4th Book of 2022
We know that people say never judge a book by its cover but I must say that there are few books which give you great vibes the moment you have a look at them. Something within you keeps pleading to get the book and read it. I don’t know if it’s cover page, author’s name or synopsis or the mindset in which you get a glance of the book for the 1st time but there’s a connection that gets established. Something similar happened with the book “What the Heck Do I Do with My Life?” written by Ravi Venkatesan. I made big expectations from it the moment I read its title and saw the testimonial of Bill Gates on the cover page. It made me believe that I would get to know the concepts I have never read before. Now that I am done reading this book, I can say that the book has everything you look from a self-help or motivational book.
Ravi’s intent with the book is very clear which he himself describes in the first few pages before taking us deep into it. His purpose for writing this book is mentioned on the cover page too which says “How to flourish in our turbulent times”. Author discusses about the shift happening around us in terms of industry etc. which is going to change the way we look at money and earn it by associating ourselves with it. He tells how AI is changing things and how it is going to impact all of us – majorly the working class. Similarly, author talks very confidently about the green revolution that’s going to happen and how the industry boom is going to be 10 times bigger than the IT boom. He tells us to prepare ourselves right from now if we want to benefit from the boom. He makes us understand that personal growth in a not-so-growing industry becomes difficult whereas just being a part of a growing industry reflects upon our career, finance and securities automatically.
Author, later, makes us understand about many factors that makes us think the way we think by introducing us to the concepts like Fixed mindset vs Growth mindset, Abundance mindset vs Scarcity mindset etc. Author gives us the confident that even if we are not from the required mindset needed for growing and accomplishing success in life, we can still develop it and reshape our life. In the next chapter itself, author starts providing us practical solutions as well where he discusses metaskills like entrepreneur mindset, agility, leadership and people skills that we must have to be able to walk along with the AI age. Author elaborates each of these points and help you understand how we can work upon it and include it in our working personality. Ravi considers Leadership quality as one of the biggest assets which makes him dedicate a whole chapter to it where he tried to make us learn that we don’t need to be in a leadership position to be a leader but we can be one at any designation or grade in the organization.
Mr. Venkatesan also speaks about money in one chapter and asks us how much is enough for us. He tells us that money is a game which has no end and you’ll just keep on playing it forever hence it becomes very necessary to understand our relationship with money. Author talks about the factor of minimalistic lifestyle, decluttering our space, optimizing time before money as it’s more valuable in any sense and also speaks about criticality of disciplined financial planning and savings. In the second-last chapter, author shares with us 10 practical ideas to navigate through our career. I must say reading this chapter was so insightful that I couldn’t end thanking author after reaching almost every point. I will not speak much about what author shares in it as it will take away the essence of reading it whenever you pick it up for yourself but I must say it will make you reflect upon yourself and ask if how we are looking at life is even the right way at all.
The last chapter is more spiritual in nature where Ravi Venkatesan discusses the concept of happiness and success. He makes us understand how subjective they are in nature and why we shouldn’t end up defining it in a way others want us to define it. He also gives tip to stay happy through the process of life which becomes complex at times. After every chapter, author summarizes the chapter giving away the major key ideas from the same so that we can always refer it for our understanding whenever we get confused in life. Similarly, there is a grey section where sometimes it speaks about reflection or action and asks us few questions- just going through them and trying to answer them makes us realize how unclear we are about ourselves.
Author doesn’t shy away from sharing quotes and statements from other authors, psychologists or personalities. The language is very simple for you to just breeze through the book as it’s of about 180 pages that can be easily completed in a single sitting. It took me 3-4 sittings to finish it as there were so many insights to be noted that I just kept writing every now and then while going through the book. Author has himself said that almost every thing that every book or even this book speaks is already spoken in a better language in our ancient texts but still, there’s a try to give a perspective from the current scenario and I must say this book does that perfectly for you.
I have found it to be completely life-transforming and motivating just like Robin Sharma’s books. I have started to find self-help books speaking the same thing but the way author has executed this book makes it bit different and far better than many books in self-help shelves in the bookstores. I can already start feeling the change in the manner I have been thinking till now. I give this one 5 out of 5 and highly recommend it to everyone who’s a professional or going to be one soon.
Thanks.
WRITING BUDDHA
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