Category: books

In my last day in Argentine last year, I bought a small book from Borges as I wanted some memory of my trip. I think it is poetry but I dont understand it. I have never been able to read poetry, even in my mother tongue.

The book contains “Fervor de Buenos Aires”, “Luna de enfrente” and “Cuaderno San Martin”.

Maybe once day i will be able to capture the beauty of this type of literature. As a teenager, I remember one teacher explaining us some poems from Pedro Salina’s “La voz a ti debia” And it was really nice, I still go the book, pending to read it…. nearly 30y in the waiting 🙂

I guess I am bit obsessed with personal performance, how to make more and better in the same or less amount of time. And this is another book about the subject. I read it as ebook so didn’t take notes.

Although the main topic is how to focus and make the most of it, the second part is about “scatterfocus” that was unexpected.

Focus produces, scatter invents/solves. They follow different steps to achieve that state.

And I think focus is gold. Difficult to focus with so much distraction everywhere. I like to work in the office… because it is mainly empty and I have few distractions there but looks like everything is about attention. It is the real commodity. Everybody is fighting for it. So you have to look after it.

There is nothing revolutionary for getting focus, and that is a good thing. I like the emphasis in meditation. Be sure you look after your body: good sleep, exercise, proper food, and be sure you have a limited time to be real focus per day so make it count.

For scatterfocus, it is as easy as going for a walk without nothing really in mind, let the mind wander and think in things and problems. These are the moments when most eureka bursts happen.

Need to read it again.

I completed last week the third part of the Three Body Problem trilogy. It was interesting but in this part things got wild! Every twist caught me out of guard. The physics got me lost most of the time (3D vs 4D, etc). But I like how Trisolarians learnt to lie and play long term. How reaching light speed was the proper solution and the most important thing: humans in a spaceship disconnected from Earth, took them 5 minutes to reach Totalitarianism. And all the theories about the Dark Forest hypothesis (Fermi Paradox), deterrence, and something a bit less sci-fi.

Destroying Earth using a 2D plane that sucks the surrounding 3D… but that would suck the whole universe… but that is a good tactic if you can live in 2D… not sure if that was a superior tactic to defeat your adversaries in the dark forest?

This is an ebook about personal performance. You dont need the genetics, attend the best school, come from money, etc to be great. In many areas, the most successful individual were not prodigies. Although we have a lot of literature highlighting being a prodigy was the source of everything else. The book gives plenty of examples to contradice that. And this is a great example: Raging Rooks

With the right opportunity and motivation to learn, anyone can build the skills to achieve greater things. Potential is not a matter of where you start, but of how far you travel. The “soft” skill/qualities underrated: proactive, prosocial, disciplined, determined are more important that maths or reading skills.

Character: It is a learned capacity to live by your principles. It is how you show up on a hard day. Being comfortable being uncomfortable.

Character skills predict and produce success in life.

Then you need to the scaffolding to maintain those character skills when things dont go well (it will happen) Those structures will sustain your motivation. He puts the example of the Chilean mining accident in 2010 about the importance of “teaming”. It shows why intelligence agencies failed in early 2000 attacks

Finally, the book talks about building systems to expand opportunity. And the best example is the Finnish education system.

I will have to read it again (in paper)

To be honest, I struggled with this ebook. It is about spirituality without religion, the connection of consciousness and our brain (interesting the cases when people got removed something the brain hemispheres got disconnected), false gurus (you can apply this to many env in life: sport, work, etc), next-death-experiences, enlightenment and the use of psychedelics to open your mind.

This is an ebook about how to deal with life. Every person has its rules for living and I have read several book about rules so it is always interesting to see/read the different points of view from very different people.

This case is from a USA Seal and Admiral. Actually, I watched this video before buying the book. And hits your.

1- Start your day with a task completed: Make your bed to perfection. If you can’t make the little things right, you will never be able to do the big things right.

2- You can’t go it alone: You can’t paddle the boat (life) alone. Find someone to share your life with (struggling with this), make as many friends as possible (idem) and never forget that your success depends on others.

3- It’s not the size of your flippers that count, just the size of your heart matters: There is more in life that physical attributes.

4- Life is not fair, deal with it: The common people and the great men and women are all defined by how they deal with the life’s unfairness.

5- Failure can make you stronger: True leaders must learn from their failures, use the lessons to motivate themselves and not be afraid to try again or make the next tough decision (You will always make it to the Circus at some point)

6- You must date greatly: Without pushing your limits, without occasionally sliding down the rope headfirst, without daring greatly, you will never know what you are truly capable for.

7- Stand up to the bullies: Courage is within all of us. Dig deep.

8- Rise to the occasion: If you want to change the world, be your very best in the darkest moments.

9- Give people hope: If you want to change the world, start singing when you are up to your neck in mud. Like this. Lift up those around you and give them hope that tomorrow will be a better day.

10- Never, ever quit: This is the summary for all the above. If you refuse to give up on your dreams, stand tall and strong against the odds, then life will be what you make of it.