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Why you should get diverse career experience

Are you struggling to figure out your career?

As I was reading Range by David Epstein, he outlines how generalists tend to succeed in careers, especially in our current world. He talks about the benefits from gaining diverse experience, and the potential downside to becoming too specialized. He also highlights a handful of people who became successful because they were generalists, along with instances when generalists perform better than specialists.

You’ll get there eventually.
Photo by Thomas Dils | Accessed on Unsplashed.com

Main impacts

  1. The importance of sampling.
  2. Getting stuck in a specialization can create blinders.
  3. Find your fit.

The importance of sampling

A key part of career development is finding yourself, and you tend to find yourself through experience, not just through reflection. Reflection is important, but by itself it’s not enough. This means you need to actively try things and diversify your experience to find out what you like and what you’re good at.

Head start vs sampling

Near the beginning of the book, David talks about the difference of getting a head start versus sampling. He uses two famously successful athletes to discuss their career paths, with Tiger Woods representing the head start category and Roger Federer for the sampling.

Tiger got a head start in golf, as he started really young. Whereas Federer tried a bunch of different things before settling on tennis, which gave him a range of skills and coordination that he could then apply to tennis.

It is important to note that even though Tiger started when he was very young, he was always the one asking his dad to play golf, he was not forced to play golf.

One is not better than the other, just different, but both can achieve greatness. Typically, we hear a lot about stories like Tiger’s, where they start so young and become immensely successful. But we don’t often hear the stories of others like Federer who took a very different path. These are the kind of stories that David is highlighting in this book.

Even Vanessa and Serena Williams had immense range. They were required to try a bunch of different sports for different reasons or skills, and both were encouraged to have diverse educational backgrounds and learn multiple languages. If you want to learn more about the Williams, I thoroughly enjoyed the movie King Richard.

Reframe failure

Part of the value in sampling is knowing when to stop, and knowing when you’ve gained what you need to from an experience.

Grit is important, but more important than having grit is knowing when you need to apply it. You don’t need to commit whole heartedly to something that’s just not right for you. If you can find a balance between trying new things and fully committing to the most important ones, you’ll end up being both successful and satisfied.

It’s also important to comprehend that “failure” at something is not “failure” of yourself as a person. Choosing to move on or give up because it’s not right for you, does not make you a failure.

Failure is good. It can help get you where you need to be and provide you with experiences that may be useful later.

Try new things and don’t be afraid to move onto something new.

Getting stuck in a specialization can create blinders

This book was a combination of highlighting how diverse experiences are useful and complimenting it with examples of how becoming too specialized can also be a hindrance.

For instance, a lot of the best ideas and solutions come from outside a speciality. Usually this is because the individual can bring a different perspective and apply useful lessons from other areas. They aren’t limited by the natural constraints taught by that profession/speciality, or mentality of “that’s just how we do it.”

There’s a program where NASA crowd sources solutions in exchange for a reward. Often times the solutions come from people outside the industry, as they can apply new ideas or different perspectives to the problem. Sometimes the ideas are so simple, there’s an example of one that was only a few pages long, and all it needs was a different perspective to understand the solution.

Interdisciplinary careers

Some of the most applicable careers or degrees are interdisciplinary, but can be the hardest to justify or implement effectively. Interdisciplinary experiences allow you to gain a range of critical thinking skills. Then having the opportunity to apply different types of critical thinking across subjects/industries can be hugely instrumental and lead to breakthroughs.

Tied to this concept is the idea that some of the most influential inventions or studies are interdisciplinary, as they end up being useful across many specialities. They may also provide opportunities for knowledge to cross-over as it opens the door to multiple areas.

Interestingly, most executives in business have a diverse backgrounds. The varied experience may give them a better understanding of how different parts of the company work, having worked in similar situations, or help them to develop creative solutions to things.

Lateral thinking

A lot of this ties into the idea of lateral thinking, which is the idea of taking one concept or bit of knowledge and applying it elsewhere. It can also be things like taking a solution that works in one industry and seeing how it can be applied in other industries.

One example is how a battle strategy can help medical students solve a problem. When students heard both the medical problem and the battle story together, they were much more likely to solve the medical problem using a way that mirrors the battle strategy.

There’s also a lot of medical inventions inspired by aspects of nature or other parts of the world. It’s a matter of simply applying one concept in a very different situation.

Find your fit

As mentioned above, you find your self through experiences, not just reflection. It can take time to find your fit and what you want to do. That’s okay. Everyone has their own timeline.

