Seven Books that Changed My 2024.

The Gently Mad Bookshop and Bookbinder, Edinburgh.

I once read that the history of humanity would be so much better if everyone kept a journal to reflect on their actions. To recount stories and results to be better next time.

Better thinking.

Better responses.

Better relationships.

Better human beings.

Arguments would be different. Meaningful memories would be created. People would be happier. Even wars would have been avoided.

As Epictetus said, "Some things are in our control, while others are not. We control our opinion, choice, desire, aversion, and, in a word, everything of our own doing."

But we cannot control all our responses every time. Mike Tyson once said, “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face.” Philosophers say we will not be doing the right thing all the time. Meaning we will never attain full wisdom. It’s impossible; uncertainty hits us like a wave. But we can be a little better by at least trying to reflect.

What we see, read, think, and talk about is directly related to better reflecting on our lives and actions. Value in, value out. Garbage in, garbage out.

Reading other people's stories is one of my best ways to reflect. People who have dedicated hundreds of hours or lifetimes to recounting what they believe in a better way. In books, we find the answers to things that will never change.

Morgan Housel said it well by pointing to two types of information: permanent and expiring.

Permanent information is: "How do people behave when they encounter a risk they hadn't fathomed?"

Expiring information is: "How much profit did Microsoft earn in the second quarter of 2005?"

Expiring knowledge catches more attention than it should for two reasons. First, there's a lot of it, eager to keep our short attention spans occupied. Second, we chase it down, anxious to squeeze insight out of it before it loses relevance.

Permanent information is harder to notice because it's buried in books rather than blasted in headlines. But its benefit is huge. It's not just that permanent information never expires, letting you accumulate it. It also compounds over time, leveraging what you've already learned.

As an avid reader, I am excited to recommend seven books that changed my perspective this year.

Die With Zero, Bill Perkins.

I am not the smartest or richest guy around. Like many of you, I also didn’t receive financial education on how to manage my earnings and how do I spend them. I’ve spent over ten years of my professional career trying to figure things out with money, and Bill Perkins has changed my perspective on finitude and materialism. The statistics in this book are crazy. Do we need to save that much money? What wealth is beneficial? How about the kids? I recently wrote about the wealth nobody talks about, showing some of these concepts, but I wouldn’t recommend you miss this book.

The Way of Integrity, Martha Beck.

I first heard of Martha Beck through a podcast interview with Elizabeth Gilbert. Martha’s experiences cannot be missed. Her upbringing and family tradition are under Mormonism, but she wasn’t feeling them anymore. Her intentional life was stifled under constant family and religious pressure, social limits and traditions. Worse, she intentionally negated many things, sometimes even her strongest needs. Until one day, she said she had had enough. She decided to spend one full year without lying. She tells her story in this book using Dante’s Inferno (Or Campbell’s Hero’s Journey) and linking it to Eastern philosophy. It’s one of the most fantastic turnaround experiences.

The War of Art, Steven Pressfield.

I read this book in three days. It would have been two, but a phrase made me stop reading on the second day. Instead, I closed the book and immediately put myself to work. I pretty much stood up and went straight to the laptop to finally write something independently for the first time. I spent 6 hours writing and pushing hard, disrupting any previous habit. Since then, my creative life changed. In multiple interviews, Steven Pressfield shows how he was a frustrated writer for most of his life (He talks about it in his own memoir); unconventionally, he released his first book when he was fifty-two. Whatever your artistic way in life is, whatever your dreams are- writing, painting, singing, a different job, or a daring life- I’d highly recommend you read this book. (He also has an amazing blog and newsletter that is released every week).

Mastery, Robert Greene.

I’ve been following Robert Greene for quite some time. He became very famous when he was close to forty and released The 48 Laws of Power, one of the best books on persuasion, perception and politics, so powerful that it became banned in some prisons in the US. By 2018, I read his latest book, The Laws of Human Nature, and his research on stories and careful writings behind them makes you see your life in a different perspective. On average, he spends around seven years to make one book, almost a decade of changes and careful reviews. His crafting is beautiful. I learned that his writing style and mentorship helped one of my favorite authors, Ryan Holiday, and I got even more engaged in Robert essays. Mastery, however, is my favorite book of his. It truly changed my paradigm on talent vs habit, on crafting expectations vs realities, on infinite rules of achievement and failure. It’s quite a dense read, but might be one of the most fortunate experiences as a reader to experience it.

Same as Ever, Morgan Housel.

As one of my author heroes, Morgan writes succinctly and attractively on issues that affect us daily concerning money, human nature and blind spots that we all have. He is a great fan of Warren Buffett and Charlie Munger, and he writes from time to time via his partnership platform Collab Fund. I have reread this book three times. I think society would be generally better if we all read this book. My earlier point about permanent vs expiring information was sourced from this book. Also, you should add Psychology of Money by him (With Die with Zero, you should be bulletproof in your emotional ways of thinking about money).

Slow Productivity, Cal Newport.

Cal leads the way in insights for productivity. He has a weekly podcast about productivity hacks, and I follow his show in my top 3. He has already written some of my favourite books that I reread at least once yearly (Deep Work, Digital Minimalism). These books helped me avoid burnout in tipping points in the past. His newest title points out fascinating insights on productivity (A world where, on average, we check our emails every 6 minutes). My favourite point about the book is his “Obsessing Over Quality” principle.

Philosophy as a Way of Life, Pierre Hadot.

I read this book maybe 3 months ago, and I can’t stop thinking about it. This book opened my mind and understanding of spiritual ideas and the faith of Western philosophers since the Hellenistic period. Egypt, Greece, Rome. What is Stoicism? What is Epicureanism? How does it translate to Christianity, Islam, Judaism, and the concept of theology that we know today? Nietzsche and Goethe played their roles, too. But most interestingly, what do they all have in common? Pierre Hadot links them to “Old Truths”. As the French Writer Vauvernagues pointed out: “A truly new and original book would be one which made people love old truths”. Those whose meanings will never be exhausted by the generations of man. It is a dense book, but I often revisit it to review sources and ideas.

I am keen to hear your thoughts on these concepts or raise points to discuss. Better yet, if you know of a good book on a related topic, please share it! The best books you can read come to you through word of mouth. And as always, if any of these books mean something to you, recommend it to someone else.

I treat books in my daily life the same way I treat exercise. I feel I am training my mind with them. I once heard that we buy books not with money but with the time it takes us to read them. So I know they are worth whatever the cost and time I spend on them.

I hope you enjoy these books and that they help you live intentionally, as I try to do with mine every day!

Best,
Zac