Some books [really] change the way you see the world

Since I started my professional career, one of the advice that I got from seniors and people whom I admire, was to read books. During my school days, most of my friends were reading fiction books and taking inspiration from them I started reading fiction books but I could hardly complete those. Fast forward to professional life where I got introduced to amazing people with various backgrounds and cultural biases, non-fictional genre caught my attention. With the vast resources available at various firms where I offered my services, I started reading about everything that I could find from entrepreneurship, human psychology to evolution theory.

Recently I read Sapiens by  Yuval Noah Harari and it had profound impact on me. It is a book about human history and evolution. It tries to answer some of the astute questions that is there today. What are the effects of all the four revolution? Can we free ourselves from our cultural biases ? Are we really happy today compared to our ancestors? For person like me who have little knowledge of history, this book is a masterpiece for me. It really changed the way I think about people from other culture, region and ideology, the way I think about my family & friends and most importantly the way I think about myself. Some of my favorite quotes from the book.

History is something that very few people have been doing while everyone else was ploughing fields and carrying water buckets.

Money is the most universal and most efficient system of mutual trust ever devised.

We study history not to know the future but to widen our horizons, to understand that our present situation is neither natural nor inevitable, and that we consequently have many more possibilities before us than we imagine.

Having understood(maybe partial) the human history and what shaped current generations, can we use this knowledge to build or at least shape better future for coming generations? Strongly recommended for everyone who would like to understand how history has shaped us in who we are today.

Never Quit

It has been a while since I posted something new here. I have written couple of book reviews but that is not part of the blog post. I was busy writing technical book titled “Learning Raspberry Pi“. Somewhere I read these lines

“If you have insights, experience and expertise that would benefit others; it’s selfish to keep it to yourself.When you think about it that way; writing is a way of contributing your gift to the world.”

I have been sharing my knowledge with the people whom I know since long but I believe by doing that I reached only certain numbers/types of people. So I decided to write a book and fortunately I got great publisher “Packt“. I don’t know how challenging it was for you ( Those who have already written a book) but for me it was quite challenging maintaining the timelines of chapters and handling the pressure of my day job. The number of revisions that each chapter goes through drains your energy. There were couple of moments when the work load in my day job was too much and I was lacking motivation to write. I almost quite at those moments but I did not. Whenever I felt low while in the process of writing book , I read the experiences of people who are best-selling author. Some of the quotes that kept me going.

“If my doctor told me I had only 6 months to live, I’d type a little faster.” – Isaac Asimov

“I want to do something splendid…
Something heroic or wonderful that won’t be forgotten after I’m dead…
I think I shall write books.”
― Louisa May Alcott

Today , I feel proud of myself for not quitting. My book is available for pre-order now. As a human , we all struggle in achieving what we want and there are moments when we feel like quitting. For me it was writing book, For you , it could be starting a company , finishing college or finishing that long pending task. Whenever you feel like quitting , think about why you started. No matter what happens , never quit.