It’s important to not get frustrated with yourself. Don’t feel like you’re behind, or like you’re supposed to be at a specific point by this age. You don’t need to start young to be successful.

I’ve heard this before, but I really like the reminder that you only need to compare yourself to yourself. You only need to be concerned with who you were before and who you want to be. In general, you need to find the best ways to continue growing and become the most un-encumbered self. Your experience doesn’t need to look like anyone else’s.

Remember, it’s fine for you to take time determining what works best for you. The experiences you have along the journey can only serve to help you in the long run, and you never know how something might end up being useful elsewhere. No experience is a waste, and all are ultimately helpful.

One example I thought was really interesting was about van Gogh. He tried so many things before turning to art, from being a teacher to a pastor. In each experience he was fully dedicated to whichever career path he was currently pursuing, even though he kept failing. Then much later he finally turned to art, and even then it took him time to find the best fit. First, he tried drawing and he knew he was close to a good fit, but was constantly told he was not good enough. Eventually he tried painting and he knew it was a perfect fit, so much so that he developed his own way of painting. Incredibly, most of his art are from the last two years of his life.

Final thoughts

I felt like this book was really hopeful. Less people are sticking with one career path these days. It seems like people are taking longer routes to the career they want, or change careers one or more times. This book just showed how much these choices can be beneficial.

It’s a great reminder that you don’t need to hide your diverse experience, or be ashamed of it. It’s actually a benefit and may even make you more desirable. You just need to understand the benefits and know how to talk about it.

Personally, my career has kind of been all over the place. Kind of like a meandering stream slowly working towards a career in an environmental field, and now I’m taking all that experience and hoping to make it useful elsewhere.

Needless to say, I found hope that this can all work out for the best and that my experiences are all valuable, no matter where I end up or stop along the way.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

References

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Saturday swimming

Photo by Oscar Nord | Accessed on Unsplash.com

This is an excerpt from the book The Outsider (also called The Stranger) by Albert Camus, translated by Joseph Laredo.

When I woke up, I understood why my boss seemed unhappy when I asked him for my two days off: today’s a Saturday. I’d sort of forgotten, but as I was getting up, it occurred to me. My boss, quite naturally, thought that I’d be getting four days’ holiday including my Sunday and he couldn’t have been very pleased about that. But for one thing, it isn’t my fault if they buried mother yesterday instead of today and for another, I’d have had my Saturday and Sunday off in any case. Of course, I can still understand my boss’s point of view.

I had trouble getting up because I was tired from the day before. While I was shaving, I wondered what to do with myself and I decided to go for a swim. I caught the tram down to the bathing station at the port. I dived straight into the narrows. It was full of young people. In the water I met Marie Cordona, who used to be a typist at the office. I’d fancied her at the time, and I think she fancied me too. But she left soon afterwards and nothing came of it. I helped her onto a buoy and as I did so, I brushed against her breasts. I was still in the water and she was already lying flat on her stomach on the buoy. She turned round towards me. She had her hair in her eyes and she was laughing. I hoisted myself onto the buoy beside her. It was good and as if for fun, I let my head sink back onto her stomach. She didn’t say anything and I left it there. I had the whole sky in my eyes and it was all blue and gold. I could feel Marie’s stomach throbbing gently under the back of my neck. We lay on the buoy for a long time, half asleep. When the sun got too hot, she dived off and I followed. I caught her up, put my arm round her waist and we swam together. She was still laughing. On the quayside, while we were drying ourselves, she said, ‘I’m browner than you.’ I asked her if she wanted to come to the cinema that evening. She laughed again and said there was a Fernandel film she’d like to see. When we’d got dressed again, she seemed very surprised to see me in a black tie and she asked me if I was in mourning. I told her that mother had died. She wanted to know when, so I said, ‘Yesterday.’ She recoiled slightly, but made no remark. I felt like telling her that it wasn’t my fault, but I stopped myself because I remembered that I’d already said that to my boss. It didn’t mean anything. In any case, you’re always partly to blame.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

The Outsider (also called The Stranger) – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Meursault will not pretend. After the death of his mother, everyone is shocked when he shows no sadness. And when he commits a random act of violence in Algiers, society is baffled. Why would this seemingly law-abiding bachelor do such a thing? And why does he show no remorse even when it could save his life? His refusal to satisfy the feelings of others only increases his guilt in the eyes of the law. Soon Meursault discovers that he is being tried not simply for his crime, but for his lack of emotion – a reaction that condemns him for being an outsider. For Meursault, this is an insult to his reason and a betrayal of his hopes; for Camus it encapsulates the absurdity of life.

