'How to Enjoy Your Life and Your Job', Dale Carnegie

Rating: 6.5/10

Overall Thoughts

Part One is essentially from Carnegie's book 'How to Stop Worrying and Start Living' whilst Parts Two, Three and Four are from 'How to Win Friends and Influence People'.  So if you have read either one of those books, this book will be relatively useless.  It is basically a condensed version of both books.  However if you have read neither, I do recommend picking up a copy of this book.

As I mentioned in one of my previous reviews, while 'How to Win Friends and Influence People' is well-researched and documented, some of the advice/tactics may come across as too manipulative to be applied ethically.  Religiously following the advice/tactics in Parts Two, Three and Four may possibly do more harm than good in the long run.   

Summary of 'How to Enjoy Your Life and Your Job'

Part One: Seven Ways to Peace and Happiness

1) Find Yourself and Be Yourself: Remember, There Is No One Else on Earth like You

• To cultivate a mental attitude that will bring us peace and freedom, remember not to imitate others.  

2) Four Good Working Habits That Will Help Prevent Fatigue and Worry

• Clear your desk of all papers except those relating to the immediate problem at hand.  
• Do things in the order of their importance.  
• When you face a problem, solve it then and there if you have the facts necessary to make a decision.  Don't keep putting off decisions.  
• Learn to organize, deputize, and supervise.  

3) What Makes You Tired and What You Can Do About It

• Worry, tenseness and emotional upsets are three of the biggest causes of fatigue.  Learn to relax while you are doing your work.  
• Work, as much as possible, in a comfortable position.  Remember that tensions on the body produces aching shoulders and nervous fatigue.  
• Check yourself four or five times a day, and say to yourself, "Am I making my work harder than it actually is?  Am I using muscles that have nothing to do with the work that I am doing?" 
• Test yourself at the end of the day, by asking yourself, "Just how tired am I?  If I am tired, it is not because of the mental work I have done but the way I have done it."  

4) How to Banish the Boredom That Produces Fatigue, Worry, and Resentment

• Our fatigue is often caused not by work, but by worry, frustration, and resentment.  We rarely get tired when we are doing something interesting and exciting.  
• If you act "as if" you are interested in your job, that bit of acting will tend to make your interest real.  It will also tend to decrease your fatigue, your tensions, and your worries.  
• By talking to yourself every hour of the day, you can direct yourself to think thoughts of courage and happiness, thoughts of power and peace.  
• By thinking the right thoughts, you can make any job less distasteful.  Keep reminding yourself that getting interested in your job will take your mind off your worries, and, in the long run, will probably bring promotion and increased pay.  Even if it doesn't do that, it will reduce fatigue to a minimum and help you enjoy your hours of leisure.  

5) Would You Take a Million Dollars for What You Have?

• About 90 per cent of the things in our lives are right and about 10 per cent are wrong.  If we want to be happy, all we have to do is concentrate on the 90 per cent that are right and ignore the 10 per cent that are wrong.  
• There are two things to aim at in life: first, to get what you want; and, after that, to enjoy it.  Only the wisest of mankind achieve the second.  
• Count you blessings, not your troubles.  

6) Remember That No One Ever Kicks a Dead Dog

• When you are kicked and criticized, remember that it is often done because it gives the kicker a feeling of importance.  It often means you are accomplishing something and are worthy of attention.  Many people get a sense of savage satisfaction out of denouncing those who are better educated than they are or more successful.  
• Remember that unjust criticism is often a disguised compliment.  

7) Do This and Criticism Can't Hurt You

• Never be bothered by what people say, as long as you know in your heart you are right.  

Part Two: Fundamental Techniques in Handling People

8) "If You Want to Gather Honey, Don't Kick Over the Beehive"

• 99 times out of 100, people don't criticize themselves for anything, no matter how wrong it may be.  Criticism is dangerous because it wounds a person's precious pride, hurts his sense of importance and arouses resentment.  
• Instead of condemning people, let's try to understand them.  Let's try to figure out why they do what they do.  That's a lot more profitable and intriguing than criticism; and it breeds sympathy, tolerance, and kindness.  

9) The Big Secret of Dealing with People

• Give honest and sincere appreciation.  
• Appreciation is sincere whilst flattery is insincere.  One comes from the heart out; the other from the teeth out.  One is unselfish; the other selfish.  One is universally admired; the other universally condemned.  
• In the long run, flattery will do you more harm than good.  Flattery is counterfeit, and like counterfeit money, it will eventually get you into trouble if you pass it to someone else.  

