Bookworm Transcripts

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If you ever read a productivity book from around the turn of the century, Mike, as in the 20th century, not the 21st.

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Actually, I have. So have you, I believe.

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Before the last two weeks, maybe I should do that.

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Yeah, it wasn't.

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I'm pretty sure I'm pretty sure I think in Grow Rich is pretty old.

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I don't remember exactly, but I know it's public domain now, which is why there's 20 different publications of it on Amazon.

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Got it. That makes sense.

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Yeah, I didn't realize that one was from that far back. However, our book for today is that, but we can't go there yet.

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Not quite.

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Because I'm jumping ahead. I'm apparently itching to get to this.

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But we have some follow-up to do first.

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And I've got a couple of them that I can talk about here, and then I think you've got a couple as well.

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One of those, these both come from reading Johnny Cuff's soundtracks.

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And the first of those was just starting to notice the wrong soundtracks that I have in my head that I need to flip.

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And I've started paying attention to those and just trying to be aware of when am I telling myself something repeatedly?

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That happens all the time.

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And it's obnoxious once you start paying attention to it.

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And I can't quite tell if I'm very happy to have read this Johnny Cuff book, or if I'm really angry with Johnny Cuff right now.

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I can't quite nail down where I'm sitting on this, because I don't think I wanted to know.

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Quite so much about how my brain thinks in bad ways.

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So it happens a lot.

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I'm not very good at flipping things yet, but it does happen a lot.

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That's the double-edged sword of productivity in general.

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Is you want to do better, but in order to do better, you got to realize how much you suck.

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Yes.

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Yes.

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So anyway, I will continue working on that one.

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I'm not one of those like how on earth do you hold me accountable to this?

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But it's fascinating.

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If you don't do this, just start paying attention to the repetitive thoughts you tell yourself.

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It's obnoxious.

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Welcome to my torture.

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On this topic, by the way, I think our next book is going to bring some interesting perspective to this.

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I'm not sure if you've started it yet, I have.

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This should be a fun conversation at the very least.

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Huh.

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All right.

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Well, that one I know I've been itching to get to it.

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My plan is to start it tonight.

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So I don't know.

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Now you've got me nervous about it.

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I thought I had some preconceived notions on it.

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Now I probably don't.

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It's going to be good.

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So get your popcorn ready, everybody.

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Join us next time for sure.

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All right.

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For maybe the most volatile conversation in bookworm history.

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Really?

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That's a bold claim.

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We're talking a man to Palmer level.

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I don't know.

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I don't know.

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Well, so the basic idea of the book challenges everything that we hold to be true in the productivity

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space I feel.

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There's going to be some real uncomfortable questions that we have to ask.

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And I'm really looking forward to the conversation that results.

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You know, if it runs counter to a lot of what we talk about in self-help and productivity,

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like you're saying, if it runs counter to that, I'm probably going to have one of those

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two reactions either, yes, or I don't like you, Mr. Berkman.

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Stop it.

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Or both.

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So yeah, I can see that or both.

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Yes.

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That would be even worse, I think.

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All right.

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So notice the bad soundtracks in your head.

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And it sounds like we may reconsider more of those soundtracks next time.

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But the other one was to consider some of the symbols that I have around me physically.

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And I've been gone in a way and we had to put off a recording this time because we had

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a whole COVID potential in our household.

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Turned out negative, but we had that potential and I had to put this off.

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Anyway, all that to say, I haven't really been around my office, like really at all

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since we last recorded.

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So there's that part at least.

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But I have at least thought through some of this and I've realized like I have a bank

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of symbols already here.

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I just haven't associated like a soundtrack with those to use the John A. Keff terms.

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Some of those are like, I've always got a pile of books on my desk.

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That can be a symbol in itself.

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I have a John Deere coffee mug here that I use for tea nowadays, which is primarily

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because a couple of my office mates are Case I H fans and they need to be reprimanded and

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shown the truth for all my farm friends out there.

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So anyway, I have some of these things that I'm starting to realize I already have in

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place.

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So I don't know what's going to come of this, but I think it's at least an interesting

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exercise to just pay attention to what those are.

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I know you have quite a bit on your desk actually that kind of fits this bill I'm guessing.

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But yeah, that's where I'm at with it.

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Just trying to be aware of what I currently have and then trying to associate what are

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the soundtracks that I'm wanting to promote.

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I don't even know what that would be that I would talk about here, but what are those

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soundtracks that I want to encourage in myself?

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And is there a symbol that could be associated with those?

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So I've been going through that process again.

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This is one I don't know how to say is done, but it's one that I'm at least aware of.

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So that's what I'm going through.

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Cool.

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Power to the symbols.

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Whoo.

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You.

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I have two action items here.

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One is to identify my turn down techniques, which this was an idea of when you have those

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negative soundtracks that are blaring, how do you turn them down with the dial because

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you can't just switch them off?

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And I did identify a bunch of these.

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Most of them have to do with some form of physical exercise, which makes it incredibly

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unfortunate timing that I just broke my hand and can't do any of those.

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So this action item kind of backfired.

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It made me frustrated that I couldn't use any of my turn down techniques.

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Okay.

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No, there was some other ones there too, but I was going to say, did you figure out like

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an alternative turn down to exercise?

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Yeah.

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Well, I made a big list of them actually.

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And it's not any one that I use every single time.

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It's just kind of a grab big I go to and then whichever one I feel like in the moment.

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It's one that I use.

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So included in there are go for a run, go for a bike ride and go to the gym.

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Those are the three exercise ones, which I can't do any of those at the moment.

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And then there's meditate, there's journal, there's play video games.

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And then the other one I thought of kind of leads itself into the next action item, which

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is to create for lack of a better term, an MOC inside of obsidian.

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I know you don't like that term.

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We talked about that last time.

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You really like the map idea instead of the content idea, but basically identifying the

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turn down technique here, this is of negative soundtrack I'm listening to over and over

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again.

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So instead of just accepting all the generalities of this negative soundtrack being true, let's

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just get it on paper and let's actually name this thing.

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It's kind of like a fear setting sort of exercise, except I'm not going that far with it.

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It's just getting it down.

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And then once you see it, you're like, oh, well, that's really not that bad.

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Plus you have all these other techniques for dealing with the information as it's in front

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of you where like I'm doing this as we record this, a workshop with Nick Milo shortly, it

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will have happened already by the time this goes live, but it's on sense making.

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And so it's essentially like when you ask the right questions, the answers become clear.

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So we want to help people give them some questions they can ask to help sort through

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what they're thinking about a specific thing.

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I like that term sense making.

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It's basically just defining something and bringing meaning to it.

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So I'm trying to do that more in obsidian.

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That's what's that quote that I heard from you first, thoughts to sintangle themselves

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through lips and pencil tips.

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Well, for me also through clicky keyboards, even if I have to use just a few fingers to

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do it.

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I don't remember the source of that quote, but I know that it was like it's old.

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So it's like pre-type writer that that comes from.

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So I'm I would guess wherever that came from, it would probably translate to clicky keyboards.

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Yeah, I think it's not membrane keyboards and thinking does not work on membrane keyboards

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at all.

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It's true.

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So yeah, the whole idea behind sense making is I have this problem helped me come up with

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some interesting solutions.

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And so my other action item is am I focusing on the problem or the solution?

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I tend to get stuck on the problem, but if I build the MOC in obsidian and I go through

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the process and I ask the questions, I start with the problem.

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But by the end of it, I'm forced to be thinking about the solution.

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So kind of the trick here for me is to catch myself being stuck on the problem.

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And at that point, okay, let's just dump it into obsidian and see where it goes.

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And the moment that I start that process, I've got enough momentum to actually get to

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some solutions, even if they're not great ones and they're not going to be implemented

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right away, it at least gets me moving in the right direction.

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Makes sense.

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So more obsidian time.

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Is that what I'm hearing?

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Absolutely.

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I suppose that's not bad.

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I've been doing more in it lately, which I wasn't expecting, but Joe always moves from

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thing to thing.

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So anyway, that's all our follow up.

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You're wearing the obsidian outfit today.

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Purple shirt and black mask.

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Didn't even know that.

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I think you see that it's fascinating you say that because of my head obsidian is blue,

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but it's because of the theme I use in obsidian.

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Ah, okay.

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Like in my head obsidian is blue and everything, like all on the stream deck and everything

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whenever I've got any form of icon or shortcut or something that goes into obsidian, it's

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always blue.

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So you must be using the minimal theme.

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So my head obsidian is blue.

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It's a custom theme.

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Oh, okay.

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I wrote it.

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So I don't think it exists anywhere, not that I'm aware of.

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I know that I started with some other theme and then rewrote most of it, so I don't even

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know what it would be similar to.

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But I don't know.

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I like blue, but I'm wearing purple today.

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That's why I liked your shirt earlier.

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All right.

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All that aside, let's step into today's book because I'm super excited about going through

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a really, really old self-help book and Blake helped us out in the chat.

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He said, "Think and Grow Rich" is from 1937.

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So not quite as old as this one.

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This one was originally published.

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So this is self-control.

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It's kingship and majesty.

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This is by William George Jordan.

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And this was originally published in 1907.

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And it's technically considered a religious book.

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And he classified it as a religious book.

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Having read it, I get how they say that, but at the same time, religion and Christianity

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is not talked about a ton in this.

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It's kind of an assumed thing.

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But I also realized that if you think about 1907 and culture and society at the time,

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it was mostly a Christian society at the time.

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At least that's the way people refer to it.

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I wouldn't know.

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I wasn't there.

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So I can't confirm nor deny that claim.

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But I know that around that time period, there was a lot.

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The assumption was everybody went to church.

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So a lot of what's talked about here would probably be seen through the lens of the Bible,

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whether or not it was written with that intent or not.

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It wouldn't have to be explicit.

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Which in this case, kind of is an interesting way for us to dive into this because I know

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that we can compare this to a lot of more modern books.

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Because this one, I was shocked at how dense it was.

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It's just over 100 pages.

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What is that?

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120?

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No.

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I've been 116 pages as the one I've got.

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I know there's a bunch of different renditions of it.

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But 116 pages, but I feel like this could have easily been a 250 page book for sure.

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But I also know that whenever I've read some of the reviews and intros and stuff, this

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is one that's considered one of the books that started off the whole self-help category.

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Because it didn't used to be a thing.

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And this is one that kind of set that off and made it into a category.

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Now I didn't do that single-handedly.

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It was just one of the books that did that or helped that process.

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So anyway, it's an interesting one to go through, I think.

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Agreed.

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And if you are put off by the religious text, I think just listen to the episode then instead

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of buying it yourself.

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But there really isn't a lot that's explicitly religious in here.

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There's a lot of really powerful ideas.

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Which is one of the cool things about reading these older books is you hear things that

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you've heard in other places, more contemporary, newer sources.

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But usually by the time you hear those things in those newer books, it's like the telephone

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game and it's a pretty watered down version of the original.

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And so these older books tend to be a little bit more powerful, in my opinion, when we read

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them, because this is fresh to this writer as opposed to somebody who's just heard it

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from somebody who's heard it from somebody who's putting it in their book because they

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need to have it and they need to speak to this thing.

