights that resonated: One of my favorite anecdotes that gets to the heart of their success was that the ethos of the group was their insistence that their focus was to not make hits.

Instead, they were run top-down by an ethos of trying to make great music. Even when they failed commercially, the question the team was asked was – “Was it good?”

Combine this ethos with creative and edgy marketing and you have an incredible package.

As simple as this sounds, it is so hard to do consistently – especially when you’re under pressure to prove viability or to drive growth. And this is especially so when your original set of leaders aren’t in charge.

And that (leadership changes) is predictably what ended their epic run as well.

3. SHELF it · Book Review Actions · Book Reviews · Career · Novel Concepts and Interesting Research

BR 308: Hidden Potential – by Adam Grant

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Comments: A good read.

Insights that resonated: 

(1) “The true measure of your potential is not the peak you reached but how far you climbed to get there.”

(2) Over 8 years, undergraduate students at Northwestern university were assessed on their performance on topics when their introductory class was taught by an “expert” on the topic. These students’ grades in subsequent advanced classes were logged and studied.

The trend of the results was clear – taking an introduction class from an expert decreased performance.

(3) Deliberate play works better than deliberate practice. Steph Curry’s coach believes practice can get monotonous. So his goal is to not have boring in their workouts