I’m a Tim Ferriss apologist. Even when there are long chapters about making women have intense orgasms in the middle of a diet book, I tend to cut him some slack. He’s an innovator in the way of life, exploring the things that most of us don’t dare try, so we can more safely follow in his footsteps, for health, business, and making women have intense orgasms. Thanks, Tim. But, Tools of Titans is different than his other works, it’s the distilled tips and tricks from past guests of his podcast, and new guests that never went on. From decision frameworks, to practical purchases, to social skills, this book covers quite a bit from many, many great people. I was often surprised at whose words I was enjoying, people I’d never heard of, people I didn’t think I’d really like, people who were in lines of work I couldn’t care less about (you can see some of the quotes below). If you only read the chapters from interviews with people you know and love, this book would still be worth it.
Quotes from the Book I Needed
“You’re not responsible for the hand of cards you were dealt. You’re responsible for maxing out what you were Giffin.” – – Christopher Sommer
“Is that a dream or goal? Because a dream is something you fantasize about that will probably never happen. The goal is something you set a plan for, work toward, and achieve.” – Paul Levesque
“You should never publicly criticize anyone or anything unless it’s a matter of morals or ethics. Anything negative you say at the very least ruin someone’s day, or worse break someone’s heart, or simply change someone from being a future ally have yours to someone who will never forget that you were unkind or unfair be critical. It’s so common today to complain or criticize others work on social media, or dog pile on someone for a perceived offense. I won’t do it. It’s not my job to be the world’s critic, and I’d rather not rule out any future allies.” -Jane McGonigal
“Dealing with the temporary frustration of not making progress is an Intercal part of the path towards excellence. ” -Coach Sommer
“If you try to approach every problem with your moral compass, first and foremost, you’re going to make a lot of mistakes. You’re going to exclude a lot of possible good solutions. You’re going to assume you know a lot of things, when in fact you don’t, and you’re not going to be a good partner in reaching the solution with other people who don’t happen to see the world the way you do. ” – Stephen J Dubner
“Truth is, young creative minds don’t need more ideas, they need to take more responsibility with the ideas they’ve already got.” – Scott Belsky
“Lean into discomfort, because I think these seemingly impossible problems that we have around race and homophobia and the environment, and just the lack of love sometimes, are not going to be solved in a comfortable way… So I guess my ass would be more of a big metaphysical ask: give vulnerability a shot. Give discomfort it’s due. But I think he or she who is willing to be the most uncomfortable is not only the bravest, but rises the fastest.” – Brené Brown
“The notes are right underneath your fingers, baby. You just got to take the time out to play the right notes. That’s life.” -Ray Charles
“you must want to be a butterfly so badly, you are willing to give up being a Catapillar.” -Sekou Andrews
“You are not alone, and you are better than you think.”
January 1st, 2017 – Started Reading
January 16th, 2017 – Finished Reading