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But this is kind of like the original and it's the better version of a lot of these

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ideas.

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There's also some stuff in here that I had not heard, at least in the way that it was

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presented, which I thought was pretty cool, which we'll get to when we go through this

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outline here.

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Yeah, for sure.

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This was an interesting read.

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Considering, we've talked about this whole interconnectedness of books before, right?

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And when you have a book like this that predates a lot of the other books that you've read,

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it gets to be a little, at least in my head, it's a little backwards trying to piece it

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together because it's like, okay, we read an entire book on grit.

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If he mentions grit in here, which he doesn't specifically call out grit, but if he mentions

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grit, it's like, well, I've read a whole book on it, but he predates the whole book I read

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on it.

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So this would be like one of the sources for Angela Duckworth.

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So like that's a whole different way of thinking about it versus I read the older book, and

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then here's a newer one that talks about it.

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So then you can reference the history of the one you're currently reading.

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It can be somewhat foundation shifting, I guess, when you do it the opposite direction,

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like what we're doing here, because you end up in a spot where this one could potentially

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have been the foundation for something you read later, but they may position it differently

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than what you read later.

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So then you like, okay, well, it may changes your whole perspective on when you've already

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completed.

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That's what I'm getting in.

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That's kind of a weird way to say it.

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I think I came round and round and round circles on that.

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Well, let's just say it.

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Let's start.

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The kingship of self control is where he starts.

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That's the first chapter, which makes sense.

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It's kind of the summary of his book title here.

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But the thing you need to know is that there are 16 chapters in this book.

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This is before the time of doing three part books.

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And it's 16 chapters, the first of which introduces the whole concept of self control

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as the overarching character trait, I guess, would be the term that the rest of this book

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sits on top of.

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And if you look at each of the chapters, and we're not going to cover all of them just

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because it would just be too long despite this being a short book.

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There are character traits that he covers and talks about in some fascinating ways I

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found throughout the rest of the book.

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But it's all based on top of this concept of the kingship of self control.

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Thus he starts there because the rest of them dictate that you have self control over them

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if you follow me there.

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So I found it a really interesting way to come at it.

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But he starts this by just talking about how controlling yourself is the ultimate.

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That is where you need to start because if you don't control yourself, you're just being

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haphazard, you're following along with the crowd.

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And if you're following along with the crowd or following along with what you want and

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not throwing caution to the wind, if you go down that path, obviously you end up in places

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you don't want to be and places that you shouldn't be.

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So that's kind of the core setup for the whole book.

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You feel like I'd summarize this well?

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I feel like I'm trying to summarize the whole book when I shouldn't be.

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Yeah.

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So I agree with you that at the beginning he's defining self control as the primary thing

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here, which right away is going to be really polarizing because I think in our culture

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today there is a large emphasis on things happening to you that aren't your fault.

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I want to be careful how I describe this because I understand their situations and bad things

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happen to good people and they did nothing to invite it.

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But the truth is regardless of where you find yourself, whether you created the situation

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or you just happen to find yourself in it, once it's over your left with a choice, which

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is continue to just respond to things that happen to you or take control, ownership,

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self-determination, decide for yourself that you are going to dictate the next move.

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And if I were to summarize self control, that's basically what it is.

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He talks in this chapter about at each moment in a man's life, he's either king or slave.

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So if you're king, you get to make all the rules, if you're slave, you just do what

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you're told.

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And that is a very depressing place to find yourself in.

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I feel like if you don't feel like you have any sort of influence on your future and all

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you can do is just try to hold on and survive.

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I've heard story after story of people who have been in those situations, I'm fortunate

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that I've never been there myself, where you can feel sorry for yourself or you can grab

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a shovel and dig yourself out.

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And I feel like that's the single most important decision that you can make in your life, is

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to decide that you may not be able to control everything, which the next book specifically

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speaks to.

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But you can control some things and control what you can control, do the best with what

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you've got.

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You don't put all of the onus on the outcome, all the pressure for it to be good on your

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own shoulders.

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I think people can get discouraged with that.

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But I guess if I were to give anybody any sort of advice or echo like one idea from this

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entire book, it's right here at the very beginning, recognize that you have at least

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some influence on your future and how you manage yourself is going to be the way that

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you either end up there or not.

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And if you decide to create your own future, do what you can to build your own future,

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you're going to do a better job of creating a good one than somebody else is going to

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do for you.

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Somebody once said, I forget the original source of the quote, but if you let others

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define your world, they'll always make it too small.

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So even if you have parents, loved ones who are on your side, they want to see you succeed,

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they are going to do everything in their power to help you be successful.

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They're still not able to help you reach your full potential.

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That's something that's only inside of you that you have to see and you have to tap into

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in order for it to really come to reality until you do that.

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You're always going to be living at a level lower than what you're truly capable of.

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Sometimes I feel like it's hard to know what limits to put on or whether to put them on

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at all.

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What you're saying, usually you have a lot more capabilities than what other people are

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going to assume of you.

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I definitely saw that in this big house project I've been in the midst of.

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I had multiple people tell me that they didn't know I was that handy at doing work on a house.

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Well, I was somewhat, but not at that level.

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There's this really, really cool tool called YouTube that solves lots and lots of problems.

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And you can learn lots.

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And you can do significantly more than what you originally thought you could.

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And it amazes me.

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I'm always shocked at the number of people who don't realize that you can go learn new

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things.

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We come right back to Carol Dweck mindset, growth mindset.

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I was just thinking that too.

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Yeah.

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Just shocked at the number of people who don't realize that they can improve.

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I'm regularly told by folks both in volunteer roles and leadership roles.

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You have to just accept me for who I am.

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This is just the way I am.

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No, that's how you're choosing to be.

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You don't have to stay the way you are.

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Yes.

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And it's so, I find it kind of painful to listen to.

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It's like, it doesn't have to be like that.

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You are choosing to make this hard for yourself.

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And it's hard to know how to help someone who's in that position because the foundation

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of their whole argument is flawed, but they don't feel like they can listen to an alternative

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to their foundation.

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Yeah.

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That's what I really struggle with.

00:22:21

And again, I run into this more often than I expect to.

00:22:25

But you're absolutely right.

00:22:27

I had, as you were talking, I was thinking about some of the Ryan Holiday stuff with

00:22:30

Stillness as the key.

00:22:31

You can't change what other people do, but you can change the way you react to it and

00:22:36

staying calm and reacting to things without hurry and immediacy.

00:22:41

That's usually the better route, which we'll talk about here.

00:22:45

But anyway, he starts us off with the kingship of self-control and then he steps right into

00:22:48

the next chapter, which is the crimes of the tongue.

00:22:52

And this is where you start the process of, he takes different character traits and he

00:22:57

goes one way or the other.

00:22:58

He either shows you the negative side of it or he shows you the positive side of it.

00:23:02

And I didn't really notice any pattern here, but I know that like, he starts off with the

00:23:07

crimes of the tongue, obviously the negative potential here.

00:23:11

And he just talked about self-control.

00:23:13

And I think he's absolutely spot on to start with your mouth and the way you talk and the

00:23:18

words that you share with other people and how you can cause tons of damage with your

00:23:23

words, way more damage with your words and what you can physically in any way, whether

00:23:28

you realize that or not.

00:23:30

And I think he nails that.

00:23:31

That's absolutely true.

00:23:32

I would definitely agree with that.

00:23:35

But it also means there's a pretty big onus on us to have self-control over our tongue,

00:23:41

to control what it is that we're saying.

00:23:43

You and I probably do this more than we realize with podcasting for as many times as we share

00:23:48

words and try to be intentional with what we're sharing.

00:23:52

But I know a lot of people who don't pay attention at all, it's like, come on, come on.

00:23:57

At least don't repeat yourself over and over again.

00:23:59

I do that sometimes, but you don't have to do it at that level.

00:24:02

Anyway, watch your mouth.

00:24:04

Yeah, especially interesting coming off the heels of soundtracks.

00:24:08

And for me, the gap book, which I will continue to reference, the power of positive thinking

00:24:15

by Norman Vincent Peele, we're going to have to cover that one at some point.

00:24:19

It's such a good book.

00:24:21

You have to be in the right space in order to receive it.

00:24:26

Not everybody can just pick up that one and think it's awesome like I do, but for the

00:24:30

right person in the right place, it is a very transformational book.

00:24:35

I actually went to half-price books and bought all four copies they had and intend to give

00:24:42

them away as Christmas gifts.

00:24:45

Nice.

00:24:46

Nice.

00:24:47

So that book, that's what this statement really triggered for me, this chapter.

00:24:52

And I don't have a whole lot of notes in this one, but I do think it is very powerful to

00:24:58

think of your tongue as a rudder it talks about in the book of James and the Bible and

00:25:05

controlling this large ship.

00:25:07

I believe he references that in this book.

00:25:08

I didn't write down the notes because I've got it other places.

00:25:12

But when you think about it that way, you're steering either towards the right destination

00:25:18

or you're getting off course and there's a danger that you're going to crash and burn.

00:25:22

And I don't think it's an exaggeration to say the words that come out of your mouth will

00:25:28

lead you to either the good place or the bad place.

00:25:33

We don't think of it that way.

00:25:34

We think that they don't really, our words don't really have that big of an impact, but

00:25:41

the truth is that nothing is neutral.

00:25:43

And so you're going one of two directions.

00:25:45

And there's nothing idle.

00:25:48

There shouldn't be anything wasted.

00:25:51

I know it's kind of funny hearing that come from a podcaster.

00:25:56

But I really try to take this part seriously and try to be constructive and intentional

00:26:03

and positive with my words.

00:26:05

And I feel like I'm getting better at this.

00:26:07

I still got a long ways to go.

00:26:10

But also recognizing that the minute that you're going to start confessing all this positive

00:26:15

stuff, you're going to start constructing this good future that you're moving towards.

00:26:21

Everybody who doesn't have a revelation of what you are doing and why is going to start

00:26:29

trying to pull you down.

00:26:31

And they're just going to start saying these things and planting these thoughts.

00:26:35

That doesn't work.

00:26:36

This is hokey.

00:26:39

What are you doing?

00:26:40

You're not going to get anywhere that way.

00:26:42

And you have to be careful because if you listen to that stuff, you can sabotage yourself.

00:26:48

It's like you plant seeds.

00:26:49

And then before they really have a chance to grow into something and produce some fruit,

00:26:55

people tell you, you don't see anything above the surface.

00:26:58

Obviously that seed's not doing anything.

00:26:59

That was a bad seed.

00:27:02

That seed doesn't have any potential.

00:27:04

It was dead before you put it in the ground.

00:27:05

Well, I guess they're right.

00:27:07

I may as well just dig it up now.

00:27:09

And then you sabotage your future.

00:27:12

On page 25, he says, "The man who stands above his fellows must expect to be the target

00:27:16

for the envious arrows of their inferiority."

00:27:18

I like that phrase.

00:27:20

I feel it's going to be very divisive.

00:27:22

Like the implicit in that statement is a ranking of people.

00:27:29

And I think you can apply that idea without taking it to that extreme.