Copyright © 1942 by Albert Camus.

Translated by: Joseph Laredo

More details on Goodreads can be found here.

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Ever wondered how to think differently?

Have you ever wondered how people identify trends? Nah, me neither. But I read Non Obvious by Rohit Bhargava who identifies trends and looks to understand how the world works. It was about more than just how to spot a trend, and talked about how to understand the world and think differently.

Photo by Nick Fewings | Accessed on Unsplash.com

Main impacts

  1. Stay curious and wander intentionally.
  2. The poetry (and power) of language.
  3. Do deep work offline.

Stay curious and wander intentionally

A big part of this book was talking about how to find inspiration from every where. It’s important to stay curious and wander intentionally, meaning to try new things and expose yourself to new ideas.

There are so many ways to wander intentionally, all you have to do is do things differently. You can change your routine and just look around you. Get outside your bubble (or industry) and try to understand the world. As soon as you start making adjustments, you can be exposed to new perspectives and see things differently.

When you’re looking for inspiration, make sure to look across diverse sources, such as various industries for trends that may affect you or ideas that you can apply elsewhere.

The poetry (and power) of language

In this book, Rohit stressed the power of using the right language to describe trends, but it seems applicable to so many other areas of life.

He stressed the importance of using the right words to both capture the idea and catch people’s attention. When selecting words to describe a trend (or anything else) it needs to both explain what it is without being too vague or unclear, while also being catchy and noteworthy.

Rohit notices that poets are really good at this. They understand the importance of using exactly the right word, and that often less is more. Understandably so, since poetry leaves little room for extra words.

Recently, I’ve been hearing people talk about how elegant the prose is when an author starts as a poet and moves into novels or stories. There’s something to be said when you’re used to picking each word with care, and when each one has to add value.

I feel like this can be useful in any role that requires you to use words (aka everything). If you’re intentional about the words you use, then your message can be clearer and more effective.

Do deep work offline

Another piece of advice is to do your deep work offline. Find a way to capture the information you need and work on it without distractions.

Rohit’s example of this for identifying trends is to capture all kinds of stories that you think might be relevant to trends in a physical way, either in some kind of folder or printed version. Then, set aside some time to deliberately pour over the stories and analyze them, to find what is similar and start to develop trends.

Really, what’s important is to both set time aside for this and to do this work offline – away from devices or distractions. However that process looks like for you, the idea is to do deep work in a way that removes all distractions.

It’s important to take time to process the ideas you’re working through. That may mean different things for people, depending on how you think things through. Sometimes you need to take a break and come back later with a fresh perspective. You never know when inspiration might hit.

I think this is a really valuable reminder. Not everything needs to be done without distractions, but your deep, thoughtful work can really benefit from focused work. And like most things, this needs to be intentional.

Final thoughts

Even though I’m personally not interested in being able to identify trends, I found there was useful information on how to understand the world. Obviously, there were sections that I found less interesting or applicable to me. But I think what this book emphasizes is to be open to information from all places and actively seek new sources of inspiration. And I think that’s one of the most valuable lessons to learn.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

References

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The Prophet speaking about clothes

Photo by Hudson Hintze | Accessed on Unsplash.com

This is an excerpt from the book The Prophet by Kahlil Gibran.

And the weaver said, “Speak to us of Clothes.”

And he answered:

Your clothes conceal much of your beauty, yet they hide not the unbeautiful.

And though you seek in garments the freedom of privacy you may find in them a harness and a chain.

Would that you could meet the sun and the wind with more of your skin and less of your raiment, for the breath of life is in the sunlight and the hand of life is in the wind.

Some of you say, “It is the north wind who has woven the clothes we wear.”

And I say, Ay, it was the north wind,

But shame was his loom, and the softening of the sinews was his thread.

And when his work was done he laughed in the forest.

Forget not that modesty is for a shield against the eye of the unclean.

And when the unclean shall be no more, what were modesty but a fetter and a fouling of the mind?

And forget not that the earth delights to feel your bare feet and the winds long to play with your hair.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

The Prophet – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Kahlil Gibran’s masterpiece, The Prophet, is one of the most beloved classics of our time. Published in 1923, it has been translated into more than twenty languages, and the American editions alone have sold more than nine million copies.

The Prophet is a collection of poetic essays that are philosophical, spiritual, and, above all, inspirational. Gibran’s musings are divided into twenty-eight chapters covering such sprawling topics as love, marriage, children, giving, eating and drinking, work, joy and sorrow, housing, clothes, buying and selling, crime and punishment, laws, freedom, reason and passion, pain, self-knowledge, teaching, friendship, talking, time, good and evil, prayer, pleasure, beauty, religion, and death.

