Books That Changed My Life
“A reader lives a thousand lives before he dies. The man who never reads lives only one.” — George R.R. Martin
I was not born a reader.
I just loved bedtime stories with big colourful pictures and wild adventures. I remembered that thing all teachers did. They’d lick their fingers and take their sweet, sweet time turning each and every page.
Everything changed in fourth grade. My English teacher slipped a book into my chubby little fingers — The Lion, the Witch and the Wardrobe by C.S Lewis. I was spellbound, captivated by a world of magic and storytelling.
I read, read and read. I walked into trees, stepped in countless dog-poop and was rewarded detention for reading in maths class. I knew the books would always be there for me. They taught me so much about empathy, love, laughter, death, suffering and hope. I still have so much to learn.
May these books guide you as they’ve guided me.
Safe travels,
— JJ
“The Alchemist” by Paulo Coelho
A courageous parable reminding us that the simple things are the most extraordinary and only the wise can see them.
The Alchemist tells the tale of a young shepherd boy named Santiago as he leaves everything he knows in pursuit of his Personal Legend.
I first read The Alchemist in ninth grade. Things weren’t going well in my family life. I felt helpless, hopeless and alone until a friend suggested this book. I devoured it in one sitting. A gazillion reads later and there’s still something to learn on every page.
“There is only one thing that makes a dream impossible to achieve: the fear of failure.”
— Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist”
The fear of failure is pure poison. It’s conditioned into us when we are young and wobbly, before we know any better. We confuse our self-worth with the outcome of our work. If our work isn’t up to scratch, it’s not because we’re losers doomed for a boulevard of broken dreams.
No, the work just wasn’t good enough — nothing personal.
Fear of failure is egotistical. It’s a self defence mechanism we adopt to protect ourselves from criticism and the harsh words of others.
The cure is simple but not easy.
“Tell your heart that the fear of suffering is worse than the suffering itself. And that no heart has ever suffered when it goes in search of its dreams, because every second of the search is a second’s encounter with God and with eternity.”
— Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist”
You are not defined by what you do. You simply are, and that’s okay.
Failure is an illusion — it is part of the process toward success. Anybody who pursues their dreams encounter failure at one point or another. It is necessary and unavoidable.
Failure is a terrible experience but a wonderful teacher.
Think of all the times you’ve failed. Look around, you’re still here! Learn to embrace failure without judging. Nothing in life is good or bad. It just is. You either win or you learn. So really, you win either way.
“One is loved because one is loved. No reason is needed for loving.”
— Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist”
Love is unconditional. It is a verb and action, not a noun or thing.
I used to think love was transactional — love had a price. I remember hearing “there’s no free lunch” as a kid and I thought that applied to love as well. Maybe people only loved you if you behaved well. Maybe they only loved you if you were good at doing the thing or you were wealthy, popular and powerful.
I was wrong.
Even now I am still learning how love can be given with no strings attached. Love is a redeeming force. It reminds us that there is still magic and wonder on Earth. Why do our mothers love us and accept us even when we’re little shitheads? I have no answer to that.
“The secret of life, though, is to fall seven times and to get up eight times.”
— Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist”
Perseverance is the key to living well. Life continually test us. Don’t think you’re some special snowflake that will breeze by with your intelligence and charm. No matter how smart or prepared you think you may be, you’ll fall flat on your face time and time again. Are you willing to keep going?
“Before a dream is realized, the Soul of the World tests everything that was learned along the way. It does this not because it is evil, but so that we can, in addition to realizing our dreams, master the lessons we’ve learned as we’ve moved toward that dream.
That’s the point at which most people give up.
It’s the point at which, as we say in the language of the desert, one ‘dies of thirst just when the palm trees have appeared on the horizon.’”
— Paulo Coelho, “The Alchemist”
Our darkest moments contain the seed for our greatest victories. These ordeals are vital moments that make life beautiful and worthwhile. When everything seems hopeless, when nothing works and you’re on the cusp of throwing it all away… that’s the moment when you’re a knife’s edge away from realizing your dream.