00:27:34

Really the big idea here is just worry about yourself and don't care what other people

00:27:39

think.

00:27:40

But the real thing that this speaks to me is recognize that those challenges are going

00:27:45

to happen.

00:27:46

And they're going to come from maybe some unexpected sources.

00:27:50

Like I was saying earlier, you have people who are close to you want to help you succeed.

00:27:55

Sometimes they're the worst because they care so much that they're trying to feed you their

00:28:00

philosophy, their theology.

00:28:04

And it could be not the right thing for you.

00:28:07

And as long as you continue to disagree with them, they're just going to get more behemoth

00:28:13

and more galvanized.

00:28:16

You're going to become their project.

00:28:17

Every time they see you, they're going to try to convert you to their way of thinking.

00:28:21

And the best thing that you can do is not be affected by that stuff.

00:28:25

Easier said than done, I know.

00:28:27

But I've also been through it myself where you just have to learn to, okay, I hear you,

00:28:33

but then not hang on to those things.

00:28:36

Be quick to dismiss them and just go do your thing.

00:28:39

I want to go back to you talked about sharing books.

00:28:43

You went and bought the four books.

00:28:44

You were going to give away as Christmas presents.

00:28:47

I've been starting to notice this.

00:28:49

If you give a book to somebody, this is off topic.

00:28:52

If you give a book to somebody and they know that we run bookworm, do you find that they

00:28:57

tend to read it?

00:28:58

A lot of times if you give a book to someone, they don't read it, right?

00:29:02

But if you have a podcast about nonfiction books, I find that if I give a book, I usually

00:29:09

within about a month to two months have them come back and tell me what they thought about

00:29:13

it because they actually read it.

00:29:15

And I'm not used to seeing that.

00:29:17

So do you find that?

00:29:18

I don't know.

00:29:19

I don't know if there's some sort of clout that comes with having a podcast about nonfiction

00:29:22

books.

00:29:23

I don't know.

00:29:24

I typically, the people that I know in real life, I don't ever talk about my internet

00:29:31

life.

00:29:32

Yes.

00:29:33

I'm definitely like that.

00:29:34

There's a few of them that I go to church with, for example, that do listen to bookworm

00:29:39

and occasionally they'll say something.

00:29:41

And every time they do, because of the context, real life context, I'm always caught off guard.

00:29:46

I'm like, whoa, you actually listen?

00:29:50

Because I just assume everybody that I know around here just is not interested and does

00:29:58

not know anything about the podcasts or anything else that I do.

00:30:03

So I don't go into it anticipating we're going to have a conversation.

00:30:07

Usually when I give these books, it is because I've had a conversation with somebody about

00:30:13

the book and I can tell they're interested in it.

00:30:16

So it's almost like if I leave that conversation believing that they have a possibility of buying

00:30:23

it for themselves, most people won't.

00:30:25

But if they are even hinting at that, I'll just buy it for them and give it to them.

00:30:30

Yes.

00:30:31

That's definitely the way to go if you're able, financially, because I know that they'll

00:30:36

have a tent.

00:30:37

They almost feel guilty if they don't read it, if you gift it to them.

00:30:40

Like that in that scenario.

00:30:42

Yes.

00:30:43

Anyway, that was off topic.

00:30:45

Another chapter here I want to cover, at least Mike wants to cover.

00:30:48

I didn't have it on the outline, but Mike wanted to add it.

00:30:51

The red tape of duty.

00:30:53

I didn't include this because there's a lot of different ways that I feel like I could

00:30:56

have taken this and all of which are going to take a really long time to talk about.

00:31:00

But the gist of it is we have a tendency to do things because we feel like we are supposed

00:31:08

to do them.

00:31:09

We have the concept of duty and how sometimes that duty is actually nonsensical and not

00:31:19

required and actually does more harm than it should.

00:31:24

But where did you want to take this, Mike?

00:31:26

You specifically called this one out and quickly too.

00:31:29

I was surprised.

00:31:30

Yeah.

00:31:31

Well, this chapter influenced me the most, I think, out of this entire book.

00:31:35

I was brewing on this before we read it, to be honest.

00:31:41

So this topic kind of helped me solidify my thoughts on these two concepts, duty versus

00:31:48

love.

00:31:49

And really this started when I was putting together the newsletter, I have one called

00:31:55

Quiet Strength and I have a public link.

00:31:57

So I'll put that in the show notes for people who want to read this.

00:32:01

We talked a little bit about this.

00:32:02

When we went through, Courage is Calling, we came upon the story of August Landmesser.

00:32:08

You remember him?

00:32:09

Yes.

00:32:10

Yeah, I do remember that.

00:32:11

Okay.

00:32:12

So that's the guy with his arms crossed and everyone around him is doing the Nazi salute.

00:32:18

I dug into his story and turns out he was a car carrying Nazi because he thought it would

00:32:23

be an inform somewhere.

00:32:25

But then he fell in love with a Jewish woman.

00:32:27

So the reason that he is standing there defiantly is not because he's going to stick it to

00:32:31

Hitler, but because he's motivated by love.

00:32:35

And so right away this dichotomy of duty versus love, I really liked.

00:32:41

And he defines duty here as looking at life as a debt to be paid.

00:32:48

It's forced like a pump and it's prescribed and formal.

00:32:51

But love looks at life as a debt to be collected and it's spontaneous like a fountain.

00:32:58

And I was thinking on this and obviously the big action item from this, if you wanted to

00:33:05

have one, is let your life be one that's motivated by love, not by duty.

00:33:12

Because duty is only going to take you so far.

00:33:15

Duty is like all of the rules and the regulations, which even for a systems person like me is

00:33:21

great when it's convenient, but the minute that I don't want to do those things, then

00:33:26

it falls down, whereas love goes beyond the rules.

00:33:31

And there are so many areas of your life that this can apply to.

00:33:36

The one he talks about specifically here, I think is spiritual.

00:33:40

He even says here, Christianity is the one religion that's based on love, not duty.

00:33:44

So his words, not mine, but I feel like that's a very important concept to apply regardless

00:33:51

of your religious affiliation to any area of your life.

00:33:54

If you really want to make a difference, then you have to have a mission that is bigger

00:34:01

than yourself thinking back to like the second mountain by David Brooks.

00:34:04

Right?

00:34:05

You climb the first mountain, it's all about you, you get to the top and you're like, is

00:34:08

this it?

00:34:09

And then you see the second mountain, which is the one about other people and I should

00:34:13

have been climbing that one the whole time.

00:34:15

So I've really been thinking about this and kind of challenging myself in every area of

00:34:22

my life to let myself not be led by this is something on my list or an agreement that

00:34:30

I made a long time ago.

00:34:31

So I just got to follow through and I got to do it.

00:34:33

But why did I sign up to do this thing in the first place?

00:34:37

It's because I want to help other people.

00:34:40

And that looks different when I'm leading a discipleship group or showing up to record

00:34:44

a podcast or writing an article for the sweet setup or serving as an elder in my church.

00:34:49

Like there's all sorts of different manifestations of this, but when you can boil it down to

00:34:55

a love inspired motivation, it makes everything way more fun.

00:35:01

And you don't feel the pressure of, well, we didn't complete these three items on the

00:35:07

checklist.

00:35:08

You just do the best that you can with what you've got.

00:35:11

You try to help as many people as you can.

00:35:14

And then you walk away from it thinking, you know what, that was pretty awesome.

00:35:18

You've got to be in frustrated because you got 70% of your tasks done or whatever.

00:35:23

That whole get all your tasks done thing.

00:35:27

I feel like it's dangerous.

00:35:30

You and I have both talked about task management for a long time.

00:35:35

And when you feel like you have to finish your list, but then you make your list as, say

00:35:42

you're making your list today for, I'm making it today for tomorrow's Joe.

00:35:46

But today Joe doesn't know what tomorrow Joe is going to feel like.

00:35:51

And I always have like this perfect ideal that I feel like tomorrow Joe can accomplish.

00:35:57

And it never goes that way, but I feel like I have to complete that list.

00:36:00

Even though I didn't really consider what that list really contained.

00:36:04

Yes, I may have a hundred things on it.

00:36:06

And even if I got a hundred of them done, it doesn't necessarily mean that it's all

00:36:09

the correct thing to get done.

00:36:11

So that's a good way to put it, I think, like the whole duty of trying to get that done

00:36:16

check off the rules, check off the things.

00:36:19

Like that's just not, it's not the way to do it.

00:36:22

It all comes down to the question of why.

00:36:25

And if there's something on your to do list that you're hesitating to complete and you

00:36:29

ask yourself why, and it's not in the service inspired love motivated realm, it's almost

00:36:38

like, well, what's the point?

00:36:39

And that is very difficult for past me to accept, because in the past, I was very task oriented.

00:36:49

And I'm just going to get the thing done.

00:36:51

It doesn't matter what the circumstances are.

00:36:54

And I recognize that that approach, I could end up hurting people along the way.

00:36:59

But Chris Bailey, right?

00:37:01

The people are the reason for the productivity.

00:37:04

And so if I'm in the service of other people, if I'm trying to do as much good as I can

00:37:10

before I leave this earth, then I got to be willing to just chuck my plan entirely.

00:37:16

If the person that I'm trying to serve really needs something that's not on the plan, I

00:37:21

got to be willing to provide that and not the five things that I wanted to get done in

00:37:26

the next couple of hours.

00:37:28

I mean, any parent knows this.

00:37:30

If your kid is hurt.

00:37:32

You got to take them to the emergency room to get a cask, it's sitches, whatever.

00:37:38

It doesn't matter what you had planned to do that day.

00:37:42

That's more important.

00:37:43

And so I'm trying to recognize the moments that are more important without having the

00:37:48

disaster scenarios like that manifest.

00:37:52

Anybody who has a brain cell in their head can identify the right action to do when your

00:37:58

kid is bleeding, right?

00:38:00

Take care of them.

00:38:01

A lot of the times people are hurting and it's not so obvious.

00:38:04

So how do you recognize some of those things if they do a real good job of hiding them?

00:38:09

You got to spend the time.

00:38:10

You got to have the conversations.

00:38:12

You got to dig a little bit deeper.

00:38:14

It's not convenient, but it's the most important thing.

00:38:18

What's going on in the next one here, which is worry, the great American disease.

00:38:24

And again, I find this fact this was written in 1907.

00:38:26

This could have been written today, right?

00:38:30

There's a lot of this and I'm like, really?

00:38:33

This is over 100 years old.

00:38:35

Really?

00:38:36

This is like modern.

00:38:38

This is weird.

00:38:39

But yes, worry the great American disease.

00:38:43

One of the quotes he has towards the very beginning of this is worry is the most popular

00:38:47

form of suicide.

00:38:49

And that one kind of took me back a little bit.

00:38:52

I had to kind of process that one a little bit, Mike, just trying to figure out what

00:38:56

does he mean by that.

00:38:57

And thankfully he spells it out a little bit.

00:38:59

You start thinking about this, how many things do you not do?

00:39:03

You're just talking about duty and deciding what you should do and how do you help other

00:39:07

people and such.