Copyright © 1923 by Kahlil Gibran.

More details can be found on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

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How entrepreneurs can address poverty, carbon emissions, and unemployment

Have you ever considered the interaction of poverty, unemployment and carbon emissions? As I was reading the book A World of Three Zeros by Muhammad Yunus, he describes how the interaction of these can be addressed by social businesses. In his perspective, social businesses (an expansion on what’s currently considered business) can get us to a world of three zeros; zero poverty, zero unemployment and zero carbon emissions.

Photo by Timon Studler | Accessed on Unsplash.com

Key ideas

  1. Everyone can be an entrepreneur.
  2. Expand the concept of a “business.”
  3. Change the systems and assumptions.

Everyone can be an entrepreneur

One of the biggest messages in this book is that everyone can be an entrepreneur. There is no specific type of person that is born to be an entrepreneur, it’s not limited to certain people. It’s really just another way to be creative and finding innovative solutions. Anyone can develop that skill, if given the opportunity.

Everyone has the potential to become an entrepreneur. We just need to provide the opportunity, resources, and expand the concept of what a business can do. Sometimes people are limited by a lack of opportunities or resources (especially capital investments). But sometimes people are just limited by the idea that a business has to revolve around making a profit (see next section).

When everyone can become an entrepreneur, you allow people to change from being a job seeker into a job creator, which helps everybody. Letting people change their mentality of having to find a job, into how to create a job for themselves and others opens the door for so many new ideas and opportunities.

Expand the concept of a “business”

Going hand in hand with above, is to change the concept of a “business” to do more than create profit.

A business is just a creative way to address a problem. It doesn’t need to create profit, it needs to sustain itself and have potential for growth, but what you measure as success expand past just profits. Instead of profit being the main measure of success, profit can simply be a means to grow the business, by putting the money back into the business to create more opportunities

Business can be a tool to develop creativity and self-discovery. The entrepreneurial spirit is primarily innovation and creativity, and can be applied to any issue. There is tremendous opportunity to channel these skills for the greater good and creatively solve

An alternative to the profit driven business is a social business. A social business is a business that aims to address a social problem. The success of the business can change from ROI (return on investment) that primarily looks at profits to maximizing SROI (social return on investment). Once you expand what a business can do, you can easily adjust the key performance indicators (KPIs) to focus on areas that are important to the success it hopes to achieve. The key skills of building a business can easily be adjusted to other definitions of success.

Once you expand this concept of “business”, you open the door to creative solutions to so many social issues. It also gives people the opportunity to do what they’re passionate about, while improving the world around them. Community based solutions are typically the most sustainable and effective as they are more likely to understand the context and what will actually work within the community.

People are the key to solving world problems, and right now there’s so much untapped potential.

Change the systems and assumptions

In order to expand business concepts and open the door to more creative solutions, there are systems and assumption that need to change. To start, we need to change business to be more than just about profits, providing alternative definitions of success.

Another key assumption that we need to change is that all people are inherently selfish. Generally, people want to help but are restricted by the system, which limits what can be done. However, if we start functioning on the assumption that all people are inherently selfless, we can chance the systems and open society up to help others.

Another way to support changing the system is to provide training and support to those starting their own business (social or any other kind). Training provides guidance for other people on their journey, and you often need more than just a good idea, you need to know how to put it into action. Providing resources (money, connections, etc.) can greatly improve people’s access to starting a business. Businesses require money to start and build momentum, and money can create opportunities where people feel like they have none. Micro-loans became very popular because they showed that sometimes people just need a little support, and that people can do a lot with a little.

Overall, we need to change the system through an integrated manner. Change mindsets and provide opportunities, then you’ll see people flourish.

Final thoughts

I felt like this book was very hopeful. It chose to look at the good in humanity and highlight how we can actually address large social issues. We have the potential, people are inherently good, so let’s setup systems that encourage positive change.

This book felt aimed at people in business, and not necessarily at people who just want to change the world. It had business language and talked about untapped opportunities, while providing hope and challenging what it means to be a business.

It was a unique book. It’s not a typical entrepreneurial book nor a typical let’s save the world kind of book.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

References

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Women and Power in Politics

Photo by Miguel Bruna | Accessed on Unsplash.com

This is an excerpt from the book Women and Power by Mary Beard.