Will you give up or step up?
“Man’s Search for Meaning” by Viktor E. Frankl
A true story exploring how we can find strength, meaning and purpose in the midst of living hell.
Man’s Search for Meaning recounts psychiatrist Viktor Frankl’s real-life experiences as an Auschwitz concentration camp inmate during the Holocaust. Frankl wondered why some inmates found the strength to survive while others gave up, despite everybody facing the same hardships.
“Those who have a “why” to live, can bear with almost any “how”.
— Viktor Frankl, “Man’s Search for Meaning”
Frankl theorized that the purpose of life lies in the pursuit of meaning. These ideas later become the foundation for Logotherapy:
1. Life has meaning under all circumstances, even the most miserable ones.
2. Our main motivation for living is our will to find meaning in life.
3. We have freedom to find meaning in what we do, and what we experience, or at least in the stance we take when faced with a situation of unchangeable suffering.
— Viktor Frankl, “ Logotherapy”
Frankl hypothesizes that people kill themselves because they believe life is meaningless. Understanding that we can find meaning no matter our circumstance allows us to find purpose in every situation.
Frankl observed that your chances of surviving the concentration camps increased if you believed your suffering was meaningful. Religious people and those who thought positively about the future bore their sufferings better than inmates who found their situation helpless, hopeless and meaningless.
“When we are no longer able to change a situation, we are challenged to change ourselves.”
— Viktor Frankl, “Man’s Search for Meaning”
The ideas expressed in Man’s Search for Meaning echo the teachings of both Stoic and Taoist schools of thought. All three ideologies say we suffer because we choose to act against nature and deny reality. The first step to happiness is to accept whatever happens as fact, without judgment.
We can’t use wishful thinking to banish bad things from happening. What we can do is accept the situation and then observe whether we can change ourselves internally (our attitudes) or externally (our actions) to make the situation better.
“Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances, to choose one’s own way.”
— Viktor Frankl, “Man’s Search for Meaning”
Our ability to choose our attitude toward any situation is the source of our greatest freedom and power. When suffering is painful and suffer-able, our attitude gives us the strength to persevere. When suffering is painful and unsufferable, our attitude gives us the strength to persevere until we cannot physically do so — and then it won’t matter cause we’ll be dead and set free.
“Don’t aim at success. The more you aim at it and make it a target, the more you are going to miss it. For success, like happiness, cannot be pursued; it must ensue, and it only does so as the unintended side effect of one’s personal dedication to a cause greater than oneself or as the by-product of one’s surrender to a person other than oneself.
Happiness must happen, and the same holds for success: you have to let it happen by not caring about it.
I want you to listen to what your conscience commands you to do and go on to carry it out to the best of your knowledge. Then you will live to see that in the long-run — in the long-run, I say! — success will follow you precisely because you had forgotten to think about it.”
— Viktor Frankl, “Man’s Search for Meaning”
Engage fully yet release yourself from outcomes. By focusing on happiness or success, you forget that both are side-effects of service to a worthy cause. Do not seek happiness or success for its own sake because you’ll never find it that way. Happiness and success are by-products of work, not rewards in and of themselves.
“A human being is not one thing among others; things determine each other, but man is ultimately self-determining. What he becomes — within the limits of endowment and environment — he has made out of himself.
In the concentration camps, for example, in this living laboratory and on this testing ground, we watched and witnessed some of our comrades behave like swine while others behaved like saints. Man has both potentialities within himself; which one is actualized depends on decisions but not on conditions.”
— Viktor Frankl, “Man’s Search for Meaning”
“The War of Art” by Steven Pressfield
You have permission to suck. All artists think they’re frauds. Will you avoid creating or will you get to work?
The War of Art taught me that art is work.
All art is work, just as all work is art. Why can’t we approach our art with the same professionalism we display at our jobs?
Show up and put in the work, every single day. All artists suffer and battle Resistance daily. We find excuses not to create. Like the fable of the tortoise and the hare, consistency and perseverance is the name of the game. Don’t buy into the myth of inspired magic.