00:39:09

What happens if you worry about how other people are going to react or what other people

00:39:14

think about what would happen if you did do that thing?

00:39:18

It might be a weird way to try to get your head around that.

00:39:20

But if you can process that, if we worry about what other people are thinking of us,

00:39:25

if we worry about the results of our actions.

00:39:29

We have a tendency to not do them at all.

00:39:31

That's my tendency.

00:39:33

And I will eventually just not do those things no matter what the potential result would be.

00:39:40

And thus, I've done a disservice to those around me because I'm not following through

00:39:45

on things that would be extremely helpful to them.

00:39:48

So it's absolutely true.

00:39:51

Worry is a huge problem.

00:39:53

And I love that he calls it the great American disease because I know that that's a very

00:39:57

prominent thing in America even today.

00:40:00

So don't worry, Mike.

00:40:02

You'll be okay.

00:40:03

You know, it's kind of interesting because he says this is the great American disease.

00:40:09

Americans, we tend to have this emphasis on our rugged individualism and we're a self-made

00:40:17

man or woman and our success is completely attributed to ourselves as we'll find in the

00:40:23

next book.

00:40:24

Maybe that's not entirely true.

00:40:27

But it also, I think, is very much linked to the previous chapter, which we didn't cover,

00:40:33

chapter four, the Supreme Charity of the World, because he makes the point in that chapter

00:40:38

that you can never see the target a man aims at, just the target that they hit.

00:40:43

In other words, we judge people by their actions, not their intentions.

00:40:48

But we want everyone to know our heart.

00:40:50

No, that's not what we meant.

00:40:52

But no one's going to take that time to do that.

00:40:54

They're just going to look at the results and what's in it for me.

00:40:58

So I can't help but think that maybe the solution to all of this worry is focusing on yourself

00:41:08

so much.

00:41:10

Just try to help other people and let the chips fall where they may.

00:41:15

That's the big takeaway for me from this.

00:41:19

And I think if you were to take an action item from this, that would kind of be the

00:41:23

approach.

00:41:24

He says, "Take action because action cures worry."

00:41:27

The cure is to recognize the absolute uselessness of worry.

00:41:31

But in addition to that, I think anytime you're focused on yourself, you're kind of naturally

00:41:36

going to worry and you're going to view other things that are happening as threats to your

00:41:42

happiness because it's a zero sum game.

00:41:45

And if you don't get the success, then it's because somebody else got it first and there's

00:41:50

less to go around.

00:41:51

But I think that is not true at all.

00:41:55

Worry is a big problem and it's everywhere.

00:41:57

I mean, we talk about the American way but it's definitely international.

00:42:02

It's all over the place anymore.

00:42:03

But don't do it.

00:42:06

Let's keep moving because we got a decent amount to cover here yet.

00:42:08

The next one I want to go over is actually the next chapter, The Greatness of Simplicity.

00:42:14

And this is where I started to find myself realizing that there are a lot of books in

00:42:20

mainstream concepts and ideals today that this predates.

00:42:29

This is what I was talking about early on.

00:42:30

The foundational change that you can see when you start realizing that some modern day pieces

00:42:36

have some older roots.

00:42:38

And this is one of those.

00:42:40

The greatness of simplicity and the one particular concept I found myself, this is hitting me

00:42:47

in the face.

00:42:48

It's totally minimalism.

00:42:50

100%.

00:42:51

And this is in 1907.

00:42:53

And I don't think of folks in 1907 needing a concept like minimalism.

00:42:59

Like I see that as like coming from our consumerist mindset from our, we got to have all the latest

00:43:04

and greatest, we got to have all the things and we got to have more toys in our neighbors

00:43:08

and our grasses got to be green.

00:43:10

Like I see that mentality being the one that then leads to the exact push to the opposite

00:43:17

of minimalism.

00:43:19

You don't need all of that.

00:43:20

You need this simplicity.

00:43:22

But here we are hearing about it from 1907.

00:43:25

So obviously there's a couple things going on, I would think.

00:43:30

One is this problem has been going on longer than we thought it was.

00:43:35

Or our sense of what simple is has changed drastically.

00:43:42

Because I would bet that even in an extreme minimalist home today, that's probably quite

00:43:50

extravagant and has tons of extras over what that would mean in 1907.

00:43:56

Like you know what I mean?

00:43:57

Like that baseline is probably significantly different.

00:44:01

You know, Becky and I joke about this a lot.

00:44:03

People were just built tougher back then.

00:44:07

We can go out in five degree weather, but I'm not going to go out there for multiple

00:44:11

days in that.

00:44:12

And people did that.

00:44:13

Joshua Becker would not be a minimalist in 1907.

00:44:16

No, I don't think so.

00:44:18

Probably not.

00:44:19

But I agree with you.

00:44:22

Again, the next book is going to speak to some of this.

00:44:27

But also I think it's interesting how the framing of minimalism and simplicity has changed.

00:44:35

Because remember, this is all through the perspective of self control.

00:44:39

So don't go chase everything you want.

00:44:43

Don't get everything you want.

00:44:46

Keep things simple.

00:44:47

As opposed to minimalism today is almost an aesthetic or a fad.

00:44:57

That's the wrong term for it.

00:44:58

And I know some people who embrace this philosophy and they don't just have 66 items of clothing

00:45:08

or whatever.

00:45:09

But I feel like there is, it's hot right now.

00:45:13

The whole idea.

00:45:14

Almost a badge of honor.

00:45:15

Exactly.

00:45:16

People kind of have this picture in their head of what a minimalist home looks like.

00:45:24

Very neutral tones, lots of white, a couple of plants, nothing else in the living room.

00:45:32

And that's not necessarily true.

00:45:34

And even the minimalist would say that's not necessarily true.

00:45:39

But I think nowadays there is this kind of inherent pressure to conform to something like

00:45:46

that because everyone feels the pressure of being so busy and having so much to maintain.

00:45:55

Almost everyone is familiar at least with that feeling.

00:45:59

Even if they don't take the time to identify the source of it and move towards the simplicity.

00:46:04

But I think the default move towards simplicity can be get rid of all the things that don't

00:46:10

spark joy, sell all the books.

00:46:16

And I think that is a very American approach to it.

00:46:21

Instead of assuming responsibility, oh, I've collected too much things, it's well, no,

00:46:26

I just need to try this system.

00:46:29

And that's going to produce the happiness that I'm after.

00:46:32

Not sure I'm doing a great job of explaining this, but do you get what I'm trying to say

00:46:36

here?

00:46:37

Yeah, it's essentially more than cutting back on things.

00:46:41

It's cutting back on like some of the mindset side too.

00:46:44

Like that's kind of what I'm hearing.

00:46:46

It's not a self control me issue to be dealt with because I don't want to dig too deep.

00:46:51

That's going to be scary.

00:46:53

It's just I haven't found the right methodology, the right aesthetic.

00:46:58

And once I do that, then it's going to provide the piece that I'm after.

00:47:02

It's an external source of peace that we're trying to get instead of looking internally

00:47:07

and resolving the conflict there.

00:47:09

This might go back to Johnny Cuffs' soundtracks with the switches versus the dials.

00:47:15

You have this concept of minimalism or in this case, simplicity, but like you're saying,

00:47:20

people are searching for that thing that they can flip the switch and that's what's going

00:47:25

to make me happy.

00:47:26

And that's what's going to solve my productivity problems.

00:47:29

And that's going to keep me focused.

00:47:31

And that's the thing that's going to keep me motivated to where I don't have to actually

00:47:34

work every day.

00:47:36

And it'll just be fun.

00:47:38

That's what we're searching for.

00:47:40

But that's not a switch.

00:47:42

Like you got to find the different dials to tune as opposed to just go turn that one

00:47:47

thing on or off.

00:47:48

And I guess I'm thinking specifically of like Joshua Becker with the minimalist home,

00:47:52

because at the end of each one of those chapters that we covered, there's very specific action

00:47:57

items as you take it room by room.

00:48:00

And the end result is you've gone through your entire dwelling and you've gotten rid

00:48:07

of a lot of clutter and you feel a lot better about your situation.

00:48:12

But it's a lot easier to package.

00:48:14

Just follow along with me as we go through every closet and we deal with the things in

00:48:20

there as opposed to looking to your soul and see what's really there.

00:48:25

Because it's a desire for more stuff and to keep up with the Joneses.

00:48:29

Yes, but we like things.

00:48:32

Things are fun.

00:48:33

It's true.

00:48:34

Just see how many things your kids want for Christmas.

00:48:36

I don't answer that question.

00:48:37

Alright, the next chapter here.

00:48:40

I put this in because I work at a church.

00:48:43

So I hear this stuff a lot.

00:48:45

But syndicating our sorrows, I'm skipping over one chapter called living life over again,

00:48:51

but syndicating our sorrows.

00:48:53

If I had to summarize this in one sentence, it would be sharing our woes with others.

00:48:59

This is one of those negative chapters.

00:49:01

Don't do this scenario.

00:49:02

The sentence I wrote down is the most selfish man is the one who is unselfish with his sorrows.

00:49:10

Yes.

00:49:13

And it's so true.

00:49:15

It's very common for me at a church to hear people, for lack of better terms, whine and

00:49:22

complain about things.

00:49:23

It happens a lot.

00:49:25

Sometimes we need to hear those sorrows.

00:49:29

We need to hear those woes because I've got a family member that's being cruel to me and

00:49:36

we could potentially help in that.

00:49:39

That's one side of it.

00:49:40

I don't feel like that's what he's talking about here.

00:49:43

He's talking about, "Oh, I really don't like the way that Jane did that."

00:49:48

That service was just way too long.

00:49:50

That sort of thing.

00:49:51

Sure, maybe you have qualms with it.

00:49:54

Go talk to Jane about it.

00:49:55

You don't need to tell me about it.

00:49:56

I probably have my own opinions, but I'm probably not going to share them with you.

00:50:00

That's just the way it is.

00:50:03

That's what he's getting at here.

00:50:04

You don't have to syndicate those, which I found it interesting he used that term.

00:50:08

It's interesting where that's come over the decades and century now.

00:50:14

But yes, don't share those.

00:50:15

You don't need to do that.

00:50:17

I think of an RSS feed that's just my gripes and opinions about all the things that are

00:50:24

going wrong.

00:50:26

I'm not exactly sure that's what he is saying here, by the way.

00:50:30

You got to be careful with this because you really can't apply this to other people.

00:50:36

You just got to do it yourself.

00:50:39

I feel if you're going to apply anything from this because there are situations where people

00:50:45

just need to share stuff.

00:50:48

They haven't told anybody.

00:50:50

The very best thing you can do for those people is just shut up and listen.

00:50:55

But there are other times when people are just used to sharing everything that's going

00:51:01

wrong in their life and they want someone to empathize with them and be like, "Oh, you

00:51:06

poor thing.

00:51:07

It's okay."

00:51:08

Depending on where they happen to be at, that could be the right message or it could

00:51:13

be the wrong message.

00:51:15

Sometimes people need a kick in the butt.

00:51:18

You know what?

00:51:20

Maybe if you actually started doing the right things, you'd get right results.