Even if we do restrict our sights to the upper echelons of national politics the question of how we judge women’s success in that area is still tricky. There are plenty of league tables charting the proportion of women within national legislatures. At the very top comes Rwanda, where more than 60 per cent of the members of the legislature are women, while the UK is almost fifty places down, at roughly 30 per cent. Strikingly, the Saudi Arabian National Council has a higher proportion of women than the US Congress. It is hard not to lament some of these figures and applaud others, and a lot has rightly been made of the role of women in post-civil war Rwanda. But I do wonder if, in some places, the presence of large numbers of women in parliament means that parliament is where the power is not.

I also suspect that we are not being quite straight with ourselves about what we want women in parliaments for. A number of studies point to the role of women politicians in promoting legislation in women’s interests (in childcare, for example, equal pay and domestic violence). A report from the Fawcett Society recently suggested a link between the 50/50 balance between women and men in the Welsh Assembly and the number of times ‘women’s issues’ were raised there. I certainly do not want to complain about childcare and the rest getting a fair airing but I am not sure that such things should continue to be perceived as ‘women’s issues’; nor am I sure that these are the main reasons we want more women in parliaments. Those reasons are much more basic: it is flagrantly unjust to keep women out, by whatever unconscious means we do so; and we simply cannot afford to do without women’s expertise, whether it is in technology, the economy or social care. If that means fewer men get into the legislature, as it must do – social change always has it losers as well as its winners – I am happy to look those men in the eye.

But this is still treating power as something elite, coupled to public prestige, to the individual charisma of so-called ‘leadership’, and often, though not always, to a degree of celebrity. It is also treating power very narrowly, as an object of possession that only the few – mostly men – can own or wield (that’s exactly what’s summed up by the image of Perseus or Trump, brandishing his sword). On those terms, women as a gender – not as some individuals – are by definition excluded from it. You cannot easily fit women into a structure that is already coded as male; you have to change the structure. That means thinking about power differently. It means decoupling it from public prestige. It means thinking collaboratively, about the power of followers not just of leaders. It means, above all, thinking about power as an attribute or even a verb (’to power’), not as a possession. What I have in mind is the ability to be effective, to make a difference in the world, and the right to be taken seriously, together as much as individually. It is power in that sense that many women feel they don’t have – and that they want. Why the popular resonance ‘of ‘mansplaining’ (despite the intense dislike of the term felt by many men)? It hits home for us because it points straight to what it feels like not to be taken seriously: a bit like when I get lectured on Roman history on Twitter.

The comic below was one of the examples used in Mary’s book, and even though it’s from the 1980’s it still feels relevant.

source: https://twitter.com/PunchBooks/status/1103946652216446976
Drawn by: Riana Duncan from 1988

Here is an example Mary used in her book of how women and power are depicted in current politics:

Trump as Perseus decapitating Hillary Clinton as Medusa. ”It may take a moment or two to take in that normalisation of gendered violence, but if you were ever doubtful about the extent to which the exclusion of women from power is culturally embedded or unsure of the continued strength of classical ways of formulating and justifying it – well, I give you Trump and Clinton, Perseus and Medusa, and rest my case.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

Women and Power – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

At long last, Mary Beard addresses in one brave book the misogynists and trolls who mercilessly attack and demean women the world over, including, very often, Mary herself. In Women & Power, she traces the origins of this misogyny to its ancient roots, examining the pitfalls of gender and the ways that history has mistreated strong women since time immemorial. As far back as Homer’s Odyssey, Beard shows, women have been prohibited from leadership roles in civic life, public speech being defined as inherently male. From Medusa to Philomela (whose tongue was cut out), from Hillary Clinton to Elizabeth Warren (who was told to sit down), Beard draws illuminating parallels between our cultural assumptions about women’s relationship to power—and how powerful women provide a necessary example for all women who must resist being vacuumed into a male template. With personal reflections on her own online experiences with sexism, Beard asks: If women aren’t perceived to be within the structure of power, isn’t it power itself we need to redefine? And how many more centuries should we be expected to wait?

Copyright © 2017 by Mary Beard.

More details on Goodreads can be found here.

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Skills to be a successful entrepreneur

Have you ever wondered what skills entrepreneurs have in common? As I was reading The Creator’s Code by Amy Wilkinson, she discusses the skills she found to be shared by the 200 successful entrepreneurs she interviewed.

Also, just a content warning, this book is a bit outdated and highlights some people who are now considered either controversial or no longer successful, such as Elon Musk and Elizabeth Holmes. If reading it, take it with a grain of salt.