A little poop each day. That’s how great art is made.
“How many pages have I produced? I don’t care. Are they any good? I don’t even think about it. All that matters is I’ve put in my time and hit it with all I’ve got.
All that counts is that, for this day, for this session, I have overcome resistance.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Write as fast as the gingerbread man runs. If you’re writing, just write — Don’t edit. Editing comes later. Don’t judge yourself either.
Sit down, take a deep breath and get started.
“We don’t tell ourselves, “I’m never going to write my symphony.”
Instead we say, “I am going to write my symphony; I’m just going to start tomorrow.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Procrastination is the killer of dreams. Nobody wants to admit that they’re a quitter. We sugar-coat our shortcomings by saying we’ll do the thing another day. It’s easy to confuse “wanting to do something” with “actually doing it”. How many times have you said “I’ll do the thing someday” and never followed through?
“I write only when inspiration strikes,” he replied. “Fortunately it strikes every morning at nine o’clock sharp.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Structures, habits and routines frees us to focus on our art. I used to think they hinder us from creating.
I was wrong.
When you craft routines that promote focus and deliberate practice, you free yourself to be more creative. You no longer waste precious brain power on decision fatigue or analysis paralysis.
Think about a restaurant menu with a thousand items versus a menu with three. Which would be easier to pick from?
Like a simple menu, structures allow us to spend less time choosing and more time enjoying our meal.
“Are you paralyzed with fear? That’s a good sign… The more scared we are of a work or calling, the more sure we can be that we have to do it.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Throw away your fairy-tales about inspired artists!
Everybody experiences fear and everybody feels self-doubt. It’s okay to be human. Don’t let yourself use fear as an excuse not to do something, because you’ll only harm yourself in the end. Since everybody feels fear, you can’t say “oh, I’m not a real artist, they’re different because they’re talented”.
Stop making excuses. Work on your craft and commit to your art.
“The artist committing himself to his calling has volunteered for hell, whether he knows it or not. He will be dining for the duration on a diet of isolation, rejection, self-doubt, despair, ridicule, contempt, and humiliation.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Once you’re committed, the real fun begins. This stage lasts from the moment you start to the end of your life. It involves a lot of self-doubt, pain and suffering. Yes, that’s a lot of suffering. Please learn to enjoy it.
“The artist must be like that marine. He has to know how to be miserable. He has to love being miserable.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Embrace the suck, it’ll be there rain or shine.
“The opposite of love isn’t hate; it’s indifference.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Sometimes you’ll want to give up. There will be many days when nothing you do works and you’re drowning in self-doubt. You’ll think silly thoughts like maybe you don’t deserve to be an artist.
Breathe, take a long, multi-hour walk like Beethoven, or stand naked, open the windows and have an “air bath” a la Benjamin Franklin.
It’s okay to experience negative emotions. It’s important to recognize that life is not always soft swirls and rainbow sparkles. Even McDonalds has a broken ice-cream machine 99.99% of the time.
Don’t give up when you feel frustrated. Breathe, take a step back.
Then get to work.
“Resistance knows that the amateur composer will never write his symphony because he is overly invested in its success and over terrified of its failure. The amateur takes it so seriously it paralyzes him.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
We’re all going to die some day. Take it easy, it’s just life.
“So you’re taking a few blows. That’s the price for being in the arena and not on the sidelines. Stop complaining and be grateful.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Would you rather live life or watch it pass on by? This is a choice you must make for yourself. Remember Theodore Roosevelt in 1910?
“It is not the critic who counts; not the man who points out how the strong man stumbles, or where the doer of deeds could have done them better.
The credit belongs to the man who is actually in the arena, whose face is marred by dust and sweat and blood; who strives valiantly; who errs, who comes short again and again, because there is no effort without error and shortcoming; but who does actually strive to do the deeds; who knows great enthusiasms, the great devotions; who spends himself in a worthy cause; who at the best knows in the end the triumph of high achievement, and who at the worst, if he fails, at least fails while daring greatly, so that his place shall never be with those cold and timid souls who neither know victory nor defeat.”
