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Book Reading Goal for 2017 (Update)

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One of my goals for 2017 has been to read two non-fiction books and one novel per month. Inspired by Shane Parrish’s suggestion, my plan has been to read 25 pages a day.

As of August 2017, I’ve read 12 non-fiction books and 17 novels. With some exceptions, I’ve managed to read 25 pages most days. I only wrote three book reviews (I’m not happy with this), and a summary for Kevin Kelly’s outstanding book The Inevitable, which you can download here for free or buy on Amazon.

Finally, a comment from Ryan Holiday from his recent AMA (Ask Me Anything) on Reddit on the importance of reading:

To me, reading is both intrinsically pleasurable–it’s beautiful like music–but it also has a big ROI. I think most cases about reading use the former argument and not the latter. Not everyone loves the smell of books you know? Not everyone fancies are beautiful turn of phrase. So why try to change their mind along those lines?
(…) There is a quote from Bismarck: “Any fool can learn by experience. I prefer to learn by the experience of others.” Well, for 5,000 years we’ve been recording knowledge in the form of books and poems. That’s a lot of smart (and dumb) people talk about their experiences. Why wouldn’t you want to avail yourself of that? Why wouldn’t you want to save yourself a lot of painful trial and error? One book–that cost $15–could make you millions of dollars. Or help you meet the love of your life. Or give you an idea that changes the world. Or solve your anxiety or your resentment towards your parents.
But that can only happen if you pick one up and fucking read it.

Non-fiction (12 books)

The Inevitable. Understanding the 12 Technological Forces That Will Shape our Future, by Kevin Kelly (Review)
The Unofficial Author’s Guide To Selling Your Book On Amazon: The Top 5 Cheat Sheet for Self Publishing Authors, by Richard McCartney
Antifragile, by Nassim Taleb
The Habit Guide. Zen Habit’s Effective Habit Methods + Solutions, by Leo Babauta
Mindset: The New Psychology of Success, by Carol Dweck
The Power of Habit, by Charles Duhigg (Review)
Grit. The Power of Passion and Perseverance, by Angela Duckworth
Deep Work, by Cal Newport (Review)
Zero to One: Notes on Startups, or How to Build the Future, by Peter Thiel
Daring Greatly, by Brené Brown
Give or Take, by Adam Grant
Hack Upwork: How to Make Real Money as a Freelancer, by Danny Flood

Novels. Fantasy, Science Fiction, etc. (17 books)

Nexus, by Ramez Naam
Republic of Thieves, by Scott Lynch
Fire Thief Reborn, by Seth Mullins
Ruins (Pathfinder Book 2), by Orson Scott Card
Visitors (Pathfinder Book 3), by Orson Scott Card
Snapshot, by Brandon Sanderson
Change Agent, by Daniel Suárez
Changes (The Dresden Files, Book 12), by Jim Butcher
Ghost Story (The Dresden Files, Book 13), by Jim Butcher
Skin Game (The Dresden Files, Book 15), by Jim Butcher
Furies of Calderon (Codex Alera Book 1), by Jim Butcher
Academ’s Fury (Codex Alera Book 2), by Jim Butcher
Cursor’s Fury (Codex Alera Book 3), by Jim Butcher
Captain’s Fury (Codex Alera Book 4), by Jim Butcher
Princeps’ Fury (Codex Alera Book 5), by Jim Butcher
First Lord’s Fury (Codex Alera Book 6), by Jim Butcher
The Rise and Fall of D.O.D.O., by Neal Stephenson

Photo credits: Pavan Trikutam

What You Don’t Know Will Help You at Problem-Solving

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What’s your approach to problem solving? There are several frameworks available which you could use to give a better structure to your problem-solving process, but that’s not what I’m referring to.

Some weeks ago, speaking with a colleague about a specific problem, her approach to solving the problem we had at hand surprised me. Unconsciously, she limited herself to solutions she could implement all by herself. Which were, of course, limited.

Some people limit their solutions to what they think they can achieve with what they already know. The solutions you can come to with this fixed mindset are most of the time unsatisfactory. You don’t realize that you can grow. You don’t consider asking for help, or hiring the appropriate person or consultant for the job.