Photo by Ariel | Accessed on Unsplash.com

Main impacts

  1. Stay agile and test your ideas.
  2. Find inspiration everywhere.
  3. Develop the essential skills.

Find inspiration everywhere

One of the really interesting parts of this book was the discussion of how these entrepreneurs come up with ideas. Amy groups the common thought processes into three types:

  • “Sunbirds: From one domain to another”
    • Sunbirds tend to look at other industries to solve a problem in their own industry, by taking something that already exists and using it somewhere new. An example of this was getting inspiration from a helicopter blade for a heart stent.
  • “Architects: building new models from the ground up”
    • Architects identify a gap or need and building something new that fits. Generally, they look for what is missing or for common pain points, then they find solutions by questioning assumptions and challenging how things are normally done. An example of this is how spanx was developed, Sara Blakely realized there was no reasonable option of what to wear under white slacks and she created something to fulfil the need.
  • “Integrators: Combining concepts”
    • Integrators tend to combine existing parts to create something new, such as putting unexpected things together like unusual spice combinations. They tend to mix and match until they find breakthroughs. An example of this is Chipotle, as the founder wanted both fast food and the best, fresh ingredients.

But overall, the key ingredient for each of these is curiosity.

Stay agile and test your ideas.

So not that you have your idea, you need to start putting it out in the world.

A key part of the initial stages is to remain agile. You need to find ways to test your ideas, ways to get started and see if that’s the best direction to go.

Being able to test parts of your strategy allow you to fail on a smaller scale, and fail wisely, before fully committing to a large investment or an overarching strategy. It also ensure that you’re not restraining yourself by going all in on aspects that you can’t change later on if fail. It’s also a great way to quickly get feedback on your ideas, allowing you to continuously improve without getting stuck.

While staying agile, it’s important to keep your overarching goal in mind, guided by the general direction you want to go. This mix of maintaining an overarching direction while testing lots of things in the shorter term, provides brand consistency and resilience.

Develop the essential skills.

The backbone of this book is that Amy interviewed and analyzed over 200 successful entrepreneurs to find similarities between them. Based on all of her research, she created a framework that outlined what she saw as six essential skills of all the entrepreneurs.

The six essentials skills she found are:

  1. “Find the gap:” To keep their eyes open for opportunities, be curious about the world and look for new ideas.
  2. “Drive for daylight:” To stay focused on the future. Similar to a race car driver, keep your eyes on the horizon as generally you will go wherever you look.
  3. “Fly the OODA loop:” The OODA (observe, orient, decide and act) loop was developed by a pilot. It means to keep updating your assumptions, stay agile, and always be evaluating your situation/environment.
  4. “Fail wisely:” To practice and master small failures so that you can avoid catastrophic mistakes. Basically make small bets to test your ideas and develop resilience.
  5. “Network minds:” To bring together diverse individuals and collaborate with unlikely allies. As well as find interesting and engaging ways to connect with others (ex: gamify work, competitions, etc.)
  6. “Gift small goods:” To be generous to others, often by sharing information and offering kindness. This strengthens the relationships in your network and helps build a positive reputation.

Final Thoughts

I thought this book was okay. There were definitely some interesting concepts. I think it’s refreshing that this book on entrepreneurs was based on research rather than just someone’s subjective perception of their own success.

But there were definitely some dated examples (like Elizabeth Holmes) that you have to read with an updated perspective. I also can’t help thinking about how personal environments are likely to have a huge influence on an individual’s success but that it wasn’t considered in this framework.

I wasn’t overly impressed with the book. But I really did enjoy the discussion on how new ideas are created and inspiration is all around us.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

References

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Lord Henry and Dorian Gray

Excerpt from The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde

Photo by Natalia Yakovleva | Accessed on Unsplash.com

This is an excerpt from the book The Picture of Dorian Gray by Oscar Wilde.

‘There is no such thing as a good influence, Mr. Gray. All influence is immoral-immoral from the scientific point of view.’

‘Why?’

‘Because to influence a person is to give him one’s own soul. He does not think his natural thoughts or burn with his natural passions. His virtues are not real to him. His sins, if there are such things as sins, are borrowed. He becomes an echo of some one else’s music, an actor of a part that has not been written for him. The aim of life is self-development. To realise one’s nature perfectly-that is what each of us is here for. People are afraid of themselves, nowadays. They have forgotten the highest of all duties, the duty that one owes to one’s self. Of course they are charitable. They feed the hungry, and clothe the beggar. But their own souls starve, and are naked. Courage has gone out of our race. Perhaps we never really had it. The terror of society, which is the basis of morals, the terror of God, which is the secret of religion-these are the two things that govern us. And yet – ‘

‘Just turn your head a little more to the right, Dorian, like a good boy,’ said the painter, deep in his work, and conscious only that a look had come into the lad’s face that he had never seen there before.