10) "He Who Can Do This Has the Whole World with Him.  He Who Cannot Walks a Lonely Way."

• Arouse in the other person an eager want.  
• Before you want to persuade somebody to do something, pause and ask yourself: "How can I make this person want to do it?"  
• If there is any one secret of success, it lies in the ability to get the other person's point of view and see things from that person's angle as well as from your own.  

11) Do This and You'll Be Welcome Anywhere

• Become genuinely interested in other people.  
• If we want to make friends, let's put ourselves out to do things for other people - things that require time, energy, unselfishness and thoughtfulness.  
• If you want others to like you, if you want to develop real friendships, if you want to help others at the same time as you help yourself, keep this principle in mind.  

12) How to Make People Like You Instantly

• Make the other person feel important and do it sincerely.  
• How? When? Where?  The answer is: All the time, everywhere.  
• The unvarnished truth is that almost all the people you meet feel themselves superior to you in some way, and a sure way to their hearts is to let them realize in a subtle way that you recognize their importance, and recognize it sincerely.  

Part Three: Ways to Win People to Your Way of Thinking

13) A Sure Way of Making Enemies and How to Avoid It

• Show respect for the other person's opinions; never begin by announcing "I am going to prove so-and-so to you."  That's tantamount to saying "I'm smarter than you are.  I'm going to tell you a thing or two and make you change your mind."  It arouses opposition and makes the listener want to battle with you before you even start.  
• If you are going to prove anything, don't let anybody know it.  Do it so subtly, so adroitly, that no one will feel you are doing it.  
• You will never get into trouble by admitting that you may be wrong.  That will stop all argument and inspire your opponent to be just and fair and open and broad-minded as you are.  It will make him want to admit that, he, too, may be wrong.  

14) The High Road to Reason

• Begin in a friendly way. 
• Scolding parents and domineering bosses and husbands and nagging wives ought to realize that people don't want to change their minds.  They can't be forced or driven to agree with you or me.  But they may possibly be led to, if we are gentle and friendly, ever so gentle and ever so friendly.  

15) The Secret of Socrates

• In talking with people, don't begin by discussing the things on which you differ.  Begin by emphasizing - and keep on emphasizing - the things on which you agree.  Keep emphasizing, if possible, that you are both striving for the same end and that your only difference is one of method and not of purpose.  
• The more "Yeses" we can, at the very outset, induce, the more likely we are to succeed in capturing the attention for our ultimate proposal.  
• It doesn't pay to argue; it is much more profitable and much more interesting to look at things from the other person's viewpoint and try to get that person saying 'yes, yes'.  

16) How to Get Cooperation

• Let the other person feel that the idea is his or hers.  
• It is wiser to make suggestions and let the other person think about the conclusion, rather than trying to ram your opinions down the throats of other people.  

17) An Appeal That Everybody Likes

• All people you meet have a high regard for themselves and like to be fine and unselfish in their own estimation.  
• All of us, being idealists at heart, like to think of motives that sound good.  So, in order to change people, appeal to the nobler motives.  

Part Four: Ways to Change People Without Giving Offense or Arousing Resentment

18) How to Criticize and Not Be Hated for It

• Calling attention to one's mistakes indirectly works wonders with sensitive people who may resent bitterly any direct criticism.  

19) Talk About Your Own Mistakes First

• Talk about your own mistakes before criticizing the other person.  Admitting one's own mistakes - even when one hasn't corrected them - can help convince somebody to change his behaviour.  

20) No One Likes to Take Orders

• Asking questions not only makes an order more palatable; it often stimulates the creativity of the persons whom you ask.  People are more likely to accept an order if they have had a part in the decision that caused the order to be issued.

21) Let the Other Person Save Face

• Even if we are right and the other person is definitely wrong, we only destroy ego by causing someone to lose face.  

'The Art of Thinking Clearly', Rolf Dobelli

Rating: 3/10

Overall Thoughts

The Art of Thinking Clearly?  International bestseller?  I don't think so.  Alas, I fell victim to the phrase 'never judge a book by its cover'; clearly the seemingly attractive front cover gave this book an aura of credibility it does not deserve.  The title itself is misleading since this is not a self-help book containing advise on 'clear thinking'.

This book consists of 99 short chapters which mainly discusses psychological findings of other individuals/sources and comprises of illustrations which are primarily related to the medical or investment/business industry, which is clearly not relatable to most people, myself included.   Further, 3 pages per chapter is barely sufficient to critically discuss a concept/subject.  This book lacks  central argument, and is essentially a list of cognitive biases with bare descriptions.

