A Technique for Producing Ideas
In the foreword to James Webb Young’s book, A Technique for Producing Ideas, Keith Reinhard asks, “How can a book first published in the 1940s be important to today’s creative people …
Books
Education is a Priceless Opportunity to Furnish Your Mind and Enrich Your Life
The more I dig into Ogilvy the more curious I get. How could you not fall in love with a man who wrote, “We have a habit of divine discontent with our performance. It is an antidote to …
66 Personal Development Habits For Smart People
Steve Pavlina’s book, Personal Development for Smart People: The Conscious Pursuit of Personal Growth, offers an interesting look at self-improvement. “Perception is the most basic aspect …
The Laws of Simplicity
“Simplicity is about subtracting the obvious, and adding the meaningful.” John Maeda is a graphic designer and computer scientist. His book, The Laws of Simplicity, proposes ten laws for …
Robert Oppenheimer And The Shape of Genius
Freeman Dyson reviews the new biography of Oppenheimer by Ray Monk: The subtitle, “A Life Inside the Center,” calls attention to a rarer skill in which Oppenheimer excelled. He had a unique ability to …
Peak Listening — A Simple Trick You Can Apply Today
I thought this excerpt from The Plateau Effect: Getting from Stuck to Success was worth thinking about. If you try to improve your listening skills, you’ll notice a lot of discussion about “listening …
Eight Books Bill Gates Is Reading This Summer
Much like last year, the 2013 edition of Bill Gates summer reading list is full of interesting non-fiction. 1. The World Until Yesterday: What Can We Learn from Traditional Societies? Gates writes: …
Elements of Effective Thinking
Do you want to come up with more imaginative ideas? Do you stumble with complicated problems? Do you want to find new ways to confront challenges? Of course, you do. So do I. But when is the last time …
Understanding Our Need for Novelty and Change
In New: Understanding Our Need for Novelty and Change, Winifred Gallagher writes: [O]ur fast-paced world invites us to see ourselves in yet another light—this time as nature’s virtuosos of …
What Makes You Happy?
Aristotle came to the conclusion that what a person wants more than anything else is to be happy. But what makes us happy? Is it that next vacation? A new car? A promotion? In 1961, the US …
Ten Techniques To (Quickly) Build Trust With Anyone
I’m not sure how I came across Robin Dreeke’s It’s Not All About Me: Ten Techniques for Building Quick Rapport With Anyone, but I’m glad I did. Robin is the former lead …
There is No Such Thing as Information Overload
Just as too much junk food can lead to obesity, too much information consumption can lead to stupidity. Clay Johnson’s book, The Information Diet, shows you how to thrive in this information …
Karl Pillemer, Interview No. 2
Karl Pillemer is the author of 30 Lessons for Living: Tried and True Advice from the Wisest Americans. I posted some of the key lessons from his book last week. As part of my ongoing series of …
The Art of Reading: Analytical Reading
Analytical reading is the fourth part in my series on ways to improve our reading skills. The first rule of analytical reading is that you must know what kind of book you are reading. Are you reading …
The Seductive Appeal of Mindless Neuroscience
We believe that the fMRI can help us explain everything subjective. The problem is that brain imaging cannot explain everything — at least not yet. *** No doubt you’ve seen the clickbait: this …
Daniel Dennett: Intuition Pumps and Other Tools for Thinking
After reading How to Make Mistakes and How to Criticize with Kindness, a reader sent in a link to this video of Philosopher Daniel Dennett speaking at Google. Dennett is the author of the faboulous …