Bookworm Transcripts

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Sorry, I'm a couple minutes late. I just got a call. I'm the community manager for the Appleton co-working space

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So I'll set up a tour for tomorrow morning. Nice. Nice

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Good for you. I'm not I'm not a co-working space guy

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Well, in my experience, there are a couple different types of co-working spaces

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There are the kind which are very sterile and don't have very many people in them, which we have one of those as well

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Okay, then there is the kind that is kind of focused on the community and that's the Appleton co-working one that I'm involved with

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And I really just love community. I love getting

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Smart talented people together in the same space and seeing what we can come up with so

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I want to help build that in this area. So I am officially now community manager

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Like I needed one more thing to do, but right right but it's fun because you're bored and you're looking for things to do all the time

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I'm aware of that right

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Alright, so I have something that you need to you need to start talking about this

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I saw a tweet that you put out and

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It involved one of these internet connected light bulbs

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Yes

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so

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One of my follow-up items is a stop-doing list

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And I did that and as I was doing that just basically applied that principle to a whole bunch of things and

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I guess the term for it might be curating or editing your life and

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I was thinking about all the different

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Places I have to go to do different things like right now. I'm recording this podcast in my off-site

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Office which I pay monthly for and it's great. You know, I have a place where I can just show up my

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Setup is ready to go. I don't have to worry about being interrupted

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But it has a very real cost in terms of money and time because it's about 10 minutes from my house

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And it's kind of the opposite direction from everything else that I might be doing in the day

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so

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Think that I am going to well, I'm not I think we have started

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Finishing off an office in the basement of our house for me. Oh, nice

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The thing is that it is in the corner of the basement our house is like a walkout ranch

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So mine is in the corner of the basement where there are no windows and

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so as we're

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Planning out this office

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One of the things that I've always wanted was to have these these hulaights because I've seen tans

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And I see how they can kind of create like a feel for your room

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And I think that's going to be really important especially when I have no sunshine

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So the office is in progress, but I bought a

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Hugh

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starter kit, which is the the bridge and then the three bulbs and

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Just put them in other lamps in our house just to play with them in the meantime and they may be permanently in our bedroom

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Because Rachel absolutely loves them

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Yeah, it's it's pretty cool like I don't know she typically will go to bed before I do and so this way

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You know we can just turn on one of those lights really really low

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It's almost like a night light and I don't have to stumble over stuff when I come into the bedroom

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Yeah, it's it's great and

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The different colors like it seems very simple. It seems not that big a deal

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Which is why I put it off for a very long time. I'm like well, it looks cool, but really it's not worth it

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I mean the bulbs are 50 bucks a piece

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Here's the thing though the bulbs themselves they say will last 50,000 hours so

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If I'm doing my math correctly, you know roughly 20 hours in a day roughly 300 days in a year, okay?

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That means that you could have these

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These bulbs on all all the time pretty much for about 20 years and they're not gonna burn out

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Which that in of itself

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Makes them much more cost effective

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But then also the ability to play with the different colors and really just like set the mood for whatever you're doing

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Like if I'm reading at night, I don't want blue light which is gonna keep me up

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I can make it more orangish

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You know some people don't like the the flux app for your for your Mac or the night shift on iOS devices

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Let's see. I love that stuff

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Yeah

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I'm I'm a firm believer in that stuff and I've talked about talked about that on the productivity show where like I

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Have been diagnosed with epilepsy so one of the things that can trigger a seizure is not enough sleep

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I'm also on medication which makes me more drowsy so sleep is very important to me

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I've been using flux for years. I'm all in on this this idea, you know, no blue light at night and

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so

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Yeah, it's it's it's great. You know, I can have my my side of the the of the bed

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You know, I've got my hulaite. It's it's not super bright

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It's got this orangish tint and I can read for 20 30 minutes and by that point like I am very tired

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I am ready to go to bed

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and

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Yeah, it's it's an investment in the way I rationalize it

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I guess if you want to use that but the way that that I view it is that it's not just an investment in like

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Oh, I've got this cool new gadget for my house

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but it really does make all my my morning and evening routines more efficient and

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Since I've got a lot of things going on and sleeps really important to me like I think it's a it's a worthwhile investment

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Just from that standpoint plus it's a lot fun and see and I that point I get the fun part

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I totally understand but the whole

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instigate like the whole catalyst here was light in the

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Office space correct and this is this is in a walkout ranch or in our neck of the woods. It would be a rambler

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still get to that term, but

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This is where I think you and I would differ a little bit on this because my instinct would have been to put in a window

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Instead of buying a light bulb, which is way more expensive, of course, but right well

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We looked at that option. Yeah, it was several thousand dollars more expensive

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But also we want to make this office like it's kind of a

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elongated room and the idea is that like if someone were to buy the house in the future

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This is not going to be the person's ideal office

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It's my ideal office because it's in the corner away from everything else and it'll be quiet. Yep

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But the average person is not going to want to use that room as an office

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But it would make an awesome theater room and so if you're gonna do a theater room

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you have to block out all the light anyways, and so

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We just think that this might be a really cool

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Way to implement this stuff which has been on my to try list for a long time

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But never could justify it. So this is kind of the thing that pushed me over the edge

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See, okay, you may have to work on me on these things because I

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I understand what you're saying. I

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Get the benefits, but at the same time I'm sitting here thinking

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Internet connected the light bulb

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Do I really need it to be that complex to turn on a light like that's what that's what I start thinking about

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Like I just don't understand I

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Guess the the whole rationale behind the details I get the big picture stuff

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But to me I'm thinking okay, that means if the internet goes down

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I can't do all that stuff and now I'm frustrated because the light bulb can't be tweaked like simple things like that now start to creep in

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Yeah, not necessarily

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I mean the way that it works is like we've got them in these lamps which are triggered by

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You can turn the lamp on and off and when you turn the lamp on and off

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What it does is it basically resets what color you headed on and it functions just like a normal light bulb

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So if you had these switch operated you could turn them off turn them back on and they're going to look just like

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Normal lights so you don't have to worry about them not working in that that sense. Yeah, I get that part

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I'm I mean, I'm sure they're fail safe still kind I mean they have to function is regular light bulbs

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That's the premise of it, but

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it's the concept that if I

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get used to

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being able to control like the brightness and the coloring of that light bulb and then I

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mean internet's not perfect the signals are never going to be a hundred percent and

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I have a couple days when I don't have internet, which is actually really rare. I get that

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But I could easily see myself getting quite frustrated if it doesn't work the way I'm used to

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I'm very much a creature of habit here Mike. So if it doesn't work the way I expect it to I tend to get a little bit

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anxious

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Well, yeah, I can see that I haven't encountered that yet. Although I haven't had them very long

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one of the things that I did

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Mmm, I guess last summer was yeah, I think it was prime day. They had a big sale on the euro routers

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So I have euros throughout my house and that has been a significant improvement in our Wi-Fi. Yep, so I

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Don't know. I mean, I'm not really concerned about the

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Losing the connection for the Internet of Things, but I guess you know time will tell yeah

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I'm just I haven't bought into the Internet of Things

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Concept really at all which is a bit counterintuitive if you look at all this stuff

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I do like I'm very heavy on tech, but I've never touched this like I don't have an echo

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I don't have any of these internet connected really anything nothing

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So I've not bit into that at all. So that might be the bigger piece that you're trying to get me to overcome here

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Yeah, I think that is the the bigger piece there and in tan described it as lifestyle productivity

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So the echo is kind of the gateway drug to that Asian efficiency actually bought me an echo. So nice

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Yeah, it's it's pretty fun and my kids like they they know how to use this thing in fact my nine-year-old

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Uses it much more frequently than I do. I don't tend to think that way

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Like I'll still go to my phone to find like a sports score or something in the ESPN app

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whereas he'll just be like I

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Don't want to say the the trigger term, but you know, hey lady in the canister

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What was the score of the bucks game last night and it'll it'll tell them so I think that there's

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these these devices whether whether you like it or not are changing the way that we live and

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The younger generation seems to adapt to them much more quickly

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I want to know what all the fuss is about and with the Phillips hulets. I can see some home automation

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Benefits to this as well. Although I'm not 100% sure how many use these yet. So these are for example home kit enabled

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so theoretically I could from my phone or you know

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Hey

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Person on the phone, you know, a hoy telephone

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Turn on the lights in the office or set the scene for this whatever like you can you can set all of that stuff

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And then you can trigger all of that using

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Using home automation and I don't think we're really to the point yet where home automation is really clicking

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So it's kind of a well well west thing where you've got these things integrating with this and these things integrating with that

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And these things not talking to each other

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But I think that there is definitely going to be something here in the future in fact

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I knew a guy who even just a couple years ago had a a business doing

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home automation before

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The echo and before Siri and people would pay him tens of thousands of dollars to do this exact same thing

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And he'd go needs install like a little network server inside the house that they could control with a remote

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you know and

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Now for a couple hundred bucks you can get the light bulbs and and your smart device is gonna act as the hub and allow you to control

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All that stuff. I think that is

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Kind of a game changer, but still needs to kind of play out. I

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Think you and I are coming at this very

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Opposite into the spectrum so I I do a lot of computer stuff

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And we need to get past this and go on to follow up because we're gonna have a long one here

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but I

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I tend to fall on the side of trying to do more things in the analog sense because we've read a lot about how

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Internet in itself can affect us and most of these books that we've read

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Indicates negative effects from spending too much time with

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connected devices and I tend to

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You know from that I tend to want to

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Separate a little bit I spend my whole day working on computers. I like to get away from it when I'm done

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To me that that it works better for me to just say okay. I'm gonna have my 10 hours of

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computer work in a day or sometimes longer than that and

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once I'm done with that I

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would really rather just go play games with the girls and read a book or

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You know do something in the kitchen or do something in the wood shot with saws

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You know things that can cut my hand off instead of

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Adjust lights like that's

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Okay, well, I tend to put my money in time. All right, so let me jump in right here because

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The Hue lights also have a disco mode. Oh, of course they do

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Of course they do boys love the disco mode all you have to do is like place the music and then the

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I think maybe the speaker is actually on your phone

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But there's like no latency between your phone and the lights themselves

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So the microphone will pick up the beats to the music and it will actually flash the lights accordingly and it's nice

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It's pretty awesome

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All right, so follow up because I don't know where to go from that

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So I've got a bunch here we've got a ton here

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We could we could talk about my my follow-up item to disconnect since this okay

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It's there you go now that you're connecting your house. How does this work?

