Principles by Ray Dalio changed my life and really helped me better understand that inwardly looking at and analyzing my emotional responses to problems at work and home set me up for failure and since reading it I've had such profound clarity of thought. I recommend that book to literally everyone.
Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
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Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#12The Gulag Archipelago by Alexander Solzhenitsyn. Literally destroyed left wing politics in my mind.
The whole left/right dichotomy is a bugaboo.
Politics is the continual friction between individuals and various groupings of people.
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#13On The Shortness of Life by Seneca.[1]
Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl is also excellent.[2]
[1] - https://tripinsurancestore.com/4/on-the-shortness-of-life.pd...
[2] - https://www.amazon.com/Mans-Search-Meaning-Viktor-Frankl/dp/...
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#14The Forum on KQED (radio) had a great program on this very topic — best books of the decade, with a broad set of recommendations by panelists and callers.
Website link below has whole program for listening (I recommend), as well as a published list of all recommendations:
https://www.kqed.org/forum/2010101874704/tell-us-your-favori...
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#15Probably Robert Anton Wilson’s Cosmic Trigger or Prometheus Rising back in 2010. The “reality tunnel” concept has defined much of my personal and intellectual exploration of the past 10 years.
“ When we meet somebody whose separate tunnel-reality is obviously far different from ours, we are a bit frightened and always disoriented. We tend to think they are mad, or that they are crooks trying to con us in some way, or that they are hoaxers playing a joke. Yet it is neurologically obvious that no two brains have the same genetically-programmed hard wiring, the same imprints, the same conditioning, the same learning experiences. We are all living in separate realities. That is why communication fails so often, and misunderstandings and resentments are so common. I say "meow" and you say "Bow-wow," and each of us is convinced the other is a bit dumb.”
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#16The Black Swan by Taleb and Thinking, Fast and Slow by Kahneman are two books that pretty much completely changed how I view the world, and have made me much happier as a direct result.
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#17- Orhan Pamuk - My Name is Red (Nobel Prize Winner, 2006)
- Daniel J. Levitin - Organized Mind
- Shunryu Suzuki - Zen Mind, Beginner's Mind
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#18On The Shortness of Life by Seneca.[1] Man's Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl is also excellent.[2] [1] - https://tripinsurancestore.com/4/on-the-shortness-of-life.pd... [2] - https://www.amazon.com/Mans-Search-Meaning-Viktor-Frankl/dp/...
It seems Frankl has been somewhat exposed/debunked. I loved his book too as a teenager; it pained me to read sources mentioned on his wikipedia page. Would you believe he was at Auschwitz for only a few days, performed medical experiments on Jews himself, and it appears his main thesis about attitude mattering above all else for survival in the camps is simply false.
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#19* The Brain by David Eagleman
* Steppenwolf by Herman Hesse
* A Universe From Nothing by Lawrence Krauss
Re: Ask HN: Best books you read in the past decade?
#20Wisdom Sits in Places by Keith Basso.
If anyone knows similar books, please please point me to them.