— U.S. President Theodore Roosevelt, “Citizenship in a Republic”
Better to have fought in the arena of life than to experience nothing at all. Not choosing is also a choice. Time waits for nobody, and we’re all mortal after all.
“The professional cannot allow the actions of others to define his reality. Tomorrow morning the critic will be gone, but the writer will still be there facing the blank page. Nothing matters but that he keep writing.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
People will say the darnedest things about your work. Smile and wave, because it’s a blessing anyone bothered. Give thanks for all your haters, learn what you can and try your best the next day.
Recall Neil Gaiman’s wise words, “when people tell you something’s wrong or doesn’t work for them, they are almost always right. When they tell you exactly what they think is wrong and how to fix it, they are almost always wrong.”
“The danger is greatest when the finish line is in sight.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
Like in Paulo Coelho’s The Alchemist, Pressfield warns us that we are most tempted to give up right before we succeed. Don’t listen to all that junk saying you’ve wasted your time. If you’re in the arena fighting the Good Fight and you’re making art that is true to you then you’re on the right path.
Please finish what you started.
“Creative work is not a selfish act or a bid for attention on the part of the actor. It’s a gift to the world and every being in it. Don’t cheat us of your contribution. Give us what you’ve got.”
— Steven Pressfield, “The War of Art”
“On Writing” by Stephen King
Inspiration exists, but it has to find you working.
On Writing is the best book about writing I've ever read. This book taught me that the process of writing isn’t magical. This book also taught me that writing is magic. It is a practical, no-nonsense guide on writing well.
“To write is human, to edit is divine.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Writing is half the battle. Editing is the secret sauce.
“Omit needless words.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
It’s easy to fall in love with the sound of your own voice. Be careful.
“If you want to be a writer, you must do two things above all others: read a lot and write a lot. There’s no way around these two things that I’m aware of, no shortcut.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Athletes win championships because they nourish themselves properly and train well. Writing is no different. Nourish yourself by reading and keep practicing by writing. Nothing special here.
“Sometimes you have to go on when you don’t feel like it, and sometimes you’re doing good work when it feels like all you’re managing is to shovel shit from a sitting person.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Keep going even when your work feels like rubbish. These ideas echo The War of Art: When the going gets tough, don’t jump ship and give up.
“Stopping a piece of work just because it’s hard, either emotionally or imaginatively, is a bad idea.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Keep going. Keep going. Keep going.
“The timid fellow writes ‘the meeting will be held at seven o’clock’ because that somehow says to him ‘put it this way and people will believe you really know’. Purge this quisling thought! Don’t be a muggle! Throw back your shoulders, stick out your chin, and put that meeting in charge! Write ‘the meeting’s at seven.’ There, by God! Don’t you feel better?”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Say what you mean and mean what you say. This was my sixth grade teacher’s favourite saying. I wish I listened.
“I believe the road to hell is paved with adverbs, and I will shout it from the rooftops.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Avoid words that end in “-ly”. Adverbs are for the lazy. Think they’ll make your writing spectacularly-delightfully-amazingly-fantastic?
They won’t.
“I’m convinced that fear is the root of most bad writing.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
I am still learning how to overcome my fears each and every day. Bad writing is unclear writing — it’s hesitant and uncertain. We write poorly because we fear criticism. We fear judgment and ridicule, so we hide behind “umms” and justifications.
It’s okay to be afraid. Acknowledging fear is the first step. The second step is to write like this:
“One word at a time.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Why? Because:
“You can learn only by doing.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Don’t worry if you feel unfocused. Remember this when you’re confused:
“ All novels are really letters aimed at one person.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Write everything as a love letter to one person. Don’t try to please everybody, because you can’t. Write for one special person and make them smile or feel something. That’s more than enough.
“You find yourself constantly questioning your prose and your purpose when what you should probably be doing is writing as fast as the Gingerbread man runs.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
Stop second-guessing yourself and get to work.