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Well, let me say like I am

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The light bulbs are not going to tell me when an email comes in

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Well, that's good. They're not going to tell me when somebody likes to face flash three times

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They're they're not going to interrupt what I am doing at any given moment

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So I think that's kind of the distinction that I'm making there, but

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Yeah, I mean this is from somebody who has completely removed email from from their phone

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So I see these as two very different things, but the follow-up item here to disconnect

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Have to admit I haven't really done

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Great at this I had every intention to do it and then got a little behind on a project and basically had to work through the weekend

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So I need to still create the time to do this. I've got the plan to do it. It's just that

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Well, I mean with Asian efficiency

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We just are in the middle of developing a new product

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And so there were some things that just needed to get done

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And I had taken a couple days off earlier in the week and we got a little bit behind and it was

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You know up to me. I just needed to get get it done. So I I got it done, but

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the weekend is really the time when I want to make sure to disconnect and

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This kind of runs into evaluate my tools. Do I run them or do they run me because one of the quote-unquote tools?

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That I use is tweetbot. So I really like Twitter. I'm not on Facebook

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I don't really do a whole lot with social media, but I do like Twitter. I also

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Have realized this is my confession that apparently I am a Twitter completionist

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I have a hard time not looking at Twitter

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But one of the things that I'm holding on Twitter completionist explain that for me

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So term I've heard before. Yeah, so if you go into tweetbot specifically

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You open up the app and it'll tell you how many unread posts there are and then I think that's an option you can turn on or off

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Since you last were in Twitter

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So basically it puts a marker at like the last tweet that you read on your timeline

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And then it counts them all up ahead like above that

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And so if I were to disconnect for a Saturday for example not check Twitter

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And then I open it in the evening and I see like 350 messages like that's a little bit

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Anxiety producing in me and I'm like why that's that's dumb

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So you feel like you have so by the completionist that means you're trying to read every single tweet

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Yeah, because yeah because I have curated very

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Close or like I've been very

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very careful about what I have

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What I follow so everybody that I follow is not like they are people that I want to hear what they have to say

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I'm not getting ten people saying different versions of the same thing

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I'm not getting the people who are being extremely political

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Like I use mute filters and I block out all the stuff

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I don't want to see which is in my opinion the great thing about Twitter over something like Facebook

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As you can really control what you see on your timeline

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But as a result like I want to get through all that stuff and so

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Yeah, I need to

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Again, you know, I failed at this. I need to I need to create that time and my plan is to

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Saturdays

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Specifically to just completely disconnect so no email no social media

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No work and if I'm gonna do something I guess project related. It's gonna be read a book for this podcast

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But that's the ideal and I have not gotten there yet

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Okay now something I do is I

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With the disconnect thing is I throw my phone on a do not disturb every Saturday

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Because I work at the church Sunday is a workday for me

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So I tend to use my day off as Saturday and I put my phone permanently and do not disturb

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Which means for me that indicates that

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Nothing will go off on that phone unless it's a phone call from somebody on my VIP list, which is a pretty short list and

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That's literally the only thing that that phone gets used for on a Saturday. That's it

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Yeah, I think part of the problem here is that Tana and I have gotten into Carcassonne

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So we've been playing the iOS version of Carcassonne quite a bit and as soon as I get the notification that it's my turn

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That opens the floodgates see this is how out of the loop. I am I've never even heard of this. Oh my gosh

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You have to try Carcassonne. No, I don't I don't have to try this board game in the world

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Yes, you do Carcassonne is amazing. You don't have to do the iOS version, but you have to play Carcassonne

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Next time we get together whether it is at max stock in the summer or find the Minneapolis again

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I am bringing Carcassonne. We are playing Carcassonne. All right

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Trust me. It's life-changing. Okay

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Well, see you got on your list here. I

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Mentioned the stop-doing list. So let me just run down the items here that I put on here

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I think initially when I said I was gonna create a stop-doing list it was gonna be

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Just saying no to a bunch of things just because I thought that well if I say no to things then things will be better

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as I evaluate at all things I'm committed to I

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Don't feel good about saying no to any of them

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so that kind of let me down a bunny trail it's like well, you're not gonna

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delete any of your current responsibilities

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then how are you going to stop doing the things that you're not supposed to be doing like how are you gonna get more focused on the

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things that are really providing a return and

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So I identified some things that I do spend a bit of time with and I don't have plans necessarily for

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Fixing all of these but I'll just run through them. So number one is email

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Even though this isn't a huge problem. I still have to deal with email every single day and

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I was thinking, you know, it'd be really great if I just didn't have to check this

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So I don't know if that means I need to figure out and document my system and then try the VA thing again

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or what but

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Yeah, email is definitely a thorn in my side. So is calendar management I

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Would it would be great to say you wanted schedule meeting with me then, you know

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Talk to my assistant and I know that there are digital services that do this sort of thing

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I've got enough different calendars though that those don't work at least not without paying through the nose to

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integrate them all together like Calum Lee and doodle have some free services and they're great for scheduling meetings with people but

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It would be great to say, you know, you want to schedule coffee with me

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You want to have a meeting for something at church or whatever like something that's outside the normal

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everyday

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routine then

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Don't talk to me because I don't have time to look at everything and make sure that

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That all the plates that keep spinning

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But just talk to talk to this person and they'll get it on there

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Then all I've got to do is look at my calendar and show up when I'm supposed to be there

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But again, that's gonna take some work

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Another thing that I identified as a potential thing to stop doing this kind of hurts me to say this

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But I spend quite a bit of time making coffee

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What no this doesn't yeah, so I really like coffee I

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Think that making coffee at home. There's a lot of benefits to that number one. It's much less expensive

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number two

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It really like there is something about the process that I really enjoy so I could I'm using that currently in my morning

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Ritual as like a reward

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So when I get done with these things then I can make myself a cup of coffee

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but it takes

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15 to 20 minutes to make a fancy cup of coffee and

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If I do that

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Even once a day that's gonna add up but realistically I'll have a cup in the morning and then maybe a cup in early afternoon

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So is there a more efficient way to make coffee that still tastes good?

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I'm looking in the French press. No, no no French press

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French press is all right. I just do not like the

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Silt the the grounds that get in the coffee itself. You're doing it wrong

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Well, you'll have to show me how to do it then because every time I've tried to do a French press

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There's been some among there always is yeah, there's always a little bit in there

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Yeah, and I just for whatever reason can't stand that so it tastes good

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But yeah, I know a lot of people swear by the French press

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But regardless what I'm thinking is is there a way to automate the whole coffee process?

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I know that there are some machines that you can program

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I am trying to find an automated pour over machine that can handle the grinding of the beans as well

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If I could find that that would be amazing

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But even if I have to grind the beans, that's not really that big a deal

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So I think an automated coffee maker is probably in my future somewhere

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I had a little bit of a freak out in my mind because I thought you were getting ready to say something about a drip machine

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I was like oh Mike. Nope. I can't do that. You're on to my press and you're gonna do a drip machine

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Nope, that's just what I thought first I know I will know will not do drip. I would probably give up coffee before

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Aaron drip and find something else in fact, you know people I talk a lot about coffee and how much I I like it

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It's kind of I don't know my vice if you want to put it that way, but every January we do this fast and

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for 21 days I

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Do no coffee just to kind of show my body that I'm still in charge

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So I use that to say I don't believe I'm addicted but

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Huh I'm addicted, but I won't fast from it. I know I'm addicted. I'm gonna stick with it. I will continue feeding it

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Be the be the monster

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The other thing

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Two other things I had on this list

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meeting prep so there are

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Several meetings that I have to do throughout the week and a lot of areas of responsibility that

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I

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tend to be the person who

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Gathers the data so that the meeting is effective and we

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arrive at action items that we can do something with at the end

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So that means that it falls to me to gather that data and that takes a bit of time and it's not

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Really anything all that complicated someone else could definitely do that

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So I think as I'm going through this list. I really do need to be a at some point

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The other one. I'm not sure how to delegate this one. I know if you're in big city

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You can use something like task grab it, but errands and shopping. I

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Hate running errands. I hate going shopping

00:25:28

In fact, I just got new glasses because I needed some my old ones were super glue at least a dozen times and my wife told me

00:25:35

I'm not super gluing these anymore. You have to buy new ones

00:25:37

So I did some research. I'm like, how can I buy glasses without leaving the house?

00:25:43

So I got Warby Parker glasses, which was which are awesome and

00:25:48

I went to Costco because that you can get an eye exam

00:25:53

so I got the eye exam for like 30 40 bucks and

00:25:55

Then with the Warby Parker app you take a picture of your prescription

00:26:00

Uploads it and then you pick out the ones that you want to try on they send them to you for free

00:26:04

And then you send them back and you can order whichever ones you want and I bought some new glasses

00:26:09

I think there were 95 dollars, which is like a third of the cost that they would have been if I had gone to a

00:26:14

Vision place nearby and and bought some

00:26:17

so

00:26:20

Yeah, I need to figure out

00:26:22

specifically

00:26:24

How to eliminate all of the errands and shopping that I have to do from my life

00:26:29

like one of the things I have to do occasionally

00:26:30

I guess people who send me checks because they don't like to pay online for whatever reason and

00:26:35

I know you like some banks. You can just take the picture deposit the check. I

00:26:39

Really can't do that. So I have to I have to go deposit them and that drives me crazy too

00:26:46

In fact, I usually like don't deposit them for weeks or sometimes even months at a time and they pile up

00:26:52

Just so I can do them all at one time, but yeah, little things like that where I don't have to physically go somewhere

00:26:57

I want to get rid of as well

00:26:59

Our bank lets us take pictures. I like that

00:27:03

All right, so I'm gonna run through these rapid fire if I can so

00:27:07

The first one on this list is notice my blaming tendencies

00:27:10

I put this back on the list because I'm trying to

00:27:13

Just notice when I try to put things off of myself and onto other people and

00:27:19

Realizing that I do this a lot. So I'm just trying to pay attention to it

00:27:23

You know instances where something comes up and we'll talk about some of this today with our book today

00:27:27

if we ever get there and

00:27:30

Whenever something changes or something comes up

00:27:33

I tend to want to say it's somebody else's fault and not mine and I don't want to do anything about it

00:27:38

So I'm just trying to pay attention to that and just notice how often I do that

00:27:42

I've been trying to make a decision on building a plug-in for discourse

00:27:48

If you follow me at all, you know, I'm a huge fan of discourse and I help open source develop that

00:27:52

It's a forum software anyway

00:27:55

I did make the decision on whether or not to build this plug-in and I am going to move forward with it

