What I've been reading in January 2024
Stoic discipline, American tycoons, rugged flexibility, and more.
I decided to change the name of the monthly books post.
I called them Bunch of Books before because I thought the alliteration was clever. But there’s something off with the word “bunch”. I don’t know—I feel books deserve better than being in bunches.
This title iteration is a nod to Jason Crawford’s What I’ve been reading posts, which are always a source of inspiration for me.
Discipline is Destiny by Ryan Holiday
Ryan’s The Obstacle is the Way and Ego is the Enemy are two of my favorite books, and were my introduction to Stoic philosophy.
In Discipline is Destiny, Ryan continues to explore Stoicism and how to apply it in the modern world. This time, via the concept of temperance, one of the four cardinal virtues of Stoic and other philosophies.
I wrote in the past about the value of discipline. What a better way to start the year than by reading a book all about it?
Ryan weaves together the stories of Lou Gehrig, Queen Elizabeth, Antoniuns Pius, George Washington, and other characters, using them as examples of discipline in the body, mind, and in relationships.
[Lou Gehrig] knew that getting comfortable was the enemy, and that success is an endless series of invitations to get comfortable.
It’s a good read from an author who has already proven to be a master of his genre. But I didn’t find it as fresh and eye-opening as Obstacle or Ego were. I don’t know if it’s because I was already familiar with some of the stories and ideas, or because I’ve been reading Ryan’s work for a while. Still, definitely worth your time.
Here’s one more quote from a passage on being disciplined as a core tenant of productivity:
Discipline isn’t just endurance and strength. It’s also finding the best, most economical way of doing something. It’s the commitment to evolving and improving so that the tasks get more efficient as you go. A true master isn’t just dominating their profession, they’re also doing it with ease . . . while everyone else is still huffing and puffing.
The Tycoons by Charles Morris
The book’s subtitle is How Andrew Carnegie, John D. Rockefeller, Jay Gould, and J. P. Morgan Invented the American Supereconomy but really, it is more a book about the American economic explosion than it is a biography of four of its protagonists.
It’s a fascinating and inspiring account of how American economy took off starting in the mid nineteenth century thanks to a coming together of mindset, territory, technological development, and dedication.
America was the only country where “worker” was a job description rather than a badge of class. Most Americans seem to have truly believed, just as Lincoln said they should, that their lives would get better, that there was no limit to the vistas to be opened by hard work and imagination.
Perhaps most important was a style of problem solving. The fact that Americans typically thought of machine solutions as a first recourse, an integral part of almost any production process, was a major factor in the seemingly effortless move up to manufacturing scales previously undreamed of.
The book is worth reading just to get to the final chapter, titled “The Wrong Lesson”. In there, you’ll find an account of how bad ideas such as scientific management and the disconnect between what was taught in business schools and the reality of technology-enabled and technology-producing businesses slowly resulted in American manufacturing loosing its edge and facing a “sweep-the-board triumph of Japanese companies in nearly every important mass-production industry.”
Master of Change by Brad Stulberg
Master of Change explores how to thrive in a world that does not and will not stop changing. What’s refreshing about it is that instead of suggesting hacks or branded frameworks, Brad shows how it’s all about learning to know yourself and appreciating the complexity of the reality around you.
One step in this journey is to engage in non-dual thinking.
Non-dual thinking recognizes that the world is complex, that much is nuanced, and that truth is often found in paradox: not this or that, but this and that.
One non-dual concept at the core of the book is that to become masters of change, we need to be both rugged and flexible. As Brad puts it:
The goal is not to be so rugged that you never change. The goal is not to be so flexible that you passively surrender to the whims of life. The goal is to marry these qualities—to develop a mindset and practice called rugged flexibility.
If you already read Brad’s previous book, The Practice of Groundedness, and you are in a rush, you might want to skip this one. They overlap quite a bit. Then again, the book is short and flows well. You could read it to reiterate useful concepts on resilience and growth.
Special Mention: Outlive by Peter Attia and How Not To Age by Dr. Michael Greger
I browsed these two tomes, dipping in and out to find inspiration and guidance on how nutrition and exercise intersect to improve life span and health span. The latter being a relatively new concept representing the length of time that the person is healthy — not just alive.
The two books share a focus on prevention over intervention. We have medicine and technologies that can treat many diseases. But, as the old saying goes, an ounce of prevention is worth a pound of cure.
Something I like about Outlive is that Attia doesn’t try to sell you a fully fledged framework — or, worse, a put you in a funnel for his exercise program — but rather brings to the table a number of concepts and tools everyone can use to develop a personalized plan.
As for How Not to Age, in the style of his nutritionfacts.org articles, Dr. Greger translates the latest research on nutrition in an understandable format.
“Longevity” has become quite trendy recently. I can’t help being skeptical, even when it comes to honest books like these two. After all, the only way to know if those recommendation work for you is to adopt them and live your life.
The only way to know if the advice in Outlive and How Not to Die works for a 30-something like myself, is to implement it… and check back in 70 years or so.
Then again, as Dr. Greger put it, we don’t need randomized control trials to show jumping off a plane with a parachute is safer than without one. We might not have solid data collected over decades, but you can’t go wrong eating healthy and exercising.
Fiction
I enjoyed Rivers of London by Ben Aaronovitch, in particular the structured approach to magic he devised. The protagonist finds a mentor and has to practice basic formae, which he can then learn to combine into more powerful spells.
The books is the first in a series. I’m curious to see how it continues, but not enough to have started the next title yet.
Kids
We’ve been enjoying reading The Baby Sitters Little Sister graphic novels. The colorful drawings and cartoonish expressions are great to hold the four-year-old attention for longer than the original chapter book version would.
During school holiday, we attended a play adaptation of one of the books in my son’s beloved Treehouse Series. It was great fun and a nice way to introduce kids to live performances.
Originally published on giolodi.com.