What You Will Learn

Seth Godin is back for round 2.  We drill into the choices we make - to take responsibility or relinquish it, to be generous or follow the script, to try something new or stick to the job description.  We also spoke about the importance of REAL skills (some people call them ‘soft skills’). 'Hard Skills’ are the essential ticket you need to get a seat at the table - for you it m...

Our world is filled with factories. Factories that make widgets, insurance, websites, movies, take care of sick people and answer the phone. You can become a great factory worker if you pay attention in school, follow instructions, show up on time and try hard and in return they would take care of you. You won't have to be brilliant, creative or to take big risks. The factories would pay you a lot...

The Power of Habit - by Charles Duhigg "Why we do what we do in life and business" William James wrote in 1892: "All of our life so far as it has definite form, is but a mass of habits". Most of the choices we make each day may feel like the products of well-considered decision making, but they're not - they're habits. Though each habit means very little on its own, over time, the meals we order,...

Mindset - by Dr Carol S Dweck 'Changing the way you think to fulfil your potential'   This book is about one pervasive view we adopt for ourselves and our abilities: we either have a 'fixed mindset' or a 'growth mindset'. Those with the fixed mindset believe that we have a natural level of talent or ability that we are born with and cannot change, whereas those with a growth mindset beli...

Emotional Intelligence - by Daniel Goleman 'Why it can matter more than IQ: The groundbreaking book that redefines what it means to be smart'   Emotional Intelligence is a guide to making sense of the senselessness. Daniel Goleman worked as a psychologist first then as a journalist for the NYT, and has been tracking the progress of our understanding of the realm of irrationality. From this positio...

This is Part 3 of our 3-part series on 'Mastery' by Robert Greene. Now that we've discovered our calling in part 1, then went through an apprenticeship in part 2, it's time to bring in creativity to make something new and original and masterful. Using historical examples, Greene gives us some strategies for developing something unique.  If you're just discovering this episode, you might want...

All of us are born with an essentially similar brain, with more or less the same configuration and potential for mastery. Why is it then that in history only a limited number of people seem to truly excel and realize this potential power? In today's episode we cover part 2 of our 3-part series, The Apprenticeship phase. We will learn about the 3 Modes of the Apprenticeship Phase, strategies for co...

Robert Greene has done it again with Mastery.  All of us are born with an essentially similar brain, with more or less the same configuration and potential for mastery. Why is it then that in history only a limited number of people seem to truly excel and realise this potential power? We are a one time phenomenon in the universe - our exact genetic makeup has never occurred before nor will it...

As we come to the end of another year of the podcast, we look back on our favourite books we've read this season (so far). As we do at the end of every year then again at the end of every season, we each look back and rank all of the books we read, compile our respective 'Top 10' lists, then share the biggest lessons we took from each book. This is a great way to get a taste of all of the books an...

The body is often likened to a machine. But it is much more than that, it works 24 hours a day for decades without for most part, needing regular servicing or the installation of spare parts. It runs on water and a few other organic compounds, is soft and rather lovely, reproduces itself with enthusiasm, feels affection and appreciates the sunset How many machines behave like that?   In this...

The book breaks down effective management through the tale of the 'One Minute Manager' through 3 simple secrets.   The First Secret - One Minute Goals   Most organisations when you ask people what they do and then ask their boss, normally you get two different lists.   Once the manager has told you what needs to be done, or you have agreed what needs to be done, each goal is recorde...

Ego Is The Enemy - by Ryan Holiday 'The fight to master our greatest opponent' All of us, at every stage of life, are the victims of our own ego. Our ego leads us to strive too far, expect too much, assume that we're deserving - all before we've even done the work. If we achieve success our ego makes us do things that lead us to failure, if we fail our ego crushes our attempts to get up and try ag...

Our third annual pilgrimage to Sydney took us right back to Dr Karl's office. His brand new book, Dr Karl's Random Road Trip Through Science, features an Augmented Reality app with Dr Karl popping out of the book to share his wealth of wisdom. (If you've been listening to the show for a few years, this is certainly 'breaking the script' and is a definite 'purple cow').  We talk about a bunch...