00:28:00

And I'm actually quite a ways on it at the moment nice

00:28:02

So it's that should be a good thing if you're familiar with that. It's essentially a paid group access

00:28:07

plug-in so it allows you to

00:28:10

Set up groups in discourse and have people pay you to get access to that group which can then lead to

00:28:18

Paid categories and private areas of a forum. So it's something. It hasn't been done

00:28:22

Well, and I'm gonna step in and do that. So I've got a yes on that one

00:28:26

The second one second decision. I've been trying to make and this is all based off the book decisive

00:28:31

Decision on a CHMS or a church management system at our church

00:28:38

I'm in the middle of that one that one's gonna take me a little while

00:28:41

I've got a couple more months that I've planned out to help me make that decision on whether or not

00:28:46

We should switch the one we're using to something else

00:28:48

So I'll check in with that one in a little and like probably a month out or so just to see how that's going

00:28:55

But I'm still working on that one don't have a decision there, but I'm at least using the process

00:28:59

sweet

00:29:01

the last two I have here I'm gonna consolidate so a commonplace book and

00:29:05

memorization and I've always resisted doing a commonplace book and

00:29:10

There were a lot of reasons for that and I think it was primarily that I didn't fully understand

00:29:16

How a commonplace book was originally designed and what the purpose of it was learning that it involves memorization and

00:29:22

Me understanding through our last book that there's a lot of value in memorizing along with some other stuff

00:29:28

I've decided to step into doing that so I ordered of course a new commonplace book because you can't do this digitally

00:29:36

Of course not

00:29:38

So I ordered a commonplace book that I'm gonna use for it

00:29:41

And I'm in the process of collecting quotes mostly from books and some other things and then I've begun the process of memorizing those so

00:29:47

That's a go. That's a good one. I'm moving forward on that one. I like that one the the quotes specifically

00:29:54

I've been using an app called quote book which I've mentioned on this podcast before but unfortunately it's not being developed anymore and

00:30:01

There really isn't a good alternative for something like that

00:30:05

So I'm still putting things in quote book, but I am counting down the days until it doesn't work anymore

00:30:10

And it makes me very nervous, you know, I really don't think they're ever gonna stop making notebooks, so I

00:30:15

Don't really have to worry about them not developing notebooks anymore true

00:30:20

But I don't want to write all my quotes in an open see that's part of it. That's part of the thing like that's what

00:30:26

Helps you understand it more true true. All right. This is not a little bit. I hear

00:30:34

Okay, let's get past all this what's our book for today?

00:30:37

Book for today is who moved my cheese by Spencer Johnson. It is a

00:30:44

very short book

00:30:47

That was kind of intentional because I saw you had the personal MBA coming up. That's a short book

00:30:53

Yeah, it's only like 460 pages no big deal

00:30:56

Although I did find a book longer than that by the way

00:30:59

I recently got tools of Titans the Tim Ferriss book that one is actually over 600 pages

00:31:04

Good night. Yeah, but who moved my cheese is?

00:31:07

94 pages and many of the pages are one line with a big piece of cheese on them. Yep

00:31:15

So you could probably get through this whole book in 45 minutes to an hour. I would say that's I sat down and did it in about

00:31:24

50 minutes. Yeah one setting

00:31:26

Yeah, the the layout of the book is kind of interesting

00:31:31

It's basically broken down into three different parts

00:31:35

so at the

00:31:38

at the beginning it talks about

00:31:40

Kind of what is gonna happen and then there's there's a gathering

00:31:44

There's a story about like a high school reunion or something

00:31:47

And then that leads into somebody in the high school reunion telling this story and then the group has a discussion about it afterwards

00:31:54

Which I don't know. I mean I get why he did that. I wasn't a huge fan of that approach

00:32:01

I thought it was cheesy. Yeah, haha, but I'm sure you'll be here till Thursday. Yep

00:32:06

Yeah, like basically the the effect of that in my opinion is that he is not the one now saying this

00:32:15

It's the character that he created that is saying this which takes a little bit of the edge off of it or at least

00:32:21

That's what I think

00:32:22

The desired effect is because I mentioned

00:32:25

That one of the reasons I picked this is that I've heard a lot of things about it

00:32:29

And I went on the Amazon reviews and they were very polarizing there were a lot of people

00:32:33

Who were like I gave this to my employees it completely changed everything and there were a lot of people who were like

00:32:38

Yeah, I boss gave me this book and it's complete garbage. I can see why CEOs love it though

00:32:41

Uh, and I do get a little bit of that. I get a little bit of both of those as I was reading this

00:32:47

I kind of viewed it through those two different lenses simultaneously

00:32:49

There's a lot of stuff in here

00:32:52

Where it talks about like change is gonna happen. You got a role with it whatever

00:32:56

I kind of think though that there's well at least I can envision scenarios where

00:33:02

CEOs and management will use that as justification to not communicate effectively to the people that they're working with

00:33:09

And like we've talked about before

00:33:13

I really do believe that the responsibility of the vision that you have like if you're

00:33:18

The responsibility for communicating the vision is on the person who has the vision

00:33:22

So you can't just say from a CEO level management level

00:33:26

Well, this is where we're going and you guys got to get on board because you got a role with the changes like that doesn't work

00:33:33

You can try that, but it's not effective

00:33:36

You need to be able to articulate your vision in a way that people understand it

00:33:39

I mean even in a family dynamic my wife and I like we're leaders of our family

00:33:43

We have to communicate the vision for our family in a way that our kids can understand it

00:33:48

We can't say well, I told you that we're going to do these things and it's going to improve this, you know by 30 percent like

00:33:54

My nine-year-old seven-year-old don't care

00:33:56

That doesn't mean anything to them

00:33:59

so

00:34:01

Yeah, I think that it's dangerous to to just give this book to people and say well here

00:34:05

This is the framework for change that will help everything go a lot smoother

00:34:08

So I didn't I didn't really like that approach

00:34:11

I I found that the

00:34:14

whole class reunion piece that the beginning and the end was

00:34:18

I don't know how to say that it was just weird to me

00:34:23

Yeah, that my I've never seen a class reunion that looks anything like that

00:34:27

Right, I'm sitting here thinking about my high school class and trying to imagine this conversation happen as I'm reading it

00:34:33

And thinking I would never say this no way this is there's just no way this is real

00:34:38

It's so fake that it's just hard to

00:34:41

It was almost hard to read in some sense, but I was trying to figure out what his ground work was that he was trying to lay

00:34:45

So I thought that was really odd

00:34:47

That's the part of the book that I was like well, I feel like this could be

00:34:50

This could be removed and it would be fine if you

00:34:54

If you laid it out saying, you know, here's the story and this is what some people think about it and this is

00:35:00

The the groundwork of what and why the story exists which they kind of did in the inner

00:35:06

Introduction

00:35:07

To me, I felt like the introduction would have been fine if you'd skipped the precursor that was developed within this class reunion setting

00:35:14

I I really could have just left that including the discussion afterwards. I mean I I understood what they were trying to get at with it

00:35:22

But it was just weird

00:35:24

Really weird?

00:35:24

weird

00:35:26

yeah, and

00:35:28

By creating that picture of like this is a high school reunion and you haven't seen these people in 20 years and all of a

00:35:33

Sun they're having this deep discussion like that makes it seem not real

00:35:37

Because I know people who I see every single week who there's no way I'm having this conversation

00:35:45

Right, absolutely

00:35:47

Like there's so many walls that need to come down people especially in like that setting like you haven't seen each other for 20 years

00:35:54

You want to put your best foot forward. It's like social media times a thousand where like you want to project the best image of yourself

00:36:01

You want everybody to think that you are super successful. I mean I can I personally probably wouldn't take that approach because I just don't care

00:36:09

But I can totally see that that would be the natural thing to do in that that setting you know you see people they haven't seen oh

00:36:17

How's it going? What are you up to like you want?

00:36:19

You want to make it seem like you did something with your life, right?

00:36:23

And in that situation there's so that people have their guard up like there's no way that you're going to have this honest

00:36:30

conversation about this guy who took over the family business and it's failing like and I would say if you're that person and

00:36:38

These people who you haven't seen in 20 years are giving you counsel

00:36:41

You're an idiot if you listen to them. Yes, because they know nothing about your situation

00:36:46

They know nothing about who you are at that particular moment. I mean

00:36:48

I think back to my own high school experience and I have changed a lot

00:36:54

I am nowhere near the person that I was in high school and I can see

00:36:57

Some of the people that I was really good friends with we've went in total different directions

00:37:02

Not where like I've taken a turn for the better

00:37:05

They've taken a turn for the worst, but just like our lifestyles are completely different

00:37:09

One of my best friends in high school is now a rancher in Colorado

00:37:13

I am not a rancher. I am a techie. I'm a geek and so if we got together over coffee like

00:37:19

I don't know nothing about roping steer like there's not

00:37:21

We're not going to have this deep heartfelt conversation

00:37:25

Which is kind of what he what he painted in this this book and I just yeah totally think it's completely unrealistic

00:37:30

The premise of the story. So what this actual story is that's in the middle. So where the meat of it is the good part

00:37:37

I would say

00:37:39

He's essentially looking at four characters

00:37:42

And this this might ruin the book. I might end up just giving you the whole book here, but I would still recommend reading it

00:37:48

Just preface that so sorry. Maybe this is spoiler alert

00:37:52

But most of our stuff is probably spoilers

00:37:54

You should probably cut out this piece and put it at the very front and say if you just want to know

00:38:00

It's in the book go read it because it's quicker than listening to the podcast

00:38:03

Yeah, that might be true

00:38:05

That there might be some truth to that. So just pause right now go grab the book read it

00:38:09

All right, welcome back. So

00:38:13

with

00:38:14

The four characters are placed inside think of a a mouse maze

00:38:20

So you've created a maze and you put cheese in different areas in the maze and the mice go and find it

00:38:25

The the catch here is that two of these characters are mice and two of them are what he calls little people

00:38:31

Which are the same size as mice, but they're humans

00:38:34

That's a little bit hard to get your head around sometimes, but think of them as little humans little people

00:38:39

The the mice their names sniff and scurry the two little people him and haw

00:38:45

Which I kind of wish to use different names for him and haw

00:38:49

I understand why he did that, but I kept getting them confused

00:38:52

Maybe that's just me, but I kept getting them backwards until about halfway through it

00:38:56

And then we spent enough time with him that I realized that haw was

00:39:00

Not me. That's pretty much what I decided there right at the at the beginning of the book even before