Instead of helping me shape my thinking and decision-making process, this book has done the exact opposite.  Truth be told, I did not take away any useful information/tips from this book.  It was a definite struggle to actually finish the entire book.

Summary of 'The Art of Thinking Clearly'

• In daily life, because triumph is made more visible than failure, people systematically overestimate their chances of succeeding.  Guard against it by frequently visiting the graves of once promising projects, investments and careers.  
• Rational decision making requires you to forget about the costs incurred to date.  No matter how much you have already invested, only your assessment of the future costs and benefits counts.  
• Whenever you hear a story, ask yourself: Who is the sender, what are his intentions, and what did he hide under the rug?  The real issue with stories: They give us a false sense of understanding, which inevitably leads us to take bigger risks and urges us to take a stroll on thin ice.  
• Do you have everything under control?  Probably less than you think.  Focus on the few things of importance that you can really influence.  For everything else: Que sera, sera.  
• If you want to convince someone about something, don't focus on the advantages; instead highlight how it helps them dodge the disadvantages.  
• Forget trying to amass all the data.  Do your best to get by with the bare facts.  It will help you make better decisions.  Superfluous knowledge is worthless, whether you know it or not.  
• Raise expectations for yourself and for the people you love.  This increases motivation.  At the same time, lower expectations for things you cannot control.  
• We make complex decisions by consulting our feelings, not our thoughts.  Against our best intentions, we substitute the question. "What do I think about this?" with "How do I feel about this?"  
• First and last impressions dominate, meaning the content sandwiched between has only a weak influence.  Try to avoid evaluations based on first impressions.  Try to assess all aspects impartially.  
• When do you listen to your head and when do you heed your gut?  A rule of thumb might be: If it is something to do with practical activities, such as motor skills or questions you've answered a thousand times, it's better not to reflect to the last detail.  It undermines your intuitive ability to solve problems.  

'Kafka on the Shore', Haruki Murakami

Rating: 7/10

Overall Thoughts

'Kafka on the Shore' hinges on the boundaries of what exists around the characters versus what exists in their minds.  The story follows a damaged fifteen year-old boy named Kafka Tamura who runs away from home and eventually finds shelter in a privately owned public library in Takamatsu, as well as an illiterate old-man named Nakata whose mind was entirely erased as a child due to a mysterious event which occurred during World War II.  One person is running away from something, the other searching; one looking forward, the other looking back; one with a bright future, the other with a dark past.  Two very different individuals, yet their fates are somehow intertwined in their journey of self-discovery.  

Murakami definitely has a wonderfully strange and unique storytelling ability.  Reading this novel left me with a lot of unanswered questions (in a good way).  The flow of the storyline is made up of a patchwork of unrelated scenes and conversations - some brutal, some chaotic, and others beautiful -  which is loosely tied together at the end.  You would have to read one of his novels to fully appreciate his talent. 

Favourites from 'Kafka on the Shore'

"I felt utterly alone, like I was the last person alive on Earth.  I can't describe that feeling of total loneliness.  I just wanted to disappear into thin air and not think about anything."  

"You're going to be okay, I tell myself, taking a deep breath.  All you can do is forge on ahead."  

"All I know is I'm totally alone.  Alone in an unfamiliar place, like some solitary explorer who's lost his compass and his map.  Is this what it means to be free?"

"I remember her smell, her touch, but not her face."  

"... it feels like everything's been decided in advance - that I'm following a path somebody else has already mapped out for me.  It doesn't matter how much I think things over, how much effort I put into it.  In fact, the harder I try, the more I lose sense of who I am."  

"Man doesn't choose fate.  Fate chooses man."  

"She's so perfect I know she can't be real.  She's like a person who stepped right out of a dream."  

"The darkness in the outside world has vanished, but the darkness in our hearts remains, virtually unchanged.  Just like an iceberg, what we label the ego or consciousness is, for the most part, sunk in darkness."  

"As long as there's such a thing as time, everybody's damaged in the end, changed into something else."  

"If she never came back everything would be lost to me forever.  All meaning, all direction.  Everything.  I know this, but I go ahead and risk it anyway, and call her name."  

"There's a void inside me, a blank that's slowly expanding, devouring what's left of who I am.  I can hear it happening.  I'm totally lost, my identity dying,"  

"Memories warm you up from the inside.  But they also tear you apart."  

"If you remember me, then I don't care if anyone else forgets."  

"Time weighs down on you like an old, ambiguous dream.  You keep on moving, trying to slip through it.  But even if you go to the ends of the earth, you won't be able to escape it.  Still, you have to go there - to the edge of the world.  There's something you can't do unless you get there."