The courage to be disliked by Ichiro Kishimi
Summary
The book is based on the ideology of Alfred Adler who was the architect of the school of individual psychology. Secondly, The entire book is in the layout of a dialogue between a philosopher and a youth. It goes like
On the outskirts of the thousand-year-old city lived a philosopher who taught that the world was simple and that happiness was within the reach of every man, instantly. A young man who was dissatisfied with life went to visit this philosopher to get to the heart of the matter. This youth found the world a chaotic mass of contradictions and, in his anxious eyes, any notion of happiness was completely absurd.
After that, the philosopher explains to him how life works its pros & cons and all the various types of emotions one goes with. In total the youth came 5 times which is termed as 5 nights in the book to seek the guidance of the philosopher. However he was not the one who easily get convinced by the theory of the philosopher and used to question him now and then, This is what makes the entire book quite interesting and at times mind-blowing.
_____________
Conclusion
In today’s world with all the hustle and bouts we live with, it is a must-read for all of us.
It makes us view life, ourselves, and everything around and within in a much simpler manner. It isn’t the life that is complicated, but us.
A simple book that conveys complex Adlerian ideas as lucidly as it can.
_____________
What I learned!!!
The central theme of Adler’s philosophy is life has no meaning, we assign meaning to it. Life is about living passionately & truthfully in present moments, as we have no control over the past & future. Also, the power of courage is something I learned in the book. The author rightly told that we have chosen unhappiness because we don’t dare to be happy. When I read this first it sounded weird but slowly it’s making sense.
2) Think Again by Adam Grant
All of humanity’s problems stem from man’s inability to sit quietly in a room alone.
“Think Again” Review-115
Nonfiction – Psychology
_____________
Summary
The book is based & concentrates on the vision of re-thinking. Reevaluating our old beliefs in a new way reinforces the importance of rethinking and highlights the perils of not revisiting one’s idea.
The author elucidates the concepts and then shows us how to apply these rethinking principles to all walks of life. From dealing with prejudices, education, organizational behavior, listening and questioning, career planning, dealing with conflict and disagreements, and avoiding overconfidence.
The best part of the book was that it was the original work of the author and not some statistics and references. The author has done hundreds of experiments and has jotted down the conclusion in this book. The best chapter for me was the “Joy of being wrong” in which the author shows how being wrong is a good sign and it means you are learning.
_____________
Conclusion
The core message of this book is to think like a scientist. Always seeking new information, challenging existing beliefs including your own, running experiments to test your hypotheses, and being a lifelong learner.
At the end of this book, you will value humility, self-doubt, curiosity, being proven wrong, healthy debate, complexity, and nuance, and the value of experiments.
_____________
What I learned!!
I enjoyed this book. It reminded me that we should never stop learning no matter how old we are. It’s wise and healthy to keep analyzing all the things you believe are true. Life is all about flow and renewal. Nothing is fixed forever – including our strongly held opinions and beliefs. This book helps to see why. It helps us to become more authentic
3) 21 lesson for 21st century by Yuval Noah Harar
#Nonfiction – Current affairs & Social philosophy
_____________
Summary
The book provides 21 lessons for how to deal with the 21st century, which is very exciting, innovative, and dangerous than any other past century.
The book is divided into 5 parts –
My favorite part was the “technological challenge” in which the authors talk about Artificial intelligence, Big data, and all its advantage and disadvantage.
The book shows the challenges the world might face if AI and Bioengineering converge. In the past, human inequality on an economic scale was a result of the highly skewed distribution of wealth. In the future, economic Inequality might seem to be a better choice, since most humans would be made Irrelevant by those who control data and information. There could be for the first time, genetic superiority of those who can manipulate their DNA, live longer, and even have a substantial enhancement of their cerebral power by coupling their brains with supercomputers in real-time.
Apart from that author comes down heavily on politicians and how they operate. They operate systematically in four stages, as explained in this book. 1) Downsize the issue.2) Focus on a touching story. 3)Weave a conspiracy theory. 4) A leader or dogma or belief, finally arrives to redeem us… and he rules till the cycle turns against him.
_____________
Conclusion
I appreciate the author’s Courage for an unbiased and vocal analysis of several political, cultural, religious, and historical perspectives However, I feel many times in the book that the author has gone to several extremes to prove his point. Although he clarifies later that this is just his imagination, I think things should be written based on facts rather than whatever comes to your mind.
4) Educated by Tara Westover
True ignorance is not the absence of knowledge but the refusal to acquire it”
“Be close enough to understand;
Be far enough to differentiate”⚖️
__________________
Review 👇
🏫👩✈️
“Educated” is a memoir of Tara Westover. In the book, she shares her life journey in a strict Mormon family and the struggles she has to go through to get herself in a proper school and for education.
🏫👩✈️
Her life started in the mountain of Idaho (a state in the Pacific Northwest region of the United States. ) with her nine siblings. From an early age, Tara wanted to join a school but her father refused it citing that schools are run by the government who will brainwash you. All such negative and fake stories were told to her about the country, government, and world. The only thing she was expected to do was worship God and read the bible. However slowly things began to change when her elder brother Tyler left the home. She was soon started getting physically abused by his other brother Shawn after she began to grow close to Charles, a boy she met while performing in theatre. At that time she decided to leave the home and started her journey. His brother Tyler encourage her to do so and lastly, she left the home in search of a better life. However, the struggle was not over and she faces a lot of trouble and challenges that are beautifully and interestingly written in the book.
__________________
What’s special about the book ⭐
💪
The courage and determination of the author come out very boldly and is an inspiration to many who are caught in similar situations of having to live in two contradicting worlds, unable to make a decision. It is truly an inspiring biography and that too written at such a young age.
________________
5) Tiny Habits by BJ Fogg
If you are not paying for the product, then you become the product.”👀
__________________
Review 👇
🏃
Tiny habits is a self-improvement book that shows how habits work. The main purpose of the book is to show how tech companies and social media companies attract us by targeting our psychology and our weakness for their profit and advantage.
🧑🔬
Brian Jeffrey Fogg is an American social scientist who is currently a research associate at Stanford University and author. He is the founder and director of the Stanford Persuasive Technology Lab, later renamed Behavior Design Lab. His work inspired many persuasive design techniques used to build successful products like Instagram, whose founder was among Dr. Fogg’s students. Who is better to teach people how to overcome the irresistible pull of these products?
🕦
How do habits work according to the author?
Prompt, Ability, and Motivation are the ingredients of every habit, good or bad.
🦸
Motivation is your desire to do the behavior. Ability is your capacity to do the behavior. And Prompt is your cue to do the behavior.
🦥
If you want to change your habits you need to start changing the ability and motivation factor first before going to prompt.
😯
The main crust of the book is to make people aware of social media addiction. How it happens and how to stop it. Social media companies have started employing attention engineers which are making their products way more addictive. So to prevent yourself from this virus you should read this book.
🌟
The book contains some great and simple life hacks that one can apply to change one habit and protect themselves from this social media virus.
__________________
Comments