Other people start with the end in mind. What needs to be done to solve this problem? What’s the best solution? How can we tap into whatever knowledge is necessary? They don’t see the lack of a particular skill as limiting, because they know they can either learn new skills or hire someone more capable to do the relevant parts of the job.

In her excellent book Mindset, Carol Dweck calls these two different mindsets fixed mindset and growth mindset.

What’s your approach to problem solving?

Photo by [Sanwal Deen](Photo by Sanwal Deen on Unsplash) on Unsplash

Deep Work: Rules for Focused Success in a Distracted World, by Cal Newport

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Deep Work, by Cal Newport

Cal Newport is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Georgetown University, who specializes in the theory of distributed algorithms. According to Newport, the unprecedent growth and impact of technology are creating a massive restructuring of our economy. Deep Work is a book about thriving in this new economy, where jobs that can be automated will be replaced by software or outsourced. “In this new economy three groups will have a particular advantage: those who can work well and creatively with intelligent machines, those who are the best at what they do, and those with access to capital.”

How does one join one of these groups? Leaving those with access to capital aside, Newport argues that there are two core abilities that are crucial for thriving in the New Economy: the ability to quickly master hard things; and, the ability to produce at an elite level, in terms of both quality and speed. These two abilities, explains Newport, depend on your abillity to perform deep work. “If you haven’t mastered this foundational skill, you’ll struggle to learn hard things or produce at an elite level.”

The ability to perform deep work is becoming increasingly rare at exactly the same time it is becoming increasingly valuable in our economy. As a consequence, the few who cultivate this skill, and then make it the core of their working life, will thrive.

Newport defines Deep Work as professional activities performed in a state of distraction-free concentration that push your cognitive capabilities to their limit. These efforts create new value, improve your skill, and are hard to replicate. In contrast, Shallow Work consists of noncognitevely demanding, logistical-style tasks, often performed while distracted. These efforts tend to not create much new value in the world and are easy to replicate.

The book is divided in two parts. The first part explains what deep work is about, why it’s important, and how it will set people appart in the New Economy. The second part of the book contains several strategies for trainning your brain and transforming your working habits. The goal is “to place deep work at the core of your professional life.” The underlying strategies are valuable, but you’ll probably have to adapt the rules the author proposes to suit your needs.

The Power of Habit. Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business, by Charles Duhigg

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The Power of Habit

Charles Duhigg is a Pulitzer-prize winning reporter for The New York Times. In The Power of Habit, the author proposes a framework for understanding the importance of habits and how habits work. Throughout the book, Duhigg uses stories —real stories— to exemplify his points, and he does a great job telling them. The stories are based, in part, on Duhigg’s interviews and journalistic research.

Perhaps the most important concept in the book is the Habit Loop, the loop that governs any habit. It is composed by three elements: cue, routine, and reward.

  • The cue is what triggers1 the habit. It tells our brains to go into automatic mode and which habit to use.
  • The routine is the action itself, which can be pyshical, mental, or emotional.
  • The reward helps our brain figure out if the loop is worth remembering for the future.

Over time, this loop —cue, routine, reward— becomes more and more automatic. The cue and reward become interwined until a powerful sense of anticiaption and craving emerges. Eventually (…), a habit is born.

In presence of the cue, says Duhigg, the habit emerges. Our brain stops making decisions, and the pattern folds automattically.

[Habits] can emerge outside our consciousness, or can be deliberately designed. (…) They often occur without our permission, but can be reshaped by fiddling with their parts. They shape our lives far more than we realize —they are so strong, in fact, that they cause our brains to cling to them at the exclusion of all else, including common sense.

It is by learning to observe cues and rewards that we can change our habits or cultivate new ones.

Part One of the book is the best part of this book. Based on numerous researchs, the author explains how new habits are formed, and how old ones can be replaced for new behaviours.

