How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big
1) The general theme of the book is to be persistent and to not restrain yourself. The author brings up a few major points based on this idea. He said that goals suck and systems are the way to go. This is because goals are flawed in that they are very specific and you don't know when you'll be rewarded. This will likely cause you to become disappointed if you have any outcome other than your expected outcome. Another major point is his advice to find your energy instead of your passion. You could have many "passions". If you follow the ideology of finding only your passion, you may be locked into that opportunity even if you don't have the energy to commit to it. Finding your energy is more important because as long as you stay energetic, you can fail countless times and still persevere.
2) I can't really connect any specifics from the book to this class. However, the theme of passion vs energy is apparent in our choice of opportunities. A friend of mine certainly is following his passion in his opportunity (not that it's a bad thing), while others that I've seen are working through trial and error from post to post - almost like it's the energy that keeps them going.
3) If I were to design an exercise for this class, It would be based on potentially changing our opportunities. I think that many of our opportunities have a lot of constrained goals involved. If Adams is correct about systems vs goals, then it would be crucial for the class to learn how to develop systems to increase productivity. A major step would be turning their goals into systems.
4) It wasn't really an "aha" moment, but reading about the useless patents that Adams had was pretty funny. Had Dr. Pryor not explained the potential uselessness of patents in class, I would not have understood this part of the book one bit.
You definitely got a good grasp of the book. I do think that failing is a big part in the growth of our knowledge. You did really well in explaining Adam's views on how passion can lead to negative outcomes. Although having passion in one thing and sticking to it may seem good; however, in reality it makes you seem one-dimensional and may backfire in the end if that opportunity doesn't grow. I really enjoyed the discussion that Adams had in the book about human energy. I feel that it's really important in striving for different opportunities and persevering through existing ones.
ReplyDeleteFirst off I love the title of this book, "How to Fail at Almost Everything and Still Win Big" because it gives hope when you're feeling hopeless. I agree with you and the author, where you need to be persistent with your goals to actually be able to achieve them one day. I also agree with the point about passions. Although it is important to have a passion, it is even more important to maintain and direct your energy towards the right path.
ReplyDeleteSeems like an interesting book to read. Im curious to see how the author describes in detail his approach of energy. See I'm one that can describe myself as more of a dreamer rather than someone with energy. To get the energy to do things is hard or me I need to set goals in order to achieve some things. So this concept is. of no goal only energy is very intriguing.
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