00:39:07

I guess the story

00:39:10

The pre-story story

00:39:12

He has a page at least in my version

00:39:16

Where he's got the four different characters and he talks about the differences

00:39:19

So sniff is one who sniffes out change early scurry is one who scurries into action

00:39:23

Hem is the one who denies and resists change as he fears it will lead to something worse

00:39:27

And haw learns to adapt in time when he sees something can lead to something better

00:39:31

Yeah, and I think that's a good summarization of the four of them

00:39:36

effectively what the story is

00:39:39

They the four of them, you know, sniff and scurry tend to do things together the two mice

00:39:44

The two little people tend to do things together as well

00:39:46

and between the two of them they hunt for cheese in this maze

00:39:51

and him and haw eventually find well the four of them eventually find

00:39:57

uh a large portion of cheese in a specific part of the

00:40:01

maze

00:40:03

And it continues to show up day after day and they become reliant on it

00:40:06

And they get used to it being there and then one day the cheese is gone. It just doesn't come

00:40:13

and

00:40:14

The rest of the book is spent exploring the reactions of these four characters to

00:40:20

This cheese just all of a sudden disappearing

00:40:23

And there's some nuances with it of you probably could have seen this

00:40:27

Change coming if you just paint attention because the amount of cheese given every day was slowly decreasing and the quality was going down

00:40:34

Like there's some of those things that come out in it

00:40:36

But the the general premise there is that that cheese disappeared

00:40:41

sniff and scurry

00:40:43

Immediately jumped into action and snipped out some different scenarios and scurried off to go hunt down some more cheese

00:40:49

And they found a much larger

00:40:52

Bank of cheese than they ever had so they adjusted very quickly

00:40:57

him

00:40:59

Took quite a while he eventually left they him and haw didn't even leave the initial station for many days

00:41:05

Man, it might have been in weeks. I don't remember

00:41:07

But him eventually worked his way out to go look for

00:41:12

Another station of cheese and haw in the story never left he never

00:41:16

I don't at least that's my interpretation. I guess you could interpret it differently

00:41:20

He to me he never left that original station and just continued going back even though there was nothing there

00:41:27

So the the whole story is explaining how different people and different personalities

00:41:34

React whenever something big change some big change happens

00:41:40

And it's all told through this story of amaze with mice and little people

00:41:44

Right, uh, the only thing i'll add there is that hem and haw are actually I think you flip them

00:41:52

So hem is the one that I just yeah hem is the one who just stays there. He's like

00:41:57

Well, it's easy to do

00:41:59

Um and haw is the one who eventually

00:42:01

Bus out on his own now what's interesting about about this

00:42:05

Uh, and this could be just the way that my brain works

00:42:08

So I know this is not the point that he was trying to make in this the story, but as I was reading this

00:42:14

There you mentioned like the mice tend to stay together the little people tend to stay together

00:42:19

And he defines some of the characteristics of the the little people uh, he mentions that they had complex brains

00:42:27

um

00:42:29

And sometimes their brains clouded their judgment

00:42:31

so

00:42:33

Right away what I thought was that the mice are very similar

00:42:38

the little people are very similar

00:42:40

And the way that he framed it in this particular story

00:42:43

The fact that the little people are more complex more sophisticated whatever that actually hurts them

00:42:49

I think in real life. There's probably a balance. There's pros and cons to each of these

00:42:54

and

00:42:56

I was thinking that it would have been a totally different story

00:42:59

Especially in a bigger context of not just finding the next cheese pile

00:43:03

But what if sniff had become friends with him and scurry become friends with ha

00:43:08

You know that the people that you surround yourself with are really important and having different perspectives is really important

00:43:15

My wife and I talked about this last night actually like I mentioned

00:43:18

We've taken the Colby test the strength finders test like every assessment we take we find out we are very very different

00:43:23

And we can either use that

00:43:26

to uh

00:43:27

We can we cannot recognize that and we can just let that create friction because the way that I typically do things

00:43:31

Isn't the way that she would typically do things

00:43:33

Or we can leverage our differences and play off of each other's strengths

00:43:37

And we can move forward together and accomplish a lot more

00:43:40

But the natural tendency

00:43:43

Maybe outside of of marriage or choosing a life partner is to just surround yourself with like-minded people

00:43:49

And there can be some benefit to that

00:43:52

You know, uh, I live in nino, wisconsin and there's not a huge

00:43:59

Tech community here, you know, I mentioned a lot of people think I don't really have a job

00:44:04

Um, you know what?

00:44:07

I have like four jobs

00:44:09

Not really

00:44:11

Um, I I do keep busy

00:44:13

But uh, there's a lot of people that i've connected with online

00:44:17

That are of similar

00:44:20

Mindset

00:44:21

And really I think that there's a lesson to be learned here in

00:44:25

Picking and choosing

00:44:26

The best of what people from different

00:44:29

backgrounds and different perspectives can add to your life

00:44:33

If you just surround yourself with like-minded people, it's easy to fall into

00:44:38

Groupthink I guess maybe is the term where you don't even consider other options

00:44:44

But if you have a healthy balance between all of these things the outcome at least in my experience is always better off

00:44:53

I think there's a lot of value to knowing which of these four characters that you are

00:44:57

And some of the examples that came out I think in the discussion

00:45:02

Part at the end when they come back to the reunion piece

00:45:07

The one part of that that stood out to me that I didn't think was odd or strange

00:45:11

Was when the main I think it was named was michael who was the one that actually told the story

00:45:16

He explained how in their organization they had some big change. I don't remember what it was

00:45:22

But they basically identified

00:45:25

Employees as each individual character. So who are the sniffs who are the scurries who are the hymns who are the haws

00:45:32

and

00:45:34

How do they get each of them to?

00:45:36

Play a part in enacting the change. I thought that was interesting to just

00:45:42

If something big comes up if if a change happens

00:45:45

Understanding who you are and who the people around you are and how they all react to it

00:45:52

There's a lot of value to that because then you can understand who to interact with in a certain way

00:45:57

So I completely agree

00:45:59

But that part did kind of bother me too because it again framed it in the way that like I totally get why the people who didn't like this book on amazon

00:46:07

don't like it because

00:46:09

It's framing it as a way. It's almost like the guy if you remember the story from the question behind the question where

00:46:14

Forget the author, but he was doing the the session with the CEO of the company and the CEO is doing this presentation

00:46:21

He gets up there and he's like personal responsibility begins with you and the author's general right?

00:46:26

Gemma is like well actually no it starts with you

00:46:29

Meaning that the CEO of the company right kind of you this is like well

00:46:33

We're just going to identify you guys and if you're not on board like tough hit the bricks

00:46:38

Yeah, I think I think that that's a wrong approach

00:46:41

And the productivity project by chris bailey talked about how people are the reason for productivity you can

00:46:48

Tweak your organization and you can try to get the right people on the bus and some people you know

00:46:52

They're just not the right people and they shouldn't be in the organization

00:46:55

But I don't think it's fair to just classify people as like well you're a sniff you're a scurry

00:47:00

And sorry there's no room for you here because I think that that is the danger of doing that

00:47:06

I get it, but all that said which character are you Mike?

00:47:15

Well, I definitely

00:47:17

Definitely the description that I used earlier

00:47:21

Try to find it again now

00:47:24

Where the little people

00:47:26

Have complex brains that

00:47:28

Sometimes cloud their judgment that definitely is me. I tend to overthink things

00:47:33

So I think that I am probably a combination of hem and haw

00:47:39

We're initially I am resistant to change

00:47:42

If something happens something changes. I typically don't like it. I like my routine. I like the familiar

00:47:48

but

00:47:49

Once I have time to process it once I have time to get

00:47:53

Some some facts

00:47:55

Which in this case, you know, maybe what would be haw realizing that you know, there's no cheese here

00:48:00

Maybe we should move on like that's I can totally see myself doing that sort of thing

00:48:04

I wouldn't be the one who's just like oh, let's go find something better

00:48:06

but

00:48:09

Yeah, I think that I'm probably a mixture of those too

00:48:11

See I would say that if you feel like you're a mixture of those two

00:48:15

You're probably haw in that he he was kind of stuck in that

00:48:19

At first and it took him a long time and then he eventually did true, but how's the good one?

00:48:24

So I don't want to just say well, I'm the good one

00:48:26

Well, I don't know. I would say sniff and scurry. I don't know. I

00:48:30

That said, I think I'm scurry

00:48:33

I really do

00:48:35

because

00:48:36

If something big happens my gut reaction is

00:48:40

What do I do?

00:48:43

Instead like take for example

00:48:45

Uh me leaving the last company I worked for it was pretty quick. It happens suddenly and whenever I left

00:48:52

I was then left with the question

00:48:55

uh

00:48:56

what happens next

00:48:58

And

00:48:59

I kid you not it was the next day that I started building out my online business and starting to work on that in a

00:49:05

In a heavy way

00:49:06

So it it took like no time at all. I don't think I even lost

00:49:10

I probably lost a couple hours of a workday and that was it

00:49:13

That's how fast I tend to move on things like okay. Well, this job's not going to work

00:49:18

So let's create another one and I will continue doing this until

00:49:22

I fully made up my mind on what the the next path is

00:49:27

And it just because I kept going at it it turned into a full business in and of itself

00:49:33

So I I and if you ask my wife whenever change happens

00:49:38

I'm very quick like I will make a decision on what comes next

00:49:42

Almost instantaneously like I just immediately jump to the next thing

00:49:47

It kind of drives her crazy

00:49:50

New becky is not one that

00:49:54

Just jumps in headfirst for change. It takes her a while

00:49:59

Uh, I don't think she's him by any means, but I would say she's probably a aha. Maybe not as severe

00:50:05

As the character in the book like it doesn't take her that long, but it does take her a while

00:50:10

Uh, which is fine. It just means that the two of us need to learn how to work with each other in our marriage through that

00:50:16

But my wife will tell you if if change happens

00:50:20

I get excited and I start

00:50:22

I get to work right away my problem with it. You've got your running shoes tied around your neck

00:50:27

I don't know that I take them off. So

00:50:29

It it's to the point that if if an idea comes up and I think it's interesting a lot of times

00:50:36

I will just go try it. I'll go try it for a couple weeks and see how I like it before I

00:50:40

Decide yes or no on it. Like that's just how I do things. I I move fast

00:50:45

See, I don't think that there's really anything wrong with that particular approach though in this book

00:50:51

I kind of wish that they focus so much on him and haw after the cheese ran out at a cheese station

00:50:57

See was it? Yeah, I think cheese station see

00:51:00

Um, and uh, you don't really know what happened with sniff and scurry other than at the end when

00:51:08

Haw finally gets there. He realizes that they've been happy and they've been at this new cheese station end for quite a while

00:51:14

Yep

00:51:16

So uh, yeah, I think we're getting kind of an incomplete

00:51:19

View here and I know it's a simple little story

00:51:22

But that was something that I had questions about was like well

00:51:27

Which one do I really want to be like?

