Outliers
As a kid in elementary school, all I did was read, at recess, at home, on the bus — I spent a lot of time reading. Like A LOT of time. We didn’t have a TV until I was 12 anyways, so when I wasn’t playing outside in the woods or sandbox or wherever (I grew up on a small 3 acre farm in the country) and wasn’t playing with my LEGOs or building crafts inside, I was reading.
As an adult, it takes me a long time to finish books…I think it’s partially because I read a lot online and don’t feel like reading much once I get home. I also really don’t enjoy reading “business books” — I just don’t. I prefer sci-fi/fiction and memoirs to any sort of businessy book. I think it’s because book reading is an escape for me, like when I was a kid, when reading was this whole other imaginative world I entered.
But I do still get through a book now and then. This week, I finished Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. It’s a businessy book that I actually didn’t mind, I think because it’s based so much in numbers and data, the analysis of which fascinate me. Gladwell’s whole point is that, especially in American culture, we have this belief in the “rags to riches” outliers, like the Bill Gates/Steve Jobs, sports stars, Hollywood actors, business tycoons, etc. But really it’s a myth — family and cultural background, practice and simple timing play a much bigger role, family playing the biggest role, he argues, in who we become than any sort of magical luck factor or stroke of genius. It’s a great read that I connected with in many ways.
I just started Gang Leader for a Day. I’ll report back when I’m done.