‘And yet,’ continued Lord Henry, in his low, musical voice, and with that graceful wave of the hand that was always so characteristic of him, and that he had even in his Eton days, ‘I believe that if one man were to live out his life fully and completely, were to give form to every feeling, expression to every thought, reality to every dream-I believe we would forget all the maladies of medievalism, and return to the Hellenic ideal-to something finer, richer, than the Hellenic ideal, it may be. But the bravest man amongst us is afraid of himself. The mutilation of the savage has its tragic survival in the self-denial that mars our lives. We are punished for our refusals. Every impulse that we strive to strangle broods in the mind, and poisons us. The body sins once, and has done with its sin, for action is a mode of purification. Nothing remains then but the recollection of a pleasure, or the luxury of a regret. The only way to get rid of a temptation is to yield to it. Resist it, and your soul grows sick with longing for the things it has forbidden to itself, with desire for what its monstrous laws have made monstrous and unlawful. It has been said that the great events of the world take place in the brain. It is in the brain, and the brain only, that the great sins of the world take place also. You, Mr. Gray, you yourself, with your rose-red youth and rose-white boyhood, you have had passions that have made you afraid, thoughts that have filled you with terror, day-dreams and sleeping dreams whose mere memory might stain your cheek with shame-’

‘Stop!’ faltered Dorian Gray, ‘stop! You bewilder me. I don’t know what to say. There is some answer to you, but I cannot find it. Don’t speak. Let me think. Or, rather, let me try not to think.’

For nearly ten minutes he stood there, motionless, with parted lips, and eyes strangely bright. He was dimly conscious that entirely fresh influences were at work within him. Yet they seemed to have come really from himself. The few words that Basil’s friend had said to him-words spoken by chance, no doubt, and with wilful paradox in them-had touched some secret chord that had never been touched before, but that he felt was now vibrating and throbbing to curious pulses.

Music had stirred him like that. Music had troubled him many times. But music was not articulate. It was not a new world, but rather another chaos, that it created in us. Words! Mere words! How terrible they were! How clear, and vivid, and cruel! One could not escape from them. And yet what a subtle magic there was in them! They seemed to be able to give a plastic form to formless things, and to have a music of their own as sweet as that of viol or of lute. Mere words! Was there there anything so real as words?

Yes; there had been things in his boyhood that he had not understood. He understood them now. Life suddenly became fiery-coloured to him. It seemed to him that he had been walking in fire. Why had he not known it?

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

The Picture of Dorian Gray – Summary

In this celebrated work Wilde forged a devastating portrait of the effects of evil and debauchery on a young aesthete in late-19th-century England. Combining elements of the Gothic horror novel and decadent French fiction, the book centers on a striking premise: As Dorian Gray sinks into a life of crime and gross sensuality, his body retains perfect youth and vigor while his recently painted portrait grows day by day into a hideous record of evil, which he must keep hidden from the world. For over a century, this mesmerizing tale of horror and suspense has enjoyed wide popularity. It ranks as one of Wilde’s most important creations and among the classic achievements of its kind.

Copyright © 1890 by Oscar Wilde.

You can find more details here on Goodreads and on StoryGraph.

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Uncle Leroy’s Big Idea (Part 2)

Photo by David Thielen | Accessed on Unsplash.com

This is an excerpt from the book Indians on Vacation by Thomas King.

If you missed it, you can read part one of this passage here.

When Bernie tells the story of Uncle Leroy, she closes her eyes so she can see the story, whole and complete. “I told you it wasn’t much of a house, didn’t I?”

“You did.”

“And that all the paint had been stripped off by the weather?”

“You told us that too.”

“And that Leroy had had a little too much to drink?”

Bernie would always pause at this point to let the tension build.

“So, Leroy’s big idea,” she’d begin again, after the proper amount of time had passed, “was that he would paint the Indian agent’s house. But he didn’t have any paint. And nobody else on the reserve had any paint, either. I’m guessing you can see the problem.”

“No paint.”

“So Leroy had to improvise.”

Just the word “improvise” would set Bernie off, and she’d begin laughing. And we’d have to wait until she stopped.