00:51:29

Uh, I wish I could understand from another you know another perspective almost like a cutscene if this were a movie

00:51:34

You know seeing what stiff and scurry were doing at the same time that Haw is trying to convince him that this is a bad idea to stay here

00:51:41

Yeah, I I understand that but at the same time, I don't know that

00:51:45

Uh, I don't know that Spencer was trying to lay out who you should be as much as just explaining

00:51:54

Four different personalities whenever change happens now

00:51:57

I I think there is a little bit of a hint of

00:52:00

Don't get stuck and and pay attention

00:52:04

You know saying you've got a quote written down here smell the cheese often to see if it's getting old

00:52:08

I think there's there's some value there because you don't want to

00:52:12

Just have it disappear one day when you could have seen it coming

00:52:16

If you could see something coming, there's no point in ignoring it and just wishing it wasn't the way it is

00:52:24

You can see things coming if you if you pay attention in most cases

00:52:28

I can tell you when a client is likely not going to sign something even though

00:52:33

I'm sitting across the table from them and they're giving me every indication that they are

00:52:40

Excited and they want to move forward on a website right away

00:52:43

But I can usually tell you even though they're telling me that

00:52:46

That I'm probably not going to ever get a signature and they're probably never going to actually move forward with this

00:52:54

Like there's just an inkling that I can get with that

00:52:56

I don't know if that's just the sniff part of this book coming out in me

00:53:02

I don't know what that is, but I think there's a little bit of value and just you know pay attention to your surroundings and see what's going on

00:53:08

because

00:53:09

I don't think any of us want to be him. I don't think any of us want to be the one who's

00:53:13

You know the proverbial stick in the mud

00:53:16

You don't want to be that person who's just dragging things down in some cases

00:53:21

I think and this is probably rare. I think there are some cases where change is a very bad thing

00:53:25

but those scenarios are pretty slim in my opinion

00:53:30

So I think there is some value in understanding how each of these four could play out in your life

00:53:35

But I don't think any one of them is necessarily the best

00:53:38

If that's fair

00:53:41

Yep, yeah, I of course

00:53:42

I agree with that. I mean really what he's doing is he's showing like he said different ways to approach change and really the

00:53:48

The big takeaway that I I got from this book is that

00:53:52

You can view change as either losing something or gaining something and that perspective will either

00:53:58

Inspire you to keep looking for something new something better whether you decide to stay at home base while you do that or not

00:54:05

Or you can just cling to the thing that you used to know and I think that there's probably a lot of people who are wired

00:54:13

that way and

00:54:15

That's the thing I didn't really like about this book was that

00:54:19

It kind of painted those types of people in a negative light

00:54:24

Hem for example gets frustrated. He's yelling that no one warned them

00:54:29

and he's just getting like negative and bitter

00:54:34

and

00:54:36

maybe that's because

00:54:38

In an organizational setting the leader isn't communicating

00:54:42

Well enough where the organization is going. You know, I view this book almost as a justification for actions

00:54:50

in terms of

00:54:53

manipulating and trimming a workforce

00:54:56

then

00:54:58

really

00:54:59

Making positive changes in an individual's life

00:55:02

Although there are definitely a lot of personal takeaways from this

00:55:05

There were enough little things that he put in there

00:55:08

I'm like, you really didn't need to put in that detail, but I see the point you're trying to make there

00:55:13

I see the justification you're trying to add

00:55:16

And that I didn't I didn't really like

00:55:19

I could see how you take this as

00:55:22

justification for doing things to an organization. I feel like if you

00:55:28

If you turn that on its head a little bit and you used these four characters and how they adjust the change

00:55:37

I think if you took that

00:55:39

and applied it to the decision making process on whether or not change should happen

00:55:43

That would be a better way to interpret it instead of using it as an excuse and saying

00:55:49

You know, I need to let everybody go here read this book and you'll understand

00:55:54

You know, this this will make you feel better about me firing you

00:55:58

You know instead of coming at it that way if you were to

00:56:01

Take the different forms of change

00:56:05

different ways of interacting and and reacting to

00:56:08

Change and then use that to say

00:56:12

Should we do this?

00:56:15

Should we explore some other options? Maybe we could do maybe we could add a division

00:56:19

Maybe we cut three and move those to this like you could start to explore some of those options

00:56:24

and then help people see how any of those may be

00:56:28

A good thing and help people to see how some of those are like how you could react to those

00:56:35

I think that could be a much better way of coming at it instead of

00:56:38

Using it as the the top down here now that i've done this to you deal with it

00:56:43

I don't think that's the right way to use it. I think that's

00:56:46

That is possibly a distortion of what

00:56:50

Spencer johnson is trying to get at I think all he's trying to say is people react

00:56:55

differently when things happen to them theoretically quote unquote happen to them

00:57:02

and there are some things that we can do individually to

00:57:06

Not be surprised by it, but to react positively to it

00:57:11

I don't think it'd be a good thing to say

00:57:15

Here's here's something I want to do to you deal with it like that's yeah using this book from that perspective

00:57:20

I think is the wrong view. I think that it gets used that way often though

00:57:25

I mean on the back of my book. Yeah, I don't I don't disagree with that at all number one international bestseller an instant classic

00:57:30

Hailed by people in leading organizations and yeah triple a amway and has your bush apple atut

00:57:35

Bosch and lumb good rich bristle miers blue cross

00:57:38

So you know that that's happening and there's enough stuff in here where it's like, uh, I can see why you're putting that in there

00:57:46

And I know how you're using this and I don't like that

00:57:48

But if this were like like we picked it up and we read it individually for this podcast

00:57:54

I think there's a lot of positive stuff in here

00:57:56

but I think that

00:57:59

The majority of the time that people pick up this book and maybe if you've heard the name who moved my cheese and you

00:58:03

Has has a negative connotation to you. It was probably because this was jammed down your throat by a manager

00:58:09

Yeah, so that was a little bit hard for me to get over. Yeah, I get that. I I think that's the wrong

00:58:16

Purpose. I don't think that's the way it was intended

00:58:18

At least that's me. That's how I took it if if I had been

00:58:23

If I had been given this book by a corporation that I worked for

00:58:28

My gut reaction to that would probably be what are you getting ready to do?

00:58:33

Like what what are you what are you plotting up there in your headquarters?

00:58:38

And it just just seems like

00:58:41

It seems like the easy button as opposed to I don't want to have this difficult conversation

00:58:47

I don't want to be responsible for communicating this vision. So here somebody wrote a really good book. Just read this

00:58:52

Yeah, you know that that doesn't work. Yeah, exactly. It's a perfect term. It's a cop out

00:58:58

Um, because I know

00:59:00

From personal experience there've been people who are like, oh this podcast episode or this book like

00:59:05

If you read this, this will be life-changing, but you can't project

00:59:09

How other people are going to benefit from this type of stuff even though you might see these things

00:59:13

You can't say well here read this and this will fix your problems

00:59:18

Like that's not gonna work. Only thing you can do is fix yourself like we talked about a couple episodes go

00:59:26

I could see because I'm sitting here trying to figure out how what would the right way of

00:59:32

portraying this and in sharing this with

00:59:35

Say i'm the leader of an organization and I I read this

00:59:39

And I get excited about it because it helps me understand when things happen to the organization as a whole

00:59:45

There's not like I need to react positively to that

00:59:48

That's probably how I would take it

00:59:50

If I had read it as an owner of a bigger organization and I would feel that that would be something beneficial to my team

00:59:57

Great. Awesome. But it'd be easy for them to interpret it

01:00:00

As I'm getting ready to do something to them like I could easily see that

01:00:04

So i'm trying to figure out what would the right way of portraying it be and i'm wondering if you know as that leader

01:00:11

I read this and I want my team to read it as well so that they understand

01:00:16

I would want to make sure that I pose it as

01:00:20

sometimes we get hit with this from say a client

01:00:23

And this is a book that I found helpful to me in reacting to that

01:00:29

I mean that that would cheat that would frame it as

01:00:32

The purpose behind why you're asking someone to read it

01:00:35

True

01:00:37

I still wouldn't recommend this book though

01:00:39

I mean the one thing that this book has going for it if you were going to take that approach is that the main story is like 50 pages long

01:00:46

So I mean you could you could theoretically get people who would never normally read a book to read this

01:00:52

Yeah, but if you're going to take that approach, I'd argue something like decisive would be much more effective

01:00:57

Yeah, that that could be that could be if you're trying to make a decision

01:01:01

As opposed to dealing with something they got that you got hit with but there could be a decision too of how do you deal with it?

01:01:07

Yeah, exactly

01:01:08

I mean if you're going to frame it as there's change that's happening and we need to respond appropriately

01:01:13

If you if you get everybody else to understand the decision making framework

01:01:16

Which they talk a lot about indecisive a lot of different examples. We need to change markets, etc

01:01:20

We need to invest in this thing. We don't need to invest in this thing

01:01:23

I think if everybody understood that you'd be a lot better off than if they've read who moved my cheese

01:01:27

But I understand also that that's a much bigger time investment also right I mean that book is quite a bit longer

01:01:33

But I would argue if you were just looking to complete a book and see changes

01:01:38

You would probably get more by saying this book changed me. I like you guys to read it

01:01:42

And then we'll talk about the takeaways as opposed to here. I'm your manager read who moved my cheese

01:01:47

Yeah, because the walls are instantly gonna be up

01:01:50

But anyways, I will get off my soapbox on that now

01:01:53

Well, and maybe before you do that

01:01:56

I mean if you if you're the leader of an organization and you feel like it'd be helpful your group

01:02:00

I'm not I'm not entirely sure. I think you're right. This may not be the right

01:02:04

thing to recommend but

01:02:07

Big butt here if I

01:02:09

Were talking to somebody personally like they're not someone who works for me. I'm not leading them. It's not part of a organization

01:02:16

I would very easily recommend this I think because if it's just me to someone else like take a good friend of mine at church

01:02:23

I know he is going through a bit of a difficult time some things have happened to him. He can't it's out of his control

01:02:29

I could easily see recommending this to him because it would help him understand, you know, something happened

01:02:35

Here are some different ways to react to that change. I could easily see recommending it to him

01:02:39

But I don't I'm not over him in any capacity whatsoever

01:02:42

I that I think there's a big difference between those two scenarios. Yeah, and that it could be you know

01:02:48

I have not been in a position where I've had

01:02:51

100 or a thousand people where I'm like, I want to improve my workforce

01:02:55

I'm gonna have him read this book, but I can totally see it being applied that way now. What would be interesting would be to see

01:03:02

If anybody has taken that approach what the results actually were

01:03:05

I think I have a little bit of an idea looking at the amazon reviews, right?

