- The E-Myth by Michael Gerber – Aspiring entrepreneurs would do well to read this book to avoid getting sucked into the myth of ditching your job, chasing after your dream, and making a fortune. It doesn’t discourage entrepreneurship but rather lays down the hard truth on the many facets involved in starting a business, as well as the many roles one has to play. This book taught me to appreciate systems, no matter how simple — that the key to building a successful business is not so much building kick-ass product but creating systems in the business process so that it can ultimately run without you slaving away at the business for the rest of your life. The prime example here is McDonalds which certainly does not produce the best burger in the world, but has one of the best systems for every facet of its business.
Favorite Passage: If your business depends on you, you don’t own a business — you have a job. And it’s the worst job in the world because you’re working for a lunatic…The purpose of going into business is to get free of a job so you can create jobs for other people…to expand beyond your existing horizons. So you can invent something that satisfies a need in the marketplace that has never been satisfied before. So you can live an expanded, stimulating new life.
- Awakening: Conversations with the Masters by Anthony de Mello – There were 2 books (or sets of books) I went deep into when I decided to reboot my religious and spiritual beliefs (the other one discussed after this). I discovered the works of Anthony de Mello which usually consist of short parables and anecdotes, usually of a student and a master — the master being “not a single person” but can be a “Hindu guru, a Zen roshi, a Taoist sage, a Jewish rabbi, a Christian monk, a Sufi mystic.” Some stories seem baffling, others pointless, and still others strange and weird. There are no apologies or explanations for them. The reader is left to take from it what he will, to reflect on them or to throw them away.
Favorite Passage: The preacher was determined to extract from the Master a clear declaration of belief in God.
“Do you believe there is a God?“
“Of course I do,” said the Master.
“And God made everything. Do you believe that?“
“Yes, yes,” said the Master, “I certainly do.“
“And who made God?“
“You,” said the Master.
The preacher was aghast. “Do you seriously mean to tell me that it is I who made God?“
“The one you are forever thinking about and talking about–yes,” said the Master placidly.
- Conversations with God by Neale Donald Walsch – This is a set of three books which the author claims started with him being down on his luck, dismal, unhappy, and emotionally drained. He decided to write an spiteful letter to God, full of angry questions. When he was done, his “hand remained poised over the paper, as if held there by some invisible force. Abruptly, the pen began moving on its own.” And so began his dialogue with “God.” Ok so a little disclaimer here, I thought it the book was a bit iffy at first because of the call for donations and then the sequels and seminars and so on it really seemed like the author was starting his own money-making scheme. But then, separating the message from the messenger (and giving him the benefit of the doubt that whatever money he gets actually goes to good causes), I found the dialogue mind-opening and it really made me think that if there were a God, he, she or it would be more like the God in Walsch’s book than the one depicted in any other “holy” book.
Favorite Passage: There are those who say that I have given you free will, yet these same people claim that if you do not obey me, I will send you to hell. What kind of free will is that? Does this not make a mockery of God — to say nothing of any sort of true relationship between us?
Email me at andy@freethinking.me. View previous articles at www.freethinking.me.