“In those days, there was a store in Cardston run by this Mormon family. They sold all sorts of used stuff, household and farming. Some of it was okay, and some of it was garbage, and if you didn’t know the different, the Mormons weren’t going to tell you.

“So, after Leroy sobered up, he rode over to Cardston to that store and bought an old milk pail, one of those zinc things with a wood piece for a handle. It was a sorry sight, that bucket. There was a story in the newspapers not long ago about a woman who collects junk like that.”

“Now they’re called antiques,” Mimi told her mother.

“So, Leroy took his junk antique and filled it with fresh cow flops. He mixed in some water, stirred it all up until it was brown and pasty, and went to work. He wasn’t sloppy either. He took his time and painted every inch of the house with cow poop. From a distance, it didn’t look bad at all. And as long as you were upwind, you didn’t notice the smell.”

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

Indians on Vacation – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Meet Bird and Mimi in this brilliant new novel from one of Canada’s foremost authors. Inspired by a handful of old postcards sent by Uncle Leroy nearly a hundred years earlier, Bird and Mimi attempt to trace Mimi’s long-lost uncle and the family medicine bundle he took with him to Europe.

By turns witty, sly and poignant, this is the unforgettable tale of one couple’s holiday trip to Europe, where their wanderings through its famous capitals reveal a complicated history, both personal and political.

Copyright © 2020 by Thomas King.

More details on Goodreads can be found here.

Posted on

Uncle Leroy’s Big Idea (Part 1)

Photo by David Thielen | Accessed on Unsplash.com

This is an excerpt from the book Indians on Vacation by Thomas King.

At some point in the story of Uncle Leroy and the Crow bundle, Bernie would touch on the drinking.

“Leroy was no drunk,” she would say, “but he did drink. And Mr. Nelson or Wilson was one of those born-againers. Man thought he could talk to god when he was really just mumbling to himself. Drinking, according to Mr. Indian agent, led to singing, and singing led to dancing. Man would have banned laughing. Would have made smiling a hanging offence.

“One year, this Wilson or Nelson organized a sports day at the same time as the Sun Dance, to try to lure people away from Belly Buttes. And he ordered the buffalo tongues mutilated, so that the women couldn’t use them in the ceremony.”

“You never knew the man,” Mimi reminded her mother. “You weren’t even born yet.”

“Stories don’t die. Stories stay alive so long as they’re told.”

Bernie would make another pot of coffee and break out the special chocolate-covered cookies as she worked her way to the heart of the matter.

“There was this bootlegger from around Missoula. Donald somebody. Like the duck. Drug dealer. Back then it was alcohol. Today it’s other stuff. So, Donald the Duck would bring his booze onto the reserve, and Leroy would find him or he would find Leroy. Didn’t much matter. The result was always the same. Leroy would get drunk, and when he got drunk, he would do something stupid.”

“This is where Uncle Leroy paints the guy’s house?”

“Stop getting ahead of the story. I raised you better than that.”

Sometimes Bernie would tell the story quick, and sometimes she would draw it out.

“Like I said, in those days, you had to have a pass to leave the reserve. Signed by the agent. Leroy didn’t pay much attention to that rule, and every time he left the reserve without a pass, that agent would try to have him arrested. And every time Leroy asked that agent for a pass to leave the reserve, Nelson or Wilson would turn him down.”

Even if you didn’t know the story, you knew that this kind of a situation was bound to go bad at some point.

“Nelson or Wilson had a house. Government issue. It wasn’t a big house. The roof leaked a little, and it didn’t have no better insulation than a plastic sack. It was painted white, but that didn’t last long. Cold winters and hard winds stripped the paint away until there was nothing left but the wood. You need me to draw you a picture?”

“Nope. I can see it.”

“So this one time, Donald the Duck brought his wagonload of booze onto the reserve, and before long, Leroy found him. And not long after that, Leroy got his big idea.”

You can read part two of this story here and learn more about Uncle Leroy’s big idea.

Have you read this book? I’d love to hear your thoughts in a comment below!

Indians on Vacation – Summary

Here is the book summary from Goodreads:

Meet Bird and Mimi in this brilliant new novel from one of Canada’s foremost authors. Inspired by a handful of old postcards sent by Uncle Leroy nearly a hundred years earlier, Bird and Mimi attempt to trace Mimi’s long-lost uncle and the family medicine bundle he took with him to Europe.

By turns witty, sly and poignant, this is the unforgettable tale of one couple’s holiday trip to Europe, where their wanderings through its famous capitals reveal a complicated history, both personal and political.

Copyright © 2020 by Thomas King.

More details on Goodreads can be found here.

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