00:51:26

Maybe you should quit whining about all these bad things that are happening to you because

00:51:31

you find yourself in the wrong place at the wrong time and just look at the people that

00:51:35

you're hanging out with.

00:51:37

That's an extreme example maybe.

00:51:40

I think there's two sides to approach this from.

00:51:45

The big takeaway for me from this chapter is this phrase, "We should seek to make life

00:51:51

brighter for others."

00:51:53

In terms of me and how am I going to apply anything from this chapter, I don't think

00:52:01

I have any action items from this book by the way, but this spurs in me a general approach

00:52:08

of the things that I am going to be sharing, are they going to help other people or are

00:52:17

they going to, I guess the opposite of that in terms of syndicating your sorrow would be

00:52:21

the belief that by me venting this, I will feel better.

00:52:25

It will help me.

00:52:26

But I don't even think that's entirely true.

00:52:28

I don't think that is helpful when you just vent negative on whatever platform you happen

00:52:34

to have, whether it's calling up your friend so you can gossip about something or writing

00:52:39

a negative post about somebody on Facebook.

00:52:44

I want to put off the type of energy that I would like to attract.

00:52:51

I do think that there is some reciprocity there.

00:52:54

If you are consistently positive, you will attract other people who are consistently positive.

00:53:02

If you are consistently negative, you will find yourself around people who are consistently

00:53:06

negative and then going back to chapter two or whatever it was, what is the effect of

00:53:12

all this positivity or all of this negativity?

00:53:14

Is it taking you where you want to go or is it not helping you in any way, shape or form?

00:53:19

If it's not helping you in any way, shape or form, then get rid of that.

00:53:22

Do the other thing.

00:53:26

We have no right to syndicate our sorrows, he says, and I think for the majority of situations

00:53:31

that is absolutely true.

00:53:33

Yes, but like you're saying, there are times when someone is going through something difficult

00:53:38

and they need to talk through it.

00:53:40

I don't think that's necessarily what we're talking about here.

00:53:42

No, that's almost like a confiding in somebody.

00:53:47

I got to tell someone as opposed to syndicating, I got to tell everyone.

00:53:52

Correct.

00:53:53

Yes.

00:53:54

That one to one versus one to many scenario I think is important.

00:53:58

The next chapter here is Revelations of Reserve Powers, which we're going to skip over, but

00:54:03

think of a Reserve Powers Unemergency Fund.

00:54:05

You got to read the book.

00:54:07

And then following that is the Majesty of Comnes.

00:54:11

There's only one thing I wanted to just kind of ask here.

00:54:14

Did you feel like this was the meditation mindfulness world from 1907?

00:54:19

I mean, obviously meditation's been around forever and this had very strong errors of

00:54:26

that to me, but I was curious your perspective on it because it seems like every time we

00:54:31

come across something that says something along the lines of meditation, you want to

00:54:34

try it again?

00:54:35

So I just wanted to know if this did that for you.

00:54:40

There's definitely some overlap.

00:54:41

I don't know if it was this chapter specifically, but yeah, meditation is not a new idea.

00:54:48

This happens to be a pretty popular genre of app store apps.

00:54:57

I like the definition of calmness that he has here, which is singleness of purpose, absolute

00:55:02

confidence and conscious power.

00:55:04

I don't think those necessarily line up with the whole idea of meditation.

00:55:07

They don't necessarily work against it either, but I think calmness goes beyond meditation.

00:55:16

So I can right now, as I record this podcast, have singleness of purpose, absolute confidence

00:55:22

and conscious power, or I can be stressed out because I wasn't able to disconnect from

00:55:28

the craziness of the day that was before we hit the record button.

00:55:33

So again, I think you can apply this to a lot of different areas in your life, but meditation

00:55:38

would be one of those and it would be a good practice and is a good practice that I'm trying

00:55:43

to make consistent.

00:55:45

It works and it comes and it goes.

00:55:48

Eventually one of these days, I do believe it's going to stick.

00:55:51

I'm not giving up on it, but I haven't made it a habit yet.

00:55:56

Sure.

00:55:57

Sure.

00:55:58

No, I was just curious if you did because the way I took it was the whole being calm.

00:56:05

There's two ways I took it.

00:56:06

One is going back to the Ryan Holiday Stillness's key, reacting to things with sound judgment,

00:56:13

like that concept is one that it struck me with, the calm way of reacting to things.

00:56:19

The other was putting yourself in a calm scenario, which I try to make sure I do somewhere around

00:56:25

twice a day by going out in the woods and such.

00:56:28

I have that luxury.

00:56:30

So I'm thrilled to be able to do that.

00:56:32

This morning I did not.

00:56:33

It was five degrees when I got her to the spring.

00:56:35

The wind was whipping and it was negative 15 wind chill.

00:56:38

I was like, "Nope, I'll let the dog out and watch from the window as far as I got."

00:56:44

So I need to get some warmer clothes for something like that if I'm going to do that.

00:56:48

Multiple clothes.

00:56:49

So if I could jump in here real quick, I'm kind of curious.

00:56:53

You're talking about two different kinds of calm here.

00:56:57

Yes.

00:56:58

One, which is internal and then one, which is external.

00:57:01

And I 100% agree you should seek to create an external environment that is as calm as

00:57:07

possible.

00:57:09

Different people have different degrees to which that is possible.

00:57:13

But one of the things I wrote down in my mind node file in this chapter is that calmness

00:57:17

as he's talking about it comes from within.

00:57:20

So where do you draw the line there?

00:57:25

I guess.

00:57:26

Because you're talking about getting out for your walk, creating some external circumstances.

00:57:30

But are there ways that you apply this in the middle of all the craziness when stuff

00:57:36

is just bouncing off the walls that you just find a moment and this is what I do to re-center?

00:57:42

Yeah, it's both.

00:57:45

And so the former of those two seeking it internally, to me that's where the potential

00:57:51

overlap from meditation comes in.

00:57:55

The external of going out in the woods, to me, induces the former.

00:58:00

So going out to the external circumstances, the nature, the walks outside, unless I bring

00:58:06

all of the kids and they're just super excited and talking about all of the different things

00:58:10

they see out there, it's very, very calm whenever I'm able to make those journeys.

00:58:16

And it helps induce the internal.

00:58:18

So I think you're right.

00:58:19

I think he does specifically call out like this is an internal thing.

00:58:22

But I'm referring to the external because at least in my case, it helps bring about that

00:58:27

internal.

00:58:28

Because I think in terms of painting a picture for what calmness is and what you're trying

00:58:32

to achieve though, my pastor has this saying be a thermostat, not a thermometer.

00:58:39

And I like that because the thermometer simply takes the temperature, but the thermostat

00:58:44

controls the temperature.

00:58:46

So you can either be affected by your surroundings or you can affect your surroundings.

00:58:53

And when you have true calmness, it overrides the external circumstances.

00:59:00

Yes, I like that.

00:59:02

The whole thermostat thermometer thing.

00:59:05

Because you can take that, my brain immediately went to all sorts of places when you sit like,

00:59:09

okay, well, yeah, the thermostat does control the temperature, but indirectly and only if

00:59:15

it has fuel in it.

00:59:16

That's true.

00:59:17

That's true.

00:59:18

If you don't have a gas line or electric or something, that thermostat doesn't do anything.

00:59:24

So if you have no fuel in the system, it's worthless.

00:59:28

Yep.

00:59:29

So, but yes, and most thermostats have a clock on them too.

00:59:32

There's that.

00:59:33

All sorts of stuff you.

00:59:34

My brain went all sorts of places there.

00:59:36

All right, so the majesty of calmness, let's go into another problem with America, shall

00:59:41

we?

00:59:42

Hurry.

00:59:43

The scourge of America, he says this time.

00:59:45

So we have worry the great American disease.

00:59:47

And now we have hurry, the scourge of America.

00:59:49

There's a couple quotes I wrote down from this one, Mike.

00:59:53

One is nature never hurries.

00:59:55

Yep, I figured you'd write that one down.

00:59:58

Yep, which I kind of had qualms with because I'm like, squirrels run around all the time

01:00:04

trying to collect as many nuts as they put like they definitely hurry.

01:00:08

Right?

01:00:09

But anyway, there was that.

01:00:11

And then the other one was let us not be impatient, which was towards the end of that

01:00:14

chapter.

01:00:15

And there's so many things, so many places you could take this.

01:00:21

We buy toys that then take upkeep and it means that we have to do things to keep us

01:00:26

busy constantly.

01:00:27

The whole busy, I'm in a rush.

01:00:30

There's too much going on.

01:00:32

These are all self-inflicted.

01:00:33

I just had a conversation with a service provider of ours here at the church.

01:00:37

I don't know, 30 minutes before we got on the podcast here about there's a lot going

01:00:43

on.

01:00:44

I'm pretty busy as times of the year at the church.

01:00:48

He said something about don't you wish you had more time in the day?

01:00:51

I was like, well, if I had 48 hours in a day, I would just fill it up the same way I've

01:00:55

got my 24 fill up.

01:00:57

So it would be the same feeling regardless.

01:01:00

It's just the way it would be.

01:01:01

So it's self-inflicted.

01:01:03

We definitely do this to ourselves.

01:01:06

But at the same time, I'm also aware that if you go the opposite side where you cut so

01:01:10

much stuff out that you don't have a lot going on, you get to boredom, which then I feel

01:01:15

like as Brett McKay has recently said on the art of maliness, that can kind of come to

01:01:21

burnout.

01:01:23

We tend to think of burnout as I've got too much going on for too long, but really that

01:01:27

has more to do with boredom and motivation than anything.

01:01:31

I feel like we're kind of floating around that whole concept in this chapter with William

01:01:36

here.

01:01:37

I think it's definitely true.

01:01:39

We definitely as Americans hurry constantly.

01:01:42

But this is also 1907.

01:01:44

Yep.

01:01:45

I feel like things are way more high paced now than they were in 1907.

01:01:49

Oh, for sure.

01:01:50

For sure.

01:01:51

If they were considered fast and people were talking about hurrying all the time in 1907,

01:01:56

they would think we're a crazy group today if they saw what we do.

01:02:00

Well, what would you say is the motivation for hurrying?

01:02:06

Being left behind or some of the fear of missing out is probably there, the FOMO.

01:02:11

If you feel like you need to hurry in your day, why is that?

01:02:19

Probably because you've got more things you need to do and you recognize you're not going

01:02:23

to get them done in the time that you have available.

01:02:25

Or you haven't paired back the list of things you feel you should do or want to do or haven't

01:02:31

narrowed it down to the things you feel called to do.

01:02:34

So it's outcome driven though, right?

01:02:37

It's based on these things that I feel like I should do, have to do, whatever, right?

01:02:44

Which is a theme to be continued in our next book.

01:02:48

I didn't realize this was a precursor at all.

01:02:53

Yeah.

01:02:54

But you probably didn't realize you were picking a secret.

01:02:56

I did not.

01:02:57

I did not.

01:02:59

But I see the overlap here.

01:03:02

A couple other quotes I'll add from this section.

01:03:05

I just want to plant that seed because I have a feeling as you're reading the next book

01:03:09

that this is going to come up again.