01:03:09

But they also have a who moved my cheese for kids

01:03:11

So in that context

01:03:14

It might be really beneficial to have my kids read that and see how they respond to it because yeah

01:03:20

I mean they're smart. They're gonna know whether this is something that I'm trying to use to manipulate them or right whether they're actually getting something out of it

01:03:27

My concern is that they would view it as the former, but maybe maybe it's not maybe I'm making too big a deal out of this

01:03:33

I really don't know. I don't have any any hard data to to support this

01:03:38

Yeah, I'm still trying to figure out where you could or couldn't recommend it

01:03:42

But that's it's probably a fluid you probably have to just pay attention to each scenario to make that decision

01:03:48

Yeah, there is some great stuff in here though

01:03:51

I mean, I really like the whole metaphor like cheeses the metaphor for what we want in life

01:03:56

Regardless of what you define that as and the maze is where we spend our time looking for what we think will make us happy

01:04:02

uh, yeah, I think if you were to

01:04:05

Analyze all the decisions that a person makes no matter who that person is every decision they make

01:04:12

It's because ultimately they think that that is going to

01:04:15

make them happier in fact

01:04:19

How did they put that? I think it was erg in terms of like the

01:04:25

The hierarchy of needs where you make decisions first of all based on existence you want to stay alive

01:04:31

And then once you have that stuff taken care of then you go up a level to relationships

01:04:38

Um, so you want to make sure that your relationships are a solid you've got friends

01:04:43

You've got a significant other and then finally the last one is

01:04:46

Growth personal growth really and that's from the next book that we'll get into

01:04:51

uh personal NBA so sorry to

01:04:55

The tease that one, but uh, I think that you could apply happiness to those three different levels like same same metaphor

01:05:01

Like you're chasing that cheese you're chasing the things that are going to help you progress

01:05:05

on that, you know, I guess another way to view it would be like Maslow's hierarchy of needs

01:05:09

but uh

01:05:11

Yeah, there's some definite nuggets in here, which I thought were great

01:05:14

The one thing I wrote down is if we just work harder, we'll find more cheese

01:05:17

That has been me to a tee in the past like well, I just got to figure out a way to make this work

01:05:24

Sometimes it's just not going to work. Sometimes the cheese really has gone and it's time to move on and find something else

01:05:30

Yep

01:05:31

And so uh, yeah, there's a lot of little things like that that really made me think

01:05:35

Um, the other thing they said was they'll never put yesterday's cheese back. It's it's time to find new cheese

01:05:41

Uh

01:05:44

Couple other quotes here. Um, I mean a lot of these like they're just supporting this. There's really only one idea in this book

01:05:51

Right and that and that is that change is inevitable and you have to embrace it

01:05:56

Um, the quicker you let go of old cheese the quicker you're going to find your new cheese

01:06:00

Uh, smelling the cheese often to see if it's getting old. I mean a lot of these things that

01:06:05

We get some of these we talked about already

01:06:08

They all line up and really the idea is don't get comfortable

01:06:11

Don't get fat and sassy where you are

01:06:14

Always be looking for the next thing and I think that I kind of have that approach anyways

01:06:19

but it's a good reminder to constantly be

01:06:21

Content but not satisfied like be okay with where you are right now

01:06:27

But always be looking to improve always be looking for the next big thing

01:06:32

And don't be clinging so hard to the the thing that is familiar that you completely miss those opportunities

01:06:38

There is in the at least the book that I received because I ordered it through amazon

01:06:45

There was a little card that came in it and did you get this? It's kind of like a little bookmark

01:06:51

I did not but I picked up my copy at half price books. Got it. Well, I ordered my new

01:06:56

Um, I'm really sure why I do that. I like making sure they're direct because then I get little stuff like this

01:07:02

uh, anyway, it came with a bookmark and it's

01:07:05

Kind of handy, but it says uh who moved my cheese at the top the handwriting on the wall

01:07:10

Uh because throughout the story

01:07:12

Hall was always writing things on the wall kind of leaving a trail for him in case he decided to come look for new cheese

01:07:17

Uh, but it laid out the seven different

01:07:20

Uh areas that he wrote on the wall throughout the the book

01:07:24

And it's a lot of these quotes that you just ran through

01:07:27

You know, they keep moving the cheese get ready for the cheese to move smell the cheese often like it's got a bunch of these

01:07:31

On here, but it just details out all these little pieces and

01:07:36

The the last one

01:07:39

On this list is be ready to change quickly and enjoy it again and again

01:07:42

They keep moving the cheese

01:07:44

Save for the adventure and enjoy the taste of new cheese. Well

01:07:47

I get that and it'd be very easy to read this and by the time you're done

01:07:52

Get the feeling that you're supposed to be super excited

01:07:55

Pay attention to when change is going to come move to it quickly and then just off to the races and be super excited

01:08:01

and

01:08:03

I I think that if you took that

01:08:06

Just carte blanc and just took it the way it is

01:08:08

Then it'd be very easy to think that if you ever stop moving it's a bad thing

01:08:15

I I don't want to go that far. I don't think that's necessarily true. There are a lot of times where I think you're perfectly

01:08:22

Can like you should be perfectly content sitting where you are and that you need to be okay with that

01:08:28

We my wife and I tend to refer to it as sitting in the pain

01:08:31

I may not like where I'm at right now

01:08:33

but I need to sit in it for a while so that I can comprehend it well enough before I move on

01:08:37

And I'll move on at some point, but I need to fully understand where I'm at right now before I can do that

01:08:43

I agree with you at least from a personal perspective because I happen to be a high-fact finder

01:08:49

And I need to know the facts before I'm gonna make a choice about where I'm going next

01:08:53

But I think there is some

01:08:56

Some truth to the fact that you do want to keep moving though

01:09:00

I think it was Winston Churchill who said if you're going through hell keep going like you don't want to set up shop there because

01:09:06

This is the thing that's familiar to you

01:09:09

I mean, I don't know a lot about this subject

01:09:13

So I guess this is kind of dangerous, but from what I do know

01:09:17

Abusive relationships often the person who is being abused I've been told will stay in the relationship because it's familiar

01:09:27

They don't want to venture out and find something new because that's something new could be better

01:09:32

Or it could be worse, but this is what they know right now

01:09:35

And they don't know where they are on that sliding scale of good versus bad

01:09:39

Uh, one of the questions that they asked in this book that really got me thinking was what would you do if you weren't afraid?

01:09:45

And I think that I've kind of overcome that

01:09:49

A couple times in my own life, but it also makes me stop and think are there any things that I have missed

01:09:57

Because I've been afraid to do them and then in the future. Obviously, I don't want to miss those opportunities like one in particular

01:10:03

Uh, I'll just use as an example the the process for writing my book

01:10:08

Uh, I knew nothing about writing

01:10:11

I knew nothing about the process

01:10:14

And if I were to sit and think about like who should actually write a book

01:10:18

I was way down at the bottom of the list. I was completely unqualified

01:10:24

Uh, and uneducated

01:10:25

But that didn't stop me and I think that for a lot of people that would stop them

01:10:30

And again, like I'm not painting this picture or I'm not trying to paint this picture as like I've got this all figured out

01:10:35

I'm sure if someone were to look at my life, they could identify

01:10:38

Times where well, you know, you completely missed this opportunity because you were afraid

01:10:42

But I share that experience because maybe there are people listening to this that that is the thing that is holding you back

01:10:49

Like you have that that dream that vision that you want to write the book

01:10:51

You want to create the the course you want to do that thing, but you don't know how to do it

01:10:55

And this applies to you, you know, what what would you do if you weren't afraid?

01:11:00

I think a lot of people have that answer at the tip of their tongue

01:11:04

They they know it, but they are afraid to embark out and find new cheese

01:11:08

And so for those type of people

01:11:11

This book is great and also for me personally like I said

01:11:14

This is a great reminder because I want to apply that mindset and that framework

01:11:19

To my life not just for a specific decision, but for all of my decisions

01:11:24

I came away from this book with a way to explain

01:11:30

You know, there's a lot of instances here where I have a way to

01:11:34

Just explain how things happen when something changes and just having words for it

01:11:40

I think can be extremely valuable just understanding here is

01:11:45

The process that we all go through when something happens to us and just being able to you know

01:11:51

I've mentioned this book to a couple people now and they're like, oh, yeah, I've read that

01:11:54

So now it's a joke between us like oh, where's your cheese at today?

01:11:58

Like you can you can start to do that. It gives you a way to talk about it

01:12:01

Which is kind of fun and it's it's something that I always find valuable when a book gives me a way to explain something

01:12:07

Which is partly why I like the commonplace and memorization thing gives me a way to memorize things and explain it better anyway diversion

01:12:15

uh one of the quotes you wrote down here feeling entitled will make you sick and

01:12:19

This is something I think I see a lot of and it's just kind of prevalent in our culture if you stop and

01:12:25

Marinate on it a little bit. Uh, so in this process him

01:12:29

He he gets into a rut

01:12:32

continuing to go to the same spot every single day where there is nothing and

01:12:37

He he gets to a point

01:12:41

Well, maybe let me back up whenever they're going and there is cheese there

01:12:44

It slowly becomes a thing and they he explains how they start having people over and they they have these big

01:12:52

Events and they show off their pile of cheese even though they've done nothing to get it. Mm

01:12:58

They feel entitled to it because it's always there and they're just so used to it and they're the only ones that use it and

01:13:05

It's mine like I it's mine. Yeah

01:13:09

And that's where he is like I deserve my cheese like why why haven't you given me my cheese back?