Part Two of the book —habits of successful organizations— and Part Three —the habits of societies— are interesting, but in my opinion, the author relies too much in stories to sustain his points. Some of these stories are used to make unjustified generalizations in some cases, and oversimplifications in others.

  1. Other authors, like Marshall Goldsmith, refer to the cue as trigger. ↩

The Inevitable. Understanding the 12 Technological Forces that Will Shape Our Future, by Kevin Kelly

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The Inevitable by Kevin Kelly

Kevin Kelly is the cofounder and Senior Maverick of Wired Magazine. Founding member of The Long Now Foundation (which focuses in fostering long-term thinking and long-term responsibility). Nomadic photojournalist, publisher of The Whole Earth Catalog, and author of several books like What Technology Wants (2010), and often-cited inspiring articles like 1,000 True Fans.

Kevin Kelly has an impressive ability to think out of the box and analyze the implications of technology from different angles. With “inevitable”, Kelly means that there is a bias in the nature of technology that tilts in certain directions and not others. “All things being equal, the physics and mathematics that rule the dynamics of technology tend to favor certain behaviors.”

In the past 30 years the social economy based on this technology has had its ups and downs and seen its heroes come and go, but it is very clear that there have been large-scale trends governing what has happened.

These broad historical trends are crucial because the underlying conditions that birthed them are still active and developing, which strongly suggests that these trends will continue to increase in the next few decades.

This book is about 12 of these patterns, inevitable technological forces —according to Kelly— that will shape the next 30 years. These tendencies do not dictate specifics or particular instances. For example, “the form of an internet —a network of networks spanning the globe— was inevitable, but the specific kind of internet we chose to have was not.”

Massive copying is here to stay. Massive tracking and total surveillance is here to stay. Ownership is shifting away. Virtual reality is becoming real. We can’t stop artificial intelligences and robots from improving, creating new businesses, and taking our current jobs. It may be against our initial impulse, but we should embrace the perpetual remixing of these technologies. Only by working with these technologies, rather than trying to thwart them, can we gain the best of what they have to offer.

“These forces are trajectories, not destinies. They offer no predictions of where we end up. They tell us simply that in the near future we are headed in these directions.”

This book reads like a conversation with the author. For each trend, Kelly points out what’s happening today, both mainstrean and at the edges of technology. Then he speculates about what the future could look like. Along the way he shares personal stories and experiences to help us better understand his point of view.

If you are interested in technology trends, this book will book will give you a glimpse of what the future can become, well beyond the typical, short-visioned, “Trends for next year” article.

Book Summary

Are you interested in technology trends? Download my 20-page book summary of The Inevitable.

I don’t know how to do this –yet. Fixed Mindset vs. Growth Mindset

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I’ve just started reading Carol Dweck’s book Mindset. Dweck has been studying for years why it’s not just our abilities and talent that brings us success– but whether we see them as fixed qualities or as the basis for improving and learning. She calls this two different mindsets fixed mindset and growth mindset.

Here is table compiled from the examples she gives in the first chapters of the book about the different mindsets. What column resonates more with you?

FIXED MINDSETGROWTH MINDSET
Your intelligence is something very basic about you that you can’t change very much.No matter how much intelligence you have, you can always change it quite a bit.
You can learn new things, but you can’t really change how intelligent you are.You can always substantially change how intelligent you are.
Urgency to prove yourself over and over.Passion for learning. Why waste time proving over and over how great you are, when you could be getting better?
Focused on being right.Focused on learning from mistakes.
I don’t know how to do this.I don’t know how to do this –yet.
“Nothing ventured, nothing lost.”“Nothing ventured, nothing gained.”
If at first you don’t succeed, you probably don’t have the ability.If at first you don’t succeed, try, try again.
Don’t believe in effort.Recognize the value of challenging themselves and the importance of effort.
Terrible at estimating their abilities.Amazingly accurate at estimating their abilities because they need it for learning.
Poor resilience against life setbacks. Fragile.Special talent for converting life’s setbacks into future successes. Antifragile.
Avoids challenge. Thrives on the sure thing.Seeks challenge, thrives on it.

Photo credits: Unsplash, Dan Carlson.