“Dumbo got airborne with the help of a magic feather. You may feel the urge to grasp a passive verb or use one of those nasty adverbs for the same reason. Just remember before you do that Dumbo didn’t need the feather; the magic was in him.”
— Stephen King, “On Writing”
“On the Shortness of Life” by Seneca
Cultivate tranquility. Embrace difficulties as an opportunity to grow. Death is a blessing and you are always free.
Written nearly 2000 years ago, On the Shortness of Life illustrates Seneca’s ideas on how to live a good life. This book introduced me to Stoic philosophy. I fell in love at first sight.
“What you need is not those more radical remedies which we have now finished with — blocking yourself here, being angry with yourself there, threatening yourself sternly somewhere else — but the final treatment, confidence in yourself and the belief that you are on the right path, and not led astray by the many tracks which cross yours of people who are hopelessly lost, though some are wandering not far from the true path…
… I call it tranquility.”
— Seneca, “On the Shortness of Life”
Tranquility is a skill we can develop. By harnessing tranquility, we learn to accept life as it is, not what we wish it to be. Stoic philosophy bears many similarities with Victor Frankl’s Logotherapy in Man’s Search for Meaning. We live happier lives by spending our energies finding solutions rather than focusing on the unfair difficulties life throws our way.
“He will live badly who does not know how to die well…For often the cause of dying is the fear of it.”
— Seneca, “On the Shortness of Life”
Death is a touchy subject. Most of us hide from death and pretend it doesn’t exist. We approach death ass-backwards. According to Seneca, Death is a blessing and privilege, because it acts as our compass.
Everyone knows that one day they’ll die. So what’s there to fear? We all end up in the same place and we all know where we’re going.
“If you regard your last day not as a punishment but as a law of nature, the breast from which you have banished the dread of death no fear will dare to enter.”
— Seneca, “On the Shortness of Life”
Death is neither good or evil, it is simply a fact of life. Once we accept death as a normal part of life, we start to thrive.
“We must cut down on all this dashing about that many people indulge in.”
— Seneca “On the Shortness of Life”
Be careful of those who are always “busy”. You get no awards for being busy. It’s an illusion. Don’t buy into the false sense of pride that comes from working harder than all your peers. Who cares?
“It is not industry that makes men restless, but false impressions of things drive them mad.”
— Seneca “On the Shortness of Life”
See things as they are. Did you fail because you’re a sad excuse of a person who is doomed to live a series of unfortunate events? No — you failed because you didn’t meet so-and-so criteria. What can you do about it? How can you adjust your attitude or actions next time so you have a higher probability for success?
Figured it out? Good, now try that.
“They make journey after another and change spectacle for spectacle. As Lucretius says, “Thus each man ever flees himself”. But to what end, if he does not escape himself…
… and so we must realize that our difficulty is not the fault of the places but of ourselves…”
— Seneca, “On the Shortness of Life”
No matter where you go, you can never escape yourself. You can bury your problems however you wish, but they’ll always catch up to you. Do not envy those who live an Instagram-perfect life. You don’t know the battles they face. Do not delude yourself with fantasies of a carefree life once you get your dream job, the F-U money, or a life of endless travel…
“Everyone hustles his life along, and is troubled by a longing for the future and weariness of the present. But the man who spends all his time on his own needs, who organizes every day as though it were his last, neither longs for nor fears the next day.”
— Seneca, “On the Shortness of Life”
You can’t escape yourself. So work on self-improvement.
Check yourself before you wreck yourself.
“The mind must be recalled from external objects into itself: it must trust in itself, rejoice in itself, admire its own things; it must withdraw as much as possible from the affairs of others and devote its attention to itself; it must not feel losses and should take a kindly view even of misfortunes.”
— Seneca, “On the Shortness of Life”
Quit wasting time envying others and get down to business. Stay focused on your own path and run your own race.
Every setback is an opportunity for growth, rejoice!
“Follow your path to the end
Accept difficulty as an opportunity
This is the sure way to end up
With no difficulties at all.”
— Lao Tzu, “Tao Te Ching”
Originally posted on Medium.