01:03:12

But hurry seeks to make energy a substitute for a clearly defined plan.

01:03:18

That gets at some of the things that you were talking about.

01:03:20

If you have a clearly defined plan, a realistic plan, you know enough information not to pick

01:03:26

more things for your to do list than you can actually do, then you won't feel like you

01:03:31

need to hurry.

01:03:32

However, that's not the only source of hurry.

01:03:34

So I think that's a fairly limited definition.

01:03:39

The other thing here is that every he says everything that is great in life is the product

01:03:43

of slow growth.

01:03:44

I tend to agree with that.

01:03:46

I don't think that's what America wants.

01:03:50

We're a microwave society.

01:03:51

We want instant gratification.

01:03:54

But I don't agree with that.

01:03:56

I very much more align with that particular statement, which again 1907.

01:04:02

So our culture is very different than it was back then.

01:04:06

Although the source of the frustration it sounds like is not all that much different.

01:04:13

It's just the ways that we try to medicate.

01:04:18

The way we try to manage our time and check off the things that we want to do has evolved.

01:04:25

But the desire to constantly do more has not.

01:04:30

Yeah, there's so many places we could take this.

01:04:33

So many places we have taken this in the past.

01:04:37

We're a whole book on busy.

01:04:38

So I mean there's just learning to pair things back and focus.

01:04:43

That's so hard.

01:04:45

And being willing to do things the slow way like you're saying, my kids always want things

01:04:49

immediately.

01:04:50

I want to snack now.

01:04:52

Well, do you have the chore list done?

01:04:56

No.

01:04:57

Do you have cats fed?

01:04:59

No.

01:05:00

Do you have your room cleaned up?

01:05:02

No.

01:05:03

So you've done none of the work that's required for snack time?

01:05:07

No.

01:05:08

So then why would you think you get snack?

01:05:09

I don't understand you're four, so I get that.

01:05:14

But this is the process, right?

01:05:17

Because I don't want my kids to grow up thinking they get what they want right now all the

01:05:21

time.

01:05:22

Because that's a dangerous place to sit.

01:05:24

We see it all over the place, right?

01:05:26

Yeah.

01:05:27

And so I think that's one part of this is the self-control aspect of, well, I need to

01:05:32

take responsibility and do my things first before I can have my treat or my snack.

01:05:39

But the next book kind of also speaks to the fact that maybe you don't have as much control

01:05:46

over the things that happen as you think you do and learning to be okay with results

01:05:52

that are not entirely within your control.

01:05:56

And I think the combination of those factors helps alleviate some of the pressure we feel

01:06:03

to hurry and some of the symptoms of busyness.

01:06:07

The next chapter here is called failure as a success.

01:06:11

The only reason I wrote this down is because it seems like in the world of startups and

01:06:15

tech companies, they talk about this a lot.

01:06:18

It's like fail fast.

01:06:20

You hear that quite a bit.

01:06:22

And again, this is one of those, this was definitely a thing even over a hundred years

01:06:28

ago that was being talked about.

01:06:30

And it's told with the story of a group that decided to float logs down a river for the

01:06:38

first time.

01:06:39

Apparently, that was a new thing.

01:06:41

I don't know how long ago that had happened though.

01:06:43

But I told the story here.

01:06:46

And it fell apart.

01:06:48

They had a storm in the whole system fell apart, but the logs went downstream and they

01:06:54

weren't able to capture all of them.

01:06:56

And what they ended up doing is they asked for people to notice them and log where they

01:07:03

were and when they saw these logs on the rivers and oceans and all the different places.

01:07:08

So they did that.

01:07:09

And although it was a failure to float the logs to where they wanted them, it was a positive

01:07:14

because they learned about all the currents and such that made up the ocean and river

01:07:19

ways and everything.

01:07:20

So like how water flows, they learned a lot because of that.

01:07:25

But it was an unintended experiment, of course.

01:07:28

So that's what he starts this off with.

01:07:30

Even though you have a failure, if you're willing to process that failure, if you're

01:07:35

willing to examine it, which I'm not always willing to do, and I know you're not either

01:07:39

my wife has told me stories.

01:07:42

But if we're willing to evaluate these failures, it can often lead to you realizing either

01:07:49

something you've learned or it led you to a place that you didn't expect to get to.

01:07:55

I've had failures with previous jobs that have taught me something that I now use daily

01:08:01

in my current job.

01:08:02

These things happen and at the time it's painful and it's not fun and you don't like

01:08:08

dealing with a difficult thing.

01:08:09

But again, if you're willing to process it, you're better off because you can usually

01:08:14

see at some point, whether it's immediate or not, I can't answer for you, but you can

01:08:20

usually see the positive in it if you're willing to look for it.

01:08:23

Yeah, I agree with everything that you said, which is why I think the story that he uses

01:08:28

of Columbus is not very effective.

01:08:31

He says, "In discovering America, Columbus failed in his original mission," which is

01:08:37

true, but I don't think it's all that practical an example even in 1907.

01:08:46

Maybe there was a limited pool of shared knowledge to draw from for that kind of thing.

01:08:52

We tend to hear the same stories over and over and over again in a lot of the books that

01:08:57

we read.

01:08:58

So if I say the Poldre sisters, you right away are thinking of the sisters who got really

01:09:03

good at chess because their dad was running an experiment on them.

01:09:08

Yeah, experiment on his kids and convinced a gal to marry them with that premise.

01:09:15

Exactly.

01:09:16

Or the Pomodoro method, exactly what that is, 80/20.

01:09:20

There's all these...

01:09:21

Jobs and Steve was.

01:09:22

Yep.

01:09:23

So there's all these principles that are kind of the foundation of our shared knowledge

01:09:28

when it comes to this productivity stuff.

01:09:31

But in 1907, I can imagine that there's a much smaller pool to draw from.

01:09:38

So maybe that's the reason there.

01:09:42

But also the log example that you were sharing earlier, I don't know.

01:09:47

That was kind of a cool story, but it didn't really work for me with what he's really saying

01:09:53

here.

01:09:54

I mean, it's right in the title of the chapter, "Failure as Success, Failure."

01:09:57

And one thing often opens the door to success somewhere else.

01:10:00

I feel like that's a very effective lesson to learn.

01:10:03

But I don't think he did a real great job in this particular chapter of explaining how

01:10:08

you would practically go about that.

01:10:11

Other than I guess, when you are trying to find nautical shortcuts and you find yourself

01:10:17

on new lands, don't consider it to be a failure and go explore instead.

01:10:22

I don't know.

01:10:24

I don't often do that.

01:10:25

So not a boatmaster.

01:10:29

I have trouble thinking through any sort of practical takeaway from this, because anytime

01:10:34

there is failure, I think you can use it as a springboard.

01:10:37

You can look for those ancillary things that weren't directly in front of you.

01:10:42

Failure as I ran into an obstacle, and now I have to kind of course correct figure out

01:10:46

a way around this.

01:10:48

But it's also quite possible that you just failed because you were stupid and you made

01:10:52

a dumb mistake.

01:10:53

And I think the important thing is to ask why.

01:10:56

But I don't think there is always a new and better path from every single failure.

01:11:01

But if you're willing, to go back to what I was saying earlier, but again, if you're

01:11:04

willing, I think if you're able and open to processing that failure, you can at least

01:11:10

learn something from it.

01:11:12

Like, no matter what it was, I would say that there's something there.

01:11:15

But you're absolutely right.

01:11:16

Like, sometimes you're just dumb.

01:11:17

Don't be dumb.

01:11:18

Yeah.

01:11:19

So I guess kind of as I read this, and maybe I missed his main point, but it kind of felt

01:11:23

like whenever you have a failure, it's not really a failure.

01:11:27

It's a form of a success.

01:11:28

You just got to find the way that it is a success.

01:11:31

And I think that's very different than figuring out why something was a failure and learning

01:11:36

from it for next time.

01:11:37

Sure.

01:11:38

Yeah.

01:11:39

No, that's a valid point.

01:11:40

Yeah.

01:11:41

I definitely took it as if you look, you can find the success.

01:11:45

But this might be a case of me taking previous books and then putting them on top of this

01:11:52

and just translating it that way.

01:11:54

I tend to do that.

01:11:55

I tend to summarize very quickly and just assume when I read these things.

01:11:59

So it happens.

01:12:00

So failure is a success.

01:12:02

And the last chapter I wanted to cover here is the last chapter of the book, because I

01:12:06

feel like you have to at least cover the beginning and the end.

01:12:08

The Royal Road to Happiness.

01:12:11

I struggled with this one, which I was not expecting to.

01:12:14

And it seemed like what he was saying is you can take self-control and apply it to all

01:12:20

these areas we've talked about and then find happiness if you do that.

01:12:24

I feel like that's what he was trying to say.

01:12:27

But I had a really hard time connecting it all together.

01:12:30

I felt like I wanted him to wrap it up with a bow and hand it off.

01:12:34

But I don't feel like he did that.

01:12:36

And I had a really hard time nailing down what he was getting at in this chapter.

01:12:39

I'm hoping you figured it out because maybe you've got a better perspective on it.

01:12:43

But I felt like what he was trying to tell us was the ways that don't work to be happy.

01:12:47

Don't search for contentedness.

01:12:51

Because that's just not going to be the answer.

01:12:53

But I didn't feel like I got a clean answer on what he was trying to do there.

01:12:56

Did you figure this out?

01:12:58

Please tell me you did.

01:12:59

I'm not going to profess to have figured it all out.

01:13:02

But I feel like my takeaway from this chapter maybe is a little bit different than yours.

01:13:08

Okay.

01:13:09

I'll just share some of the stuff that I jotted down.

01:13:11

But I definitely see the thread here with this stuff.

01:13:15

So he mentions in this chapter, for example, that happiness defies our environment.

01:13:21

It can grow in any soul and it can live under any conditions.

01:13:24

He also says that what a man has depends on others.

01:13:28

What he is depends on himself.

01:13:30

So I feel like this is tying together a lot of the threads for me that in the open loops

01:13:37

that he's created in these other chapters.

01:13:40

He kind of speaks specifically to being content with a situation.

01:13:45

He says be content with what you have, but never with who you are.

01:13:49

Content with who you are is a form of diluted despair, which I think is a very powerful

01:13:55

and I like the way that he described that.

01:13:57

If you think that who you are right now is all you will ever be, then why the heck do

01:14:03

we read all these books?

01:14:04

What's the point?

01:14:05

Yeah.

01:14:06

Because we believe that we can grow and improve and do a better job stewarding the resources

01:14:14

and the time that we have available to us.

01:14:17

He also says the basis of happiness is love of something outside of self, which is why

01:14:22

chapter three spoke so much to me about the duty versus love.

01:14:26

If you are just doing your duty, then you're never going to be happy.

01:14:31

You're just going to avoid conflict maybe checking off the boxes, but it's not going

01:14:38

to provide any sort of motivation or purpose for your life, which is where I think this

01:14:43

happiness really comes from.

01:14:46

The road to happiness specifically, he has four points, consecration, concentration,

01:14:50

conquest and conscience.

01:14:52

So four C's, nice alliteration there, but I don't have anything else written down for

01:14:59

those.

