Book – Definition
a written work that is published as printed pages fastened together inside a cover, or in electronic form.
Books have a strange way of guiding your life.
Books never hold you accountable, allow complete privacy, never threaten, do not spoon feed, and still, by the time you are done reading a book, you are at the least, a percentage more energized and enlightened. You and only you know what you are going to take away from this title.
A few books that I would like to share and recommend are:
“I would recommend Sapiens to anyone who’s interested in the history and the future of our species” – Bill Gates
I need not say more. Good starting book. Not too heavy on the mind. Great storytelling. Related to every single human on this planet, and hence has a global outreach.
We forget what the human species was and has gone through to get to today, and this book is a great reminder and guide for the same.
If you are interested more in the future, Homo Deus is the second book from Yuval Noah Harari. Try that too.
“A hopeful book about the potential for human progress when we work off facts rather than our inherent biases” – Barack Obama
Factfulness is a facts based book stating numbers and graphs from many different word agencies and bringing forward the argument that the world / era we live in today is in fact one of the best that has ever been on the planet. Things are better than we think.
Atomic Habits is a life changing book and hence makes it to my top 10. If you thought that the power of compounding is associated only with money, the book will make you think again.
The storytelling; the simple yet encouraging manner in which the topic is explained, is highly commendable. The book helps you understand how a 1% change per day adds up to 365% change by the end of the year.
“Everyone should own a copy” –
James Clear, Author of “Atomic Habits”
If there is 1 book that you should read about money, understanding the money psychology and how you can generate wealth over a period of time, with a no rush, no greed attitude – this would be it.
Highly recommend this one due to the clarity with which the topic of money has been explained.
Ikigai – a reason to jump out of bed each morning.
The book covers the authors traveling to Japan, to villages where the life-expectancy is much higher than the rest of the world – called Blue zones. And share the wealth of their ways of living, and what we could learn from them.
Every chapter, every story, every life lesson is worth the time you will spend reading this book.
How to free yourself, change your life and achieve real happiness – Ichiro Kishmi and Fumitake Koga
If Ikigiai is a light hearted, fun, playful way of storytelling, then be ready for hard hitting lessons when you read this book. Take breaks when needed – do not rush, is my suggestion.
The title can mislead and discourage people from reading the book as it sounds a little negative. But once you have read the book, you realize, the statement below the title is much more apt for this book.
If there 1 book you read from the whole list, make it this one.
Free yourself from the frustrations that sabotage your life – Dr. Les Carter
Most people would think – oh, what if someone found me reading this and think that I have anger issues.
Well – this book is about an emotion that is common to every single human on this planet, from a very small age to the day you leave the planet.
Whether you think you have anger issues or not, go ahead and get a copy for yourself. You will leave with a lot of knowledge on the emotion of anger and how everyone should and can educate themselves about this emotion.
The biggest misconception people have is that they are the odd one out and everyone else is sorted! – Ankur Warikoo
Ankur Warikoo is an entrepreneur and content creator, and I happened to fall upon his videos on YouTube. Got hooked up and that led to me reading this book.
Ankur talks about many topics, from success and failure, to habits, to money and relationships. Most of the points are known, but the point of the book is to be a reminder for all of us – how life happens to all of us in a similar yet unequal fashion.
Lots of anecdotes, lots of reminders, lots of fun stories and getting to know Ankur a little better from his stories. Great book!
“Deep work is the ability to focus without distraction on a cognitively demanding task”
“Most people, whether knowledge workers in noisy open-plan offices or creatives struggling to sharpen their vision, have lost the ability to go deep – spending their days instead in a frantic blur of email and social media, not even realizing there’s a better way.”
– Cal Newport
Based on the observations of Karl Jung, this is a fantastic book to learn how to focus on work and the benefits.
Epilogue
As a child, I was an avid reader – and was fortunate to have parents who never stopped me; instead encouraged to read as much as I wanted. In addition, the ecosystem those days was reader-friendly. Libraries were everywhere. Book shops used to accept books in return for half-price when buying new books.
Even the garbage paper shops in our town sold books. They would happen to collect books on their home to home search for waste paper – and then sell full books for as little as 50 paise to 2 rupees! This was one of my favorite shops near home. And it was right besides the Kite shop… oh those simple and blessed days of my life! We digress…
Over the years, I got lost in school and studies, then engineering, then work, marriage, parenthood – the love for books diminished. The time was spent mostly on work and family related activities. And the idea of self got lost. Until a few months ago – when my body and mind just couldn’t bear the brunt of the 2 decades of constant self abuse – I crashed. Burnt out. Tired. Depressed.
I took a break from work. Started the re-energizing process, or at least the first thing that came to my mind – fix my health. My Yoga teacher was a blessing – without whom I would have been completely lost. Slowly, as bits of energy returned, I started to go for walks. These daily walks helped me re-discover my love of books. (**Audible)
Books helped me understand that the world is simple and life is too. Overthinking does not help. Habits and compounding, are 2 words that can change your life. Process matters, so does the journey.
If you are climbing a mountain, would the views at the top be worth if you did not complete the journey to get there in the first place? Would you consider yourself only a success if you make it to the top? What would you consider yourself if you met with an accident enroute, and could never climb to the top again? What was the most important part – Was it reaching the top? Or – was it the journey? Do you think it was completely in your control to reach the top?
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I so agree with this article of yours on books and reading what other people wrote – their thoughts – their journey – but still resonates with your own journey in some ways…. Loved every brief explanations of the books….