01:13:15

Well, it's not his cheese. It was just in an area that he had access to and that entitlement

01:13:23

In this case, you know following the quote feeling entitled will make you sick if you follow the rest of the book

01:13:29

him is stuck in a rut and

01:13:33

He's angry because they're not giving him what he feels like is his even though it was never his to begin with he was simply a using it

01:13:41

If you look at our culture today, you can see that running rampant

01:13:45

I mean, it's just everywhere where things have been handed out at one point and people then feel like they deserve it

01:13:51

Even though it's not necessarily theirs to begin with it was just extra so I

01:13:57

I'm not going to go too far down that path because it's it's a slippery slope and it breaks

01:14:03

Down in some areas, but it's something that I feel like

01:14:07

Can cause a lot of toxic relationships if you let it and it's one that I feel like if you were to read this you could see that

01:14:15

but it's

01:14:18

It's toxic

01:14:20

Yeah, so we I mentioned earlier that the only person that you can change is yourself

01:14:26

And that is where

01:14:29

My big issue with how this book would typically be delivered to employees at an organization even if you frame it perfectly

01:14:37

You are giving it

01:14:39

At least in my mind from a manager or a boss to the employees

01:14:43

That sets the scene

01:14:46

and now it's

01:14:48

They're trying to change me and you can't do that. So

01:14:52

Again, I think a lot of where the the entitlement stuff

01:14:59

The big takeaway from that is that you cannot apply this to anybody else

01:15:03

You cannot say well, you can't feel entitled you didn't earn that

01:15:06

All you can say is look at yourself and you can say what did I really do to get this

01:15:12

And me specifically and I've talked a lot about I have a very particular mindset that I approach everything through

01:15:19

I'm a christian so not to get all woo-woo

01:15:21

But my faith is a very important aspect of this and so I personally have the belief that

01:15:29

Everything that I have I am not an owner of I have been blessed with I am a steward of

01:15:35

including

01:15:37

Though including the love of my wife. Okay, so that's that's a big thing

01:15:40

I think not to go into marriage counseling on this podcast

01:15:43

But it totally applies to this stewardship versus ownership and feeling entitled model

01:15:48

Every single time I'll just pick on myself every single time that there is

01:15:52

A breakdown in communication or there is an issue. We're having a fight

01:15:57

I can look at myself

01:15:59

And I can recognize a time

01:16:01

Where I have felt entitled and expected my wife to do something whether that's

01:16:07

Make a lunch for me in the next day because I got a really busy day or fill in the blank

01:16:11

But I mean if you live with a significant other

01:16:14

You know what your buttons are you know what the topics are that you fight about

01:16:19

And if you were to deconstruct those if you were to look at the root causes of them

01:16:24

I would say probably 95 percent of the time it's going to stem from this entitlement mindset

01:16:30

So feeling entitled will make you sick

01:16:32

But applying this only through a personal lens

01:16:35

If you just try to maintain what you have and the cheese really is gone

01:16:42

It's moved on and

01:16:44

Maybe that's the job that you're at like the market has dried up

01:16:47

Maybe you know

01:16:49

We we did the innovators dilemma and we talked about some of those companies that

01:16:53

Actually developed the breakthrough new technologies, but didn't embrace them and you know Kodak for a long time

01:16:58

Didn't do anything with digital and file bankruptcy

01:17:01

So maybe you're at Kodak and your job's being eliminated like

01:17:04

Don't cling to the fact that you know all of this stuff about photography

01:17:09

These old technologies old ways of doing things

01:17:11

Be willing to learn new things be willing to

01:17:14

Embrace the the change be willing to change yourself

01:17:19

One of the things that they said in this book

01:17:22

Was that what you are afraid of is never as bad as what you imagine on page 63

01:17:28

A lot of times we cling to those old things because

01:17:32

We're afraid that we won't be able to do the new thing

01:17:35

We won't be able to adapt

01:17:38

And what this book is saying and what I can verify from my own personal experience is that a lot of times you can just figure this stuff out

01:17:44

Like you may not know exactly how to publish a book

01:17:47

But if you just get up every day and you start writing you'll figure it out

01:17:51

And then on page 72 he talks about how nothing gets better until you change again

01:17:55

This is one of those sayings that

01:17:57

Reminded me specifically of the john miller story where personal responsibility begins with you over there not me

01:18:03

Yeah, um, but

01:18:06

I mean if the shoe fits

01:18:08

As my tennis coach would say try it on and think about it

01:18:11

Long long story, but uh

01:18:15

Yeah, you can only apply this stuff to yourself, but when you do apply it to yourself be honest with yourself and if this stuff is

01:18:22

If this stuff is uh hitting home with you don't just get upset like hem did and say well

01:18:29

This isn't the way that things should be

01:18:30

Maybe you're right. Maybe this isn't the way that things should be but what can you do?

01:18:35

To create the future that you want

01:18:37

What can you do in order to get to the next cheese station?

01:18:41

Maybe you don't know exactly where that next cheese station is

01:18:45

But I think a lot of times you have an inkling that it's in this particular direction

01:18:49

And if you're like me anyways, you're just hesitant to make that jump

01:18:52

Maybe not for a scurry like you, you know, you see the new thing and you're like, oh shiny new object

01:18:56

Let's go see what that is

01:18:58

That I don't know, but

01:19:01

That that's my my thoughts on the feeling entitled will make you sick like don't

01:19:04

stick where you are just because

01:19:07

You you feel that your current position is unfair if you're if you feel that your current situation is unfair then do something yourself

01:19:14

To change it because you have the power to change it

01:19:17

The main action item I took away from this book is to encourage my wife to read it and

01:19:24

I say that not I don't mean that in a common-sending way at all

01:19:29

Because I had this conversation with her and I was explaining

01:19:32

The the story of being an amaze and how different characters reacted differently whenever cheese was moved

01:19:39

I was trying to explain that to her

01:19:41

And she made the comment that she felt like she was potentially the one who never changed

01:19:47

So she was classifying herself as a hymn

01:19:50

And you know, we have a new baby in the house

01:19:53

And that means a lot of things change

01:19:56

And it's very easy to become resistant to that and be a little bit angry and have some of that entitlement feeling

01:20:01

In a few odd cases. Yeah, I even fall into that

01:20:05

And my wife felt like that was something that she wanted to read but wouldn't really

01:20:11

Commit to it. So

01:20:13

I am going to see if I can encourage her to go ahead and make that jump and go ahead and read it

01:20:17

Simply because I know it's something that for her

01:20:20

It would help a lot. It would help her understand

01:20:24

The process of whenever change happens that you can't control

01:20:28

Because I don't want to say that she struggles with that, but I know that she struggles to understand it

01:20:33

Well enough. So you know being a good husband. I want to help. So I'm a problem solver. I move quick

01:20:40

So I'm an encourager to read it and hopefully not be overbearing

01:20:43

That actually leads into the the next thing on here the job of a leader

01:20:48

Um, because this was just one line in the book

01:20:51

But I thought this was the most important line in the book

01:20:54

I've mentioned a lot of different things in here that rubbed me the wrong way because

01:20:57

It kind of framed it as like the responsibility is on the individual who has to deal with the change

01:21:03

But he says in the book that the job of a leader is to paint a picture of new cheese

01:21:10

That's so good. Like as a leader

01:21:12

You can't just say well, you got to change and trust me that there's new cheese out there somewhere

01:21:17

The job of the leader is to say

01:21:20

Follow me. I know where the new cheese is. It's right around the corner

01:21:25

You know all we have to do is this this and this and we'll be at our new cheese

01:21:28

and

01:21:30

I think that that applies to pretty much any team or organization

01:21:34

in life. So your marriage your job at the church

01:21:39

uh, any sort of job in the workplace that you might have

01:21:43

uh, I think that leadership skills are not just for

01:21:48

certain

01:21:50

kinds of people they're not for certain positions. They're not for

01:21:53

management level and CEOs

01:21:56

They're skills that everybody

01:21:58

needs

01:22:00

And if you consider yourself a leader, then you have to be able to do this

01:22:04

You have to be able to communicate that vision

01:22:07

It's not like I mentioned earlier. It's not on the people that you're trying to talk to that you're trying to communicate to it's not on them to understand

01:22:14

Necessarily where the cheese is you have to explain to them in the language that they understand

01:22:20

Where the new cheese is and only when you do that

01:22:24

Only then can you move together?

01:22:27

Cohesively as a unit towards that new goal. Sean uh, shan mckay of shan west

01:22:33

Mentioned on his podcast. I believe that

01:22:37

You know you've communicated the vision when you hear other people

01:22:41

Saying it back to you out of their own mouth

01:22:44

So they are doing it not because they're just reciting what you've said

01:22:49

But they've internalized it and they can actually communicate you can say what was the vision again?

01:22:55

And then they say it and then it's exactly what you have pictured. That is the point

01:23:00

When you have done your job as a leader

01:23:03

And I think that a lot of times we stopped short because well, I told you this, you know, no, that's not good enough

01:23:09

Yeah, you know applying it to myself personally

01:23:11

Like I can't just say well, I posted this on slack. I sent an email. You know, that's it's in writing

01:23:17

That's great that it's in writing, but the fact that it's in writing doesn't mean that communication

01:23:22

Actually took place. Yeah, it's just one half of the

01:23:25

The equation there and you know if you follow that train of thought if the leader is painting a picture of what the new cheese is and where you're going to go

01:23:33

It makes it easier for people to get past

01:23:35

An aversion of losing what they currently have

01:23:38

So they're used to cheese in a certain spot

01:23:42

And they are used to a certain flavor and quality of cheese in this area

01:23:46

but

01:23:48

Whenever the leader steps in and explains

01:23:50

In detail what the new cheese is and how to get there and continues to drive that point home

01:23:57

successfully and

01:24:00

tactfully

01:24:01

It's a lot easier for people to make the move and go ahead and make the jump into the new and get away from

01:24:07

The fear of what they're getting ready to move away from because it's comfortable. We're used to something where we're at now

01:24:12

It's a lot easier if you if you can see where you're going and know what's coming up now

01:24:18

If you're like me

01:24:20

I as long as somebody has some gist of an idea that it might be better

01:24:23

I can jump in headfirst and take off like that's just all it takes for me

01:24:30

But if you're if you're like Mike and you need some data on it then the leader has a different

01:24:35

that they need to

01:24:38

Work with you in a different way than what they would

01:24:39

With me if you want to get me on board with something

01:24:42

You have to paint a picture of a vision that I can relate to and I'm kind of picky on how

01:24:50

Well, that needs to be conveyed and the tact that needs to be driven with that

01:24:55

So I'm picky with it and I have a lot of

01:24:58

Intuitiveness with that, but I would say just what I know about you Mike

01:25:03

If you're like Mike it would take a lot of data and you would really have to show it

01:25:08

In detail and here's how it all works. Here's the plan in each step of the way and here's what

01:25:15

It will look like once we get there

01:25:18

What I'm getting at is you you have to paint those pictures potentially in different ways depending on who you're talking to

01:25:25

To help them overcome the movement of where they're currently at to get to the new

01:25:29

Yeah being a leader is not easy and a lot of people say well

01:25:34

I want to be a leader, but that means that you have to be able to speak all of these different languages

01:25:40

Yeah, so that the people that you're leading quote-unquote

01:25:43

Uh can understand where you're going and I think that being a boss does not necessarily make you a leader

01:25:50

I think that there are a lot of bosses

01:25:54

Who will misuse this book?