01:15:00

That whole idea is all that, that great.

01:15:04

It kind of feels like if he was going to write this book today, this is the one, the part

01:15:09

where his editor would explode this into three different parts.

01:15:12

This is your framework for the entire book.

01:15:15

He's trying to like wrap it all up, but I didn't think that was all that practical,

01:15:19

to be honest.

01:15:20

But it doesn't mean that there isn't a very powerful theme here, which is essentially,

01:15:25

no matter where you are, no matter what you have, you have the ability right now to connect

01:15:31

to a purpose that is bigger than yourself and to be happy.

01:15:35

And right at the last thing I wrote down from here is that unhappiness is the hunger

01:15:39

to get, happiness is the hunger to give, which I think comes back to duty versus love, or

01:15:46

even more strongly, love versus lust.

01:15:49

Ed Cole has defined this.

01:15:52

He's the guy who wrote the men's curriculum that we go through at our church.

01:15:55

Love is the desire to benefit others at the expense of self, but lust is the desire to

01:16:01

benefit self at the expense of others.

01:16:04

So lust is, I got to climb the ladder.

01:16:06

I don't care who I'm stepping on on the way up because I'm not coming back down, but love

01:16:10

is second mountain and I'm looking to do all the good that I can.

01:16:15

And that's the one that is more closer to the truth because success is not a zero sum

01:16:20

game and there's not this limited quantity of it to go around.

01:16:23

The fact that I'm successful doesn't mean that you can't be successful.

01:16:26

In fact, if we both embrace this, it means that we're both more likely to be successful

01:16:31

because we're going to work with each other and we're going to learn from each other.

01:16:35

So he didn't explicitly say this, but this is how I heard it is, you know, if you're

01:16:40

going to be motivated by love, you're going to be successful.

01:16:44

You're going to be happy.

01:16:45

You're going to be motivated by lust and try to get as much as you can for you and yourself

01:16:50

then you're going to be miserable.

01:16:52

And I think that's actually a really great way to end the book.

01:16:57

That's way better than way I took it.

01:16:59

Maybe I just missed some of the key points in that because what you just explained makes

01:17:04

perfect sense and wraps it up very nicely.

01:17:08

Somehow I didn't catch that.

01:17:09

I don't know why or how.

01:17:12

Maybe I did not read it.

01:17:13

I felt like I read it, but I don't know.

01:17:16

Sometimes I do that.

01:17:17

It's a topical reading going back to how to read a book.

01:17:19

I have a bunch of other books that have spoken to the same thing, so I'm connecting these

01:17:23

dots in a different way than you are.

01:17:25

That's all.

01:17:26

It does happen.

01:17:28

So yeah, I don't know.

01:17:29

I didn't catch most of what you just explained.

01:17:33

To me, I was seeing in the back of my mind, I was seeing some of the books that we've read

01:17:39

that talk about happiness and how it's more about succeeding in the struggle than it is

01:17:44

with not having struggle, which is opposite of what we would normally consider.

01:17:51

It's why I tend to refer to the simple phrase "momento mori" every morning.

01:17:57

You know, remember death, which is, of course, morbid, but whenever I recognize how bad something

01:18:05

could be, you appreciate what you have now much more.

01:18:10

And that's something I feel like is very vital to this whole happiness conversation, but

01:18:16

it wasn't brought up here.

01:18:17

So I think maybe I've just got this preconceived notion that that's what needs to be in there,

01:18:23

but it wasn't.

01:18:24

So then how does this work?

01:18:25

Yeah, I probably got there somehow.

01:18:27

Trying to justify this to myself right now.

01:18:30

So anyway, that's the book in a nutshell.

01:18:35

We're basically talking about how to control yourself and looking at that through a lot

01:18:40

of these different lenses of different character traits and scenarios also through the lens

01:18:45

of 1907, which I think I've been kind of hung up on this whole time, but I think it's

01:18:51

fascinating stuff on it for sure.

01:18:53

Anyway, action items, unless there's something else you want to talk about here, Mike.

01:18:57

Nope, let's do it.

01:18:58

Nope, okay.

01:18:59

So action items, I have one, and it's not really from any specific part of the book.

01:19:05

It's from my own perspective of reading this, and that is I don't think I have ever done

01:19:13

true research in trying to figure out how does self-control and ADHD go together, because

01:19:21

one of the things, at least that I always struggle with is ADHD, in my case, has to do

01:19:28

with getting hung up between tasks and the motivation to move on to that next one, and

01:19:33

struggling to control myself to move on to that next one whether I want to or not.

01:19:38

That little tiny time frame between tasks can quickly become six hours of not doing the

01:19:43

thing, and I feel like I don't have any control over that, but I feel like that's not true.

01:19:49

I just haven't figured out what the scenarios are and how to work through that.

01:19:53

So I don't know how to term that as an action item, but I wrote it down as just self-control

01:19:57

and ADHD, but I feel like it's a little bit bigger than that and a little more involved

01:20:01

than that, but I feel like I need to do a little research because I know there's some

01:20:06

stuff out there around this.

01:20:08

I've just not found it and read it yet.

01:20:10

If folks online know about this stuff, please send it to me.

01:20:14

I will definitely go through it, but I feel like I need to do some research on this because

01:20:17

although I love a lot of what's in here, I'm not sure how to apply it in some cases

01:20:23

for me, and I'm not trying to just pass it off and say, "Oh, I can't do that."

01:20:27

It's a legit struggle, at least on my side.

01:20:30

Maybe it's not for you, Mike, but I definitely struggle with it.

01:20:33

So I got that as an action item.

01:20:34

All right.

01:20:35

I think that is a very valid action item because I think the truth is probably somewhere in

01:20:41

between.

01:20:42

If you were to talk to the author, he would say, "No, just suck it up and do it."

01:20:47

I definitely feel like that's what he would do.

01:20:50

I've talked to enough people recently, like Jesse Anderson, he was on a recent episode of

01:20:55

Focused and shared a lot about ADHD versus neurotypical brains.

01:21:02

I don't understand all of it, but I have a better understanding after talking to him

01:21:06

and the dopamine-driven motivation for a lot of the different things that get done.

01:21:12

I don't have a simple answer.

01:21:15

I think that's the natural next step for this is to figure out not just how do I apply what

01:21:21

this person is saying, but what does this actually mean to me?

01:21:24

It is sense making in a nutshell.

01:21:27

All right.

01:21:28

There you go.

01:21:30

It sounds like I need to go listen to your other podcast.

01:21:33

I support your action item.

01:21:35

All right.

01:21:36

Thanks, Mike.

01:21:37

What do you have?

01:21:38

I got nothing.

01:21:39

Good job.

01:21:41

No action items, some cool.

01:21:43

You had great self-control in that.

01:21:46

I guess.

01:21:47

I don't know.

01:21:49

I feel like there's some opportunity here for action items, but also the biggest takeaways

01:21:58

for me from this book were not something new, but it was kind of filling in some blanks

01:22:06

for stuff that I've already known.

01:22:10

That sounds kind of pompous to say it that way, but we've read other books on these topics.

01:22:14

I have this picture where I can tell what it is, like a jigsaw puzzle that's missing

01:22:20

a bunch of pieces.

01:22:21

I feel like I got some more pieces by reading this, but I don't have anything that's groundbreaking

01:22:28

or new.

01:22:29

I never thought about that before.

01:22:30

I should try this.

01:22:32

Right.

01:22:33

All right.

01:22:34

Well, styling rating, I guess I get to go first this time.

01:22:36

I have to say that this is a very dense book.

01:22:39

I think I mentioned that early on.

01:22:40

I wasn't expecting that.

01:22:43

If you do some research on William George Jordan, he's mostly an essayist.

01:22:50

He wrote a lot of essays, and this is probably what that is.

01:22:55

This is likely what it would be called.

01:22:58

It's short enough that it could be that.

01:23:00

Somebody in the chat said their version was 70 pages long.

01:23:03

I think it depends on font size and page size and stuff, but I can't say that I've run

01:23:07

across something quite as cornerstone as something like this because so much of what we talk

01:23:15

about in self-help, in productivity, can come back to self-control.

01:23:21

If you don't have that, then it doesn't matter what you put on your calendar.

01:23:25

It doesn't matter what you put in your task manager.

01:23:27

You're not going to follow it anyway.

01:23:30

What's the point?

01:23:31

So much of it comes back to this.

01:23:33

Like you were saying, there are a lot of books that we have covered in the past that talk

01:23:38

and speak to these particular topics in more depth.

01:23:42

At the same time, like you said early on, older books like this tend to just have a very

01:23:48

different take on it because it is almost just a brand new idea in some cases, in a

01:23:54

lot of cases, because it hasn't been widely written about.

01:24:00

If you want to read a book on habit making, how many have we covered for bookworm?

01:24:07

And that's just one topic.

01:24:09

But if you had a book from the early 1900s on habits, I'm all over that because it wasn't

01:24:17

a popular topic at the time and it would be kind of a fresh view on it.

01:24:23

I feel like this is the same way.

01:24:25

We've talked about a lot of this, but it's still very fresh.

01:24:28

I guess I should say just refreshing to read it because of that different take on it.

01:24:33

I did struggle with the very end of it.

01:24:36

I wish I hadn't because I was so ready to give this a five star rating, but then I struggled

01:24:42

right at the end and maybe I'll reread it and maybe we do a book rereading thing at some

01:24:48

point and I'll change my opinion.

01:24:49

But I think I'm going to put it at a 4.5 just because I felt like it didn't get wrapped

01:24:55

up well enough for me.

01:24:56

Like I really struggled on that last piece, which is kind of an important one I felt like.

01:25:02

But so much of it I love that I really wanted it to get there and maybe it should be, but

01:25:09

I just felt like it didn't quite make it because of that ending piece.

01:25:13

All that said, definitely going to recommend this one.

01:25:16

Even in my circles in real life as we're calling it, I feel like this is the one I'll

01:25:23

probably mention quite a few times for sure.

01:25:26

All right.

01:25:27

Well, I thoroughly enjoyed this book.

01:25:31

I really enjoyed the style.

01:25:33

I'm not sure what that says about me.

01:25:38

I felt like he was just very direct in how he was communicating and also I feel a lot

01:25:47

of times when I read these older books that people were smarter back then.

01:25:51

Do you ever feel that way?

01:25:53

I always feel like folks from that time period are, I don't want to say more intelligent,

01:25:59

but more-

01:26:00

They sound more intelligent.

01:26:01

Definitely more intentional.

01:26:02

Yeah.

01:26:03

Like definitely more intentional and they tended to think about things differently.

01:26:06

But I think that's, I have so many reasons for explaining why that is.

01:26:10

But there's something about it, yes, I'm with you.

01:26:13

There's something very different about it.

01:26:15

The language, well, it's not too, it doesn't feel like a textbook.

01:26:20

It's not something where I have trouble grasping what they're saying, but just the cadence

01:26:26

and the word choice and everything just feels much more intentional is a good word.

01:26:33

There's nothing wasted here.