Eat That Frog! - by Brian Tracy '21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time' There is never enough time to do everything you have to do. You are literally swamped with work and personal responsibilities, endless emails, social media, projects, side projects, stacks of newspapers to read, a pile of books you want to get to 'some day' as soon as you get caught up on everyth...

Revealed how painfully burdened they feel by a sense of not being good enough. We don't have to wait until we are on our deathbed to realize what a waste of our precious lives it is to carry the belief that something is wrong with us. Yet because our habits of feeling so insufficient are so strong, awakening from the trance involves not only inner resolve, but also an active training of the heart...

After first speaking with Neil Pasricha 12 months ago about his book The Happiness Equation, he's back to chat about his brand new book You Are Awesome. It's all about building resilience, shifting from fragile to antifragile, and thickening up your skin a little.   Check out everything Neil is doing at his site: https://www.neil.blog/ Hosted on Acast. See acast.com/privacy for more informati...

Grit - by Angela Duckworth 'Why passion and resilience are the keys to success'   Angela Duckworth studied successful people and found that the mega-successful weren't the smartest, the fittest or the most talented, but the ones who had the most grit. Grit, this combination of passion and perseverance, turned out to be the strongest indicator and predicator of eventual success. The good news?...

Lurking behind the mystery of ancient ruins is the mystery with the nagging thought: might such a fate eventually befall our own wealthy society? Will tourists someday stare mystified at the New York skyscrapers, much as we stare at the jungle overgrown ruins of Maya cities?   Perhaps we can still learn from the past, but only if we think carefully about its lessons. The book has a 5 point fr...

MJ DeMarco writes some of the most eye-opening books we've read - The Millionaire Fastlane and Unscripted. If you haven't realised it yet, the world is ran by numerous scripts that aren't designed for you to live your best life. In this episode, we run the analogy of the red pill deep: breaking down the BS and biases we all hold, the importance of your F-This Event, and how you could use a job to...

Unscripted - by MJ DeMarco 'Life Liberty, and the Pursuit of Entrepreneurship'   Has life regressed into paying bills and living for a weekend? You weren't born to slave 9 - 5, Monday through Friday, paying the bills and then die. When life's final moment arrives, what will your spirit sing? Regret and remorse? Or peace and happiness? UNSCRIPTED: is your pen to rewrite a future that's already...

Daily life is full of negotiations that can drive you crazy. Over breakfast you get into an argument with your spouse about buying a new car, your spouse thinks it's time but you say "we can't afford that right now" You arrive at work for a meeting with your boss, you present her with a carefully prepared proposal for a new project, but she interrupts within the first minute and says "we already t...

How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big - by Scott Adams   Scott Adams is the creator of the 'Dilbert' cartoon series. Before this world-wide phenomenon though, Adams is happy to admit the looong list of things he tried (and failed at) before eventually achieving success. Each failed attempt gave him a lesson, something he could take with him and apply to the next thing he tri...

Everything is F*cked - by Mark Manson 'A book about hope'     In the infinite expanse of space/time, the universe does not care whether your mother's hip replacement goes well, or your kids attend college, or your boss thinks you make a great spreadsheet You care, and you desperately convince yourself that because you care, it all must have some great cosmic meaning behind it. You care b...

Meditations - by Marcus Aurelius   Originally written as a diary almost 2000 years ago, the struggles people faced then are almost identical to the ones we are facing today. This is one of the core books on stoic philosophy. We recap some of the vital passages of the book and pull out the key themes: differentiating between the things you can control and the things you can't, responsibility a...

Talking to Strangers - by Malcolm Gladwell 'What we should know about the people we don't know'   We think we can understand people. We think that by meeting someone, shaking their hand, looking into their eyes, we can get a grasp on who they are, how they feel, and what their motives or intentions are. We think that a little bit of personal knowledge gives us a big insight into their charact...