01:25:57

Um

01:25:58

And that's that's my concern, you know

01:26:01

Why I spent so much time talking about it earlier is I can totally see a situation where

01:26:06

I'm going to give all my employees this book some of them

01:26:10

It's going to resonate with and they're going to see some positive change

01:26:13

Some of them aren't going to get it and I'm going to use that as justification that they're not the right people when really it's just

01:26:20

I have not communicated I have failed as a leader because I have not communicated

01:26:25

Where the new cheese is what the change is going to look like how it's going to be better

01:26:29

In a way that they get it and I don't know where the line is between like I've tried all these different approaches

01:26:36

I can't spend all day every day trying to get this person on board

01:26:40

But I also think that just handing somebody a book isn't enough

01:26:44

Yep, I think that's a cop out. I guess that earlier

01:26:47

All right action items. Yeah, so I had the one I mentioned it earlier

01:26:53

Uh encouraging veggie to read this because I think it would help her

01:26:58

That's really what I got from it because I

01:27:00

I feel comfortable with how I react to change and I enjoy creating change, which is difficult for others sometimes

01:27:08

Sorry about that team

01:27:10

Love you guys

01:27:12

So I I can move quickly

01:27:14

Uh, if there's any other thing I would to if I

01:27:16

If there's any other thing I would take from this it would be

01:27:20

To sometimes slow down a little bit to help others

01:27:23

Come along with me. That would be the other thing

01:27:26

You're a high quick start just like my wife. Yeah, I like to take off and hit the ground running

01:27:31

uh, so my takeaway is

01:27:34

Uh, this is a simple little thing, but it really jumped out at me at one point. Hause going through the maze and

01:27:42

He's decided to make the the decision and leave she's stationed C and search out for new cheese

01:27:46

And at one point he just stops and laughs at himself

01:27:49

So my takeaway is we're willing to laugh at yourself and what you're doing wrong

01:27:53

Because I tend to take myself very seriously when really

01:27:56

You know, you can you can sensationalize the decisions that you make like this is a life-changing decision

01:28:02

In reality, it's not any one decision that really impacts you all that much

01:28:09

I mean there are very important decisions that you have to make like who you decide to marry is a very important decision that will

01:28:15

impact the rest of your life

01:28:18

Um, the job that you decide to take, you know, those things are very important, but

01:28:22

The only wrong decision is to make no decision when the cheese dries up

01:28:27

so

01:28:29

Don't be afraid. I guess my takeaway, you know, don't be afraid to try something and if it doesn't work

01:28:34

You're like, well, that didn't work

01:28:36

As opposed to no, I gotta figure out a way to make this work because I'm so invested in this

01:28:40

I have this sunk cost I've invested so much time and effort into this I've got to make this business work

01:28:44

You know being able to to laugh at yourself. You're like, well, that was a dumb idea

01:28:49

Why did I ever think that was gonna work?

01:28:51

As opposed to getting so entrenched into a way of thinking and so attached to an idea

01:28:56

This book I think was easy to read as long as you're in the middle part of it

01:29:03

We talked about this earlier the beginning and end I felt like could have been chopped off and it'd been okay

01:29:08

But at the same time, this is a very quick read

01:29:11

Because you know, I opened this up before I sat down

01:29:15

To read it and I was gonna get started on it one night and I realized one the fonts really big

01:29:20

Two margins are huge top and bottom three

01:29:24

There are a lot of pages with a picture of a cheese block and one sentence on them

01:29:28

And it's only 90 some pages long

01:29:31

Okay, this is gonna be fast

01:29:33

So I skipped it that night and I picked it up the next morning

01:29:37

I think it was like 45 50 minutes. I was done with it from start to finish

01:29:41

So it's quick and I and I like that about it. It's nice to have short books that you can recommend to people

01:29:46

I simply think like what we've been talking about

01:29:49

This is one that I will recommend but only in very specific scenarios and likely not in a broad

01:29:56

group so

01:29:59

I will recommend this one

01:30:01

And I will give it a four stars

01:30:03

But I'm not gonna say, you know, I'm not recommending to all the bookworm listeners to read this because I want you to change

01:30:12

Right. I'm simply saying that because I feel like it's helpful to anybody in their personal lives in some way

01:30:19

That's why I would recommend it

01:30:21

Yeah, I've mentioned kind of throughout the the podcast here that I really did not like the authors

01:30:30

necessarily I like the idea of the story in the narrative

01:30:33

but framing it

01:30:36

in the context of

01:30:38

A discussion that happened during high school reunion at the office a little ridiculous

01:30:41

And then there was lots of language in here, which like I said just kind of rubbed me the wrong way

01:30:48

so

01:30:51

I don't know. I mean, I definitely think there's some good stuff in here

01:30:55

But I think that there are much better books for the typical bookworm listener

01:31:00

That we have already covered

01:31:03

So I am going to give this three stars

01:31:07

Which maybe is my lowest rating so far

01:31:10

Did we give what did we give the innovators dilemma?

01:31:13

Was that one down in the that was one of our lower ones? I think I think I did three and a half for that one

01:31:19

There was a lot of good information in that one as well, but this one just

01:31:24

I don't know. I could see the agenda the entire time that I was reading it and it bothered me. Yeah

01:31:29

Yeah, yeah innovators dilemma. You gave it a three and a half. I gave it a three oh

01:31:33

I think that was one of our lower ones anyway. There you go

01:31:39

Uh coming up next so the next one up is my choice the personal MBA as mike mentioned and that's by josh koffman

01:31:47

Uh mike mentioned it's a long one

01:31:50

And i'm sorry for that

01:31:52

Uh, this is one that I saw

01:31:54

Uh shawn blanc recommended this at one point and I wrote it down and I really like shawn

01:32:00

I love his stuff. So I put it on my list and here we are. I'm gonna make you guys read it with me

01:32:06

Nice

01:32:08

So speaking of shawn blanc uh the next book that I have coming up is the 10x rule by grant cardone

01:32:15

Which shawn has mentioned on his blog. He's read and he really got a lot out of it

01:32:21

And I think it's safe to announce at this point that we are actually going to have shawn on the podcast to talk about the 10x rule

01:32:28

So we will have a guest for that episode. Yeah, that'll be fun. It's on the calendar at least

01:32:33

So hopefully that all pans out if it doesn't right

01:32:36

Whoops, sorry guys. We'll try shawn. It shawn if you're listening to this now you're committed. So yeah

01:32:41

Uh, I added something to our list of things that we normally go over because I realized mike that you and I tend to read a book in between these books

01:32:51

Uh, so I called it gap books on our outline get anybody's interested and I know that the personal envious along one

01:32:56

So I'm sure you've jumped into this one, but I'm in the middle of a book

01:32:59

That's in between these we have zero intention to talk about this on the podcast

01:33:03

But I think it's interesting to at least know what we're reading

01:33:05

Uh, so I'm currently in the middle of reading cooked by michael pollen

01:33:09

Uh, if you know my personal life at all, I come from a very strong agriculture background

01:33:14

And I have a thing for understanding the food industry from

01:33:17

plant and animal to the dinner table

01:33:21

So this is one where michael pollen talks about the history of our cooking

01:33:25

Cultural transformation. It's interesting. So if you if you got an open mind with food systems and kitchens

01:33:32

It's a fun one

01:33:35

Nice. I guess my gap book would be tools of titans by tim ferris. I mentioned

01:33:39

I've got that one the other day

01:33:41

And it's an interesting book in that it's broken down into very short chapters

01:33:46

Each chapter is just a couple pages long and it's really him distilling all the major takeaways from all the interviews that he's done

01:33:52

So I both love and hate tim ferris

01:33:55

he

01:33:58

Kind of rubs me the wrong way sometimes, but also I think that he talks about a lot of good stuff in terms of

01:34:05

uh, just productivity and and he's got that attitude where he's constantly looking to improve himself and so

01:34:10

If you listen to his podcast at all, he has some really really successful smart people on his podcast

01:34:16

This is basically a couple page summary of each of those major interviews broken down into different categories like

01:34:22

finance success

01:34:25

fitness

01:34:26

and

01:34:28

Yeah, so I think that it's going to be an easy one to fill in the gap

01:34:31

But it will probably take me a very long time to get through it. Yeah

01:34:34

fun

01:34:35

So

01:34:36

If you're interested in having us read a specific book because obviously you can tell you know

01:34:41

We've got two more that we're getting ready to read for bookworm and then we're reading stuff outside of that

01:34:44

We go through a lot of books, but if you have one that you want to recommend that you want us to go through here on the podcast

01:34:50

You can do that over on our website. We mention it every time bookworm.fm

01:34:53

And you can find a button in the sidebar there and just hit recommend and send us what that book is and in the same place

01:35:00

You can also find a book list bookworm.fm/list if you want to go straight there

01:35:04

And it will give you a list of all the books that we have

01:35:07

Finished with the links to those episodes

01:35:10

Uh, and there's also all the amazon links out there as well

01:35:13

That's one way that you can support us is click on those links and we'll get a kick back from that

01:35:17

So if you want to support us, that's a great way to do it

01:35:19

But you can also see the full list of books there

01:35:21

Including all the ones that we have planned to to read in the near future and the ones that have been recommended already

01:35:28

You can also skip your Starbucks and go donate to joe so that he builds us that apple scre-

01:35:33

Yes, I'll put it in the show notes

01:35:35

We'd also appreciate it if you have a few minutes to go into itunes and leave a review for the show if you enjoy it

01:35:43

Even if you don't let us know what we can improve on we want to we want to make the show better

01:35:48

So let us know what you like what you don't like we take all of that feedback very seriously

01:35:53

Plus if you leave reviews it helps other people find out about the show

01:35:56

And coming up next we have the personal MBA as I mentioned so if you're interested in learning about

01:36:01

Business and getting a masters of business without going to school you can join us next time

01:36:06

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