01:26:37

The traditional advice it seems for a lot of people who are writing books today is start

01:26:44

with a really dramatic story from your life and then talk about how you discovered a

01:26:49

solution and spend the next 50,000 words expounding on that solution.

01:26:53

And especially that first part where they're describing their own situation, it feels a

01:26:58

lot of times they manufacture a bunch of words in order to create a stronger effect

01:27:04

of which doesn't always work.

01:27:06

And this is very short.

01:27:09

I don't even know how many words this is, but it would probably not even be considered

01:27:13

a book now, like it would be way too short to traditionally publish.

01:27:20

But I think that lends itself well to the content.

01:27:25

I don't think it's one of the best books I've ever read.

01:27:31

And I hesitate to say that I'll recommend this one to a bunch of people.

01:27:36

I do think it's very appropriate for the right people, but I feel just in the title, you have

01:27:44

to have someone who's on board with the idea of taking responsibility for their life already.

01:27:51

There is no sugar coating this.

01:27:53

It's right from the beginning where you are is your own being fault.

01:27:57

And so if you're uncomfortable with that, you're not going to connect to anything that

01:28:02

he's saying here.

01:28:04

I also think some of this stuff, I agree with the core principle that he's driving at, but

01:28:11

some of the way that he worded some of these things, I wasn't a huge fan of.

01:28:18

We talked about a couple of them, like calmness, being two different definitions there.

01:28:26

It could be something that comes from within or it could be your environment.

01:28:30

And I feel like it's a lot more complicated than how simply he articulates it in these

01:28:37

very short chapters, which isn't necessarily a bad thing.

01:28:43

But if you're really trying to dig into some of these issues and get to the truth of them,

01:28:49

simplicity would be another one, worry, hurry, all that kind of stuff.

01:28:53

There's a lot more to be said in this conversation.

01:28:56

I feel like if this is the only thing you read and this is your starting point towards

01:29:01

these things, you've got different ends of the spectrum.

01:29:04

He is definitely skewed way towards one end of the spectrum.

01:29:08

And so one of the things that Nick Milo talks about is triangulation.

01:29:13

So I've got this data point over here.

01:29:15

I can collect a whole bunch of other data points from other voices in the echo chamber,

01:29:19

which are all going to support that.

01:29:20

Or I could go the other way and listen to the opposite end and realize that the truth is

01:29:25

probably somewhere in the middle.

01:29:26

I feel like that's necessary when you read this book.

01:29:30

Yeah.

01:29:31

So I'm going to rate it 4.0.

01:29:35

And I do think it's a good book.

01:29:37

And I really enjoyed specifically the chapter on the red tape of duty.

01:29:40

If that was the only chapter I read, it was still a worthwhile read.

01:29:46

But I think in order to get to the real meat of some of the issues and the questions that

01:29:51

he's raising in this book, you need something outside of this book in order to really get

01:29:56

a benefit from it.

01:29:58

Maybe that's a little bit of the issue you experienced with that last chapter is it's

01:30:03

not an all encompassing.

01:30:06

This is everything on the topic, which we both know from how to read a book.

01:30:11

That's impossible anyways, but it feels like a lot of books try to be that.

01:30:17

This one does not at all.

01:30:19

And so if you go into it thinking, this is going to be like a lot of the other books

01:30:23

that I read, you might be very disappointed.

01:30:26

Do you think that's maybe some of the difference between now and then you're talking about

01:30:33

like older writers, right?

01:30:36

From 100 years ago or more and how they seem more intelligent.

01:30:40

I wonder if it's because in today's books, we have a tendency to have books that will

01:30:47

try to be the one book you're going to read.

01:30:51

People don't read as much as they used to, right?

01:30:53

So I wonder if there's a different writing style that is people are going to read one

01:30:59

book a year.

01:31:00

So this book has to cover a whole set of topic in order to be read by that person for that

01:31:09

one year.

01:31:11

Whereas it used to be people shared books and they read every book they could get a

01:31:15

hold of because they were so valuable.

01:31:18

So people were actually more well read, I would say, than they are now.

01:31:24

Might be wrong.

01:31:25

I don't know.

01:31:26

That's my perception.

01:31:27

But if people are more well read, something like this would by nature have less need to

01:31:33

be all encompassing because the assumption is you've read a lot of other things.

01:31:37

In this case, he's assuming you've read the Bible many times.

01:31:41

You can tell that.

01:31:42

But I wonder if that's some of the difference.

01:31:44

I don't know that that's true.

01:31:45

It's just a speculation.

01:31:46

I think that's a factor for sure.

01:31:49

I also remember that he is an essayist, right?

01:31:52

So when I hear essay, I'm thinking short essay, not long novel.

01:32:02

So if you combine those two things that he's writing probably these individual chapters

01:32:09

as essays to spur conversation amongst the other things that are being circulated, people

01:32:16

are talking about, that makes a ton of sense.

01:32:21

I do think that you're right.

01:32:23

Most people are not going to just pick up and read a book for the collection of ideas.

01:32:29

I will, which is why I like nonfiction books because even if I completely disagree with

01:32:36

it, more data points.

01:32:38

But most people aren't going to do that.

01:32:40

They're going to wait until something is so frustrating that they want a solution to

01:32:45

a specific problem, which then makes sense that people are writing books as systems and

01:32:51

just do these three things and all your problems will go away.

01:32:55

Yep.

01:32:56

All right.

01:32:57

So we got a 4.5 and a 4.0.

01:32:59

I'm ready to shelf it, Mike.

01:33:01

You keep talking about this book that follows up to this one.

01:33:04

What is it?

01:33:05

It is 4,000 Weeks by Oliver Berkman.

01:33:09

The subtitle is, I don't have it in front of me, but it's something like Time Management

01:33:13

from Mir Mortals.

01:33:14

If you remember the previous Oliver Berkman book that we did, he brought up the idea of

01:33:21

the Momento Morrie.

01:33:22

I think that's the first time we encountered that idea of someday you are going to die.

01:33:29

If someday you are going to die and the number of projects that you complete by then is worthless,

01:33:36

how does that affect your productivity?

01:33:39

That's what we will be talking about next time.

01:33:41

Yep.

01:33:42

And I'm shocked that you picked this.

01:33:44

This was one that I was on the edge of picking.

01:33:47

And then you did this.

01:33:48

Like, really?

01:33:49

Okay.

01:33:50

All right.

01:33:51

Let's see how that...

01:33:52

So I'm very...

01:33:53

You got me...

01:33:54

I'm starting this tonight.

01:33:55

I might be kicking the bit.

01:33:57

I'm going to go ahead and get my head to bed early tonight.

01:33:59

Following 4,000 Weeks, since we're into this whole systems thing at the moment, I felt

01:34:08

like I needed to choose this.

01:34:09

I've had this in the back of my head for a while and then I was glancing through the

01:34:14

Bookworm Club recommendations list and I saw where Alex had recommended this back in May.

01:34:22

But thinking in systems.

01:34:24

This is a primer by Danella Meadows.

01:34:27

I think that's how you say it.

01:34:29

And this one is...

01:34:31

It's kind of an introduction to systems thinking.

01:34:35

But the reading I've done, it is that this is definitely considered one that is the go

01:34:40

to one of the go-tos for learning about systems thinking.

01:34:45

And you and I both tend to think in systems.

01:34:47

Thus, I felt like this one is probably a good one to get some conversation going.

01:34:53

So we're either going to love this one or hate it.

01:34:55

I'm pretty sure it's going to be one of those two categories.

01:34:57

I don't think there's going to be a middle ground on this one, Mike.

01:35:00

All right.

01:35:01

So there's that.

01:35:02

Gap books.

01:35:03

What do you got, Mike?

01:35:04

I have Simple Numbers 2.0 by Greg Crabtree, which is basically about business numbers from

01:35:13

the perspective of startups, I guess.

01:35:17

And it's interesting because in the startup world, it seems to be the primary reason that

01:35:21

you run a business is that you are building it in order to sell it.

01:35:26

And so right at the beginning of this book talks about that as one of the options, but

01:35:29

not the only option to building a valuable business with the possibility of maybe you

01:35:35

just enjoy working in this business.

01:35:37

And so that's perfectly fine.

01:35:40

Here's how you do it regularly and systematically.

01:35:45

So this is one of the areas that I want to grow in over the next year is just kind of

01:35:49

understanding business financials and accounting.

01:35:53

I feel like there's a lot of very, once you understand them, logical reasons for why things

01:36:01

grow or why they don't.

01:36:04

And until you really dig into it, you kind of feel like I do at the moment, which is

01:36:09

things just kind of magically align or they don't.

01:36:13

Yep.

01:36:14

So this is Mike's attempt to grow up business-wise.

01:36:19

That's an interesting book.

01:36:20

I may have to grab that one.

01:36:22

That sounds fascinating to me.

01:36:24

Anyway, as far as gap books, I'm still in the middle of "Take Back Your Family."

01:36:28

I mentioned that one last time.

01:36:29

It's by Jefferson Bethke.

01:36:31

It's a Christian's take on the whole busy world.

01:36:37

And I can see why a number of my local friends have said, "You got to read this."

01:36:42

So yes, I'm still in the middle of it.

01:36:45

I haven't quite figured out what I'm going to do once I'm done with it.

01:36:47

I haven't done a gap book in so long that I need to do something, like throw party and

01:36:51

some kind.

01:36:52

So anyway, "Take Back Your Family" by Jefferson Bethke.

01:36:55

I mentioned earlier that thinking and systems was one that was on the recommendations list.

01:37:01

If you have a recommendation that you would like us to cover, go to club.bookworm.fm and

01:37:08

you'll see a list of recommendations that are set up in account and you can post a new

01:37:12

book in that category and we'll see it.

01:37:15

And it self-ranks.

01:37:16

You can vote on them.

01:37:17

You definitely do look at that.

01:37:18

I should probably update the ones that we've already read.

01:37:20

Not I'm saying that.

01:37:22

But the other thing that you can do when you get to that club is join it and get a membership

01:37:28

there.

01:37:29

It's a paid membership.

01:37:30

It's $5 a month or 60 a year if you'd rather do it that way.

01:37:36

And when you do that, you not only get our undying gratitude because you help us keep

01:37:41

this show going, you get a desktop background that Mike put together, which is pretty slick,

01:37:46

to be honest.

01:37:47

You get some old gap book episodes that I did.

01:37:49

There are some short form podcasts that are exclusive to bookworm members.

01:37:56

But especially there's all of Mike's mine node files and all of the notes that he takes

01:38:02

there as well.

01:38:03

I've never figured out how to share mine.

01:38:04

Mine are just weird.

01:38:05

So at some point, I'll try to figure that out, but not now.

01:38:09

So anyway, you get all of Mike's mine node files.

01:38:11

All of this to say, the membership to me is well worth that $5.

01:38:16

Not only for all the things, but because you get to be an awesome person if you do that.

01:38:20

So thank you for those of you who do that.

01:38:23

And we would love to have you on board if you're not.

01:38:25

Yes, thank you to all the awesome persons.

01:38:28

All right.

01:38:30

If you are reading along with us, then pick up 4,000 weeks by Oliver Berkman.

01:38:35

And we'll talk to you in a couple of weeks.