Difficulty: can't write 'Bible' 'Koran' or 'Torah'
Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
1–10 of 31 posts
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#2On Being Free by Frithjof Bergmann changed my perspective on what work should be for an individual in a society. It's not very analytically heavy and is definitely a great read. I also met him and what he is doing around the world is pretty amazing.
I still remember how he told me in 2005-06 that 3d printing is going to usher in a whole new idea of what work should actually be. I was a engineering student at the time, quite obsessed with the room-sized 3d printer and could not fathom exactly how that would happen. Well I guess it is starting to at least.
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#3The Alchemist was a really interesting read. I would recommend. It allows you to reflect a lot.
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#4Siddhartha
The Alchemist
Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance
How to Win Friends and Influence People
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#5The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. He is some weird combination of crazy person, scummy used-car salesman, and genius. The best idea from the book is his "dreamline" idea, and I have been doing it since around 2009. It really helps you focus your effort, and get rid of tasks that don't accomplish your goals.
[And from your Jahreslisten: the Bible.]
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#6The Black Swan (anything by Taleb really), Meditations by Marcus Aurelius, Letters from a Stoic by Seneca, Epictetus' Discourses, Fish that ate the whale by Rich Cohen, Man's Search for Meaning, Titan, Principles by Ray Dalio (not really a book, but really worth reading, plus it's free), 4HW by Tim Ferris, The Strategy Paradox.
Also Teddy Roosevelt's biography has been very influential.
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#7Quantum Healing
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#8Knuth's "The Art of Computer Programming" - linked lists, state machines.
Carlos Castenada's Don Juan series (yes, I know it was fiction) - "one has no choice but to believe. What matters is what you believe".
John C. Lilly's "Center of the Cyclone".
These three, all around early-mid 70's, ended up moving me from the UK to Los Angeles. Strangely, each adds a different understanding to the others. Together, I guess it just makes me a bit strange. But it works.
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#9ActionScript programming (2004?). My first programming book. Why ActionScript? I can't remember. But being introduced to OOP in my early teen years was fuuun.
Re: Ask: Read a book that changed your life? Title?
#10The 4-Hour Workweek by Timothy Ferriss. He is some weird combination of crazy person, scummy used-car salesman, and genius. The best idea from the book is his "dreamline" idea, and I have been doing it since around 2009. It really helps you focus your effort, and get rid of tasks that don't accomplish your goals. [And from your Jahreslisten: the Bible.]
I know you mentioned that he's part scummy, used car salesman, but when does that part go away? You really shouldn't open a book that you actually want people to finish with 50 pages of boasting about how naturally awesome you are at literally everything, and how your life is a perpetual cycle of falling ass-backwards into giant piles of money and women. There are actually a ton of books that start like this and most of them don't contain anything of value, so I assumed that this one was the same.
Seriously though, does it get any better?