Listened to this original audio recording (LP) of Earl Nightingale. This was a breakthrough at that time but it’s still true today.
According to Earl, the problem with 5% life success rate, is conformity. We blindly followed what others do. Success is not narrowly defined as financial success but “progressive realization of worthy ideals/goals.”

In summary, the strangest secret is that “we become what we think about.” “As he sows so shall he reaps.”
1. Remind yourself you are what you think about.
2. Realize your limitation is self imposed.
3. Use your courage to think positively. Use Imagination to speculate freely. Act promptly and decisively. You’re standing in the middle of your acres of diamond.
4. Save at least 10% what you earn.
5. Act on them.

30-day test was advocated:
1. Write down your clearly defined goals, look at them all day. When you wake up and before you go to sleep. Place on the back of the card, “Ask and it shall be given you. Seek and you shall find. Knock and it shall be opened unto you.”
2. Stop thinking what it is you fear. Replace it with your positive worthwhile goals. Take control of your mind. Quit running yourself down. Be calm and cheerful.
3. Do more than you have to. Give more and better like you’ve never done before.
4. Be persistent. If fails, re-start for 30 more days.

“Act as though it’s impossible to fail.”

Making money is a direct result of success. Success is in direct proportion to our service. Put the fuel in before we can expect the heat. People who contribute to prosperity must also prosper. Your return is proportional to your service from who you receive your return.

Repeated here by a referenced doctor:
1. Set definite goal
2. Quit running yourself down
3. Stop why can you can’t. Think what you can become
4. Try to discover why you can’t from your childhood.
5. Change to the image of what you want
6. Act the part you decided to become.

Confucius is one of the most influential philosophers in the world. As a kid growing up in Taiwan, I learned about Confucius’ ideas and sayings. It was almost second nature for common Chinese to quote Confucius as the ultimate truth. But I know very little about his life and his views from Westerner’s perspective. This short book summarized it for me.

According to the author, Confucius is almost like Socrates, who was born about a century later, with respect to his conversational/dialog/Q&A approach to revealing his thoughts about certain subjects. His advocacy for broad love toward neighbors and country men in general was religious like, though he was born more than five hundred years before Christ.

Confucius first advised the rulers (war lords) how to govern people. But he didn’t get much traction so he decided to teach. He first came up with the “Golden Rules” – “What you do not wish for yourself, do not do to others.” (己所不欲，勿施於人。) – treat others how you want to be treated long before the Christ. The other thoughts include Ren (Jen, 仁), Li (禮), Yi (義). The author didn’t go into details of each thought but I’m quite familiar with them.

The author cited several contradictions in Confucius’ teachings in how to farm and how to be a governor. To me, this is nitpicking. From what I can tell, the author did not think very highly of Confucius, especially about his inability to convince any rulers to adopt his methods of governing. And when he held a small official position, he did it poorly. The author is probably evaluating Confucius from the modern westerners’ angle. I’m not saying his thoughts were all that impressive but again I didn’t live in the era to know how out-of-box thinking he held. Amazingly, he was able to laugh at himself of his lack of accomplishment. But for all I know, he and his philosophy stood the test of time over over 2700 years. It’s hard to argue against such a track record.

As far as this book, I seem to learn a lot more from the Confucius Wikipedia than from the book.

The book started out with Lang Lang’s Parents’ story. The cultural revolution’s impact on his parents and artists’ living in the era sowed the seed of determination to succeed at all costs. The influence on the little Lang Lang was tremendous and unavoidable given his natural talents inherited from his artists parents.

Inspired by “Tom and Jerry” cartoon, Monkey King, and Transformers, Lang Lang started piano lesson at his tender age of 3 and were competing in piano contests at 5.It’s no surprised that his performance is animated. He’s just as competitive as his father, who placed being #1 and striving for immortality like Mozart as the most important thing to pursue in life.

Lang was introverted as a child and got brought out of his cocoon by his teacher Chu. Losing his first big contest as a 7 1/2 year old was devastating but it’s a turning point for him to see the yellow stuffed dog (consolation prize) as an encouragement rather than a reminder of defeat. That’s what makes a good, talented person great.

At 9 years old, Lang’s father took him to Beijing and live in a slum just to be trained to get into the Beijing Conservatory. After being rejected by Teacher “Angry,” followed by being threatened by his father to commit suicide, Lang became disillusioned and discouraged and refused then to play any piano until he met up with his favorite teacher Chu, who encouraged him to continue and he did.

Lang continued participating in piano contests. The big break came when he won the first prize in Japan. This gave him the visibility in US, where he participated in music camp and eventually won a scholarship to Philadelphia. The Law of Attraction really played out in his case like meeting a Chinese restaurant owner in Germany, meeting a Japanese pianist who taught him to put the soul in the music, which allowed him to win the grand prize in Germany, and the security guard at the German embassy taught him to trick to get a visa after being rejected. There were many cases people came to help him along the way. As the saying goes, “God helps those who help themselves.”

Eventually, he arrived in the US and had several run in with his conservative father who kept on pushing him to practice over 7 hours a day. As his young teenager, he revolted against his father but eventually reconciled with him. I don’t think he could have achieved so much without his dad and he admitted it.

The injury he suffered allowed him to step back and enjoyed a little life and had some balance in his life, including reading books, going to movies and concerts. This was a blessing in disguise. His American friend, Dick, really enhanced his characters by introducing him to a well adjusted life outside of piano.

Fast forward to now or the time when he wrote the book in 2008, he had accomplished so much. Last I checked on his website. He’s all booked around the world until end of November. One particular story stood out was the fact that China first refused to have him headline with Philadelphia Symphony Orchestra because he had not participated nor won any contest for three years since he started his professional life. This struck me as something deep in the Chinese Confucius culture, where only examinations and contests place a person in his/her among all. This was backward but I think it’s still prevalent today.

The book has a little too many details but is well written. I enjoyed reading/listening to his journey. All the mentioning of the classical music rekindle my interests in classical music. He is definitely a genius pianist. I wonder about the make up of a genius: how much is from the gene and how much is from the training and practices? For Lang Lang, I think it’s probably more than 80~90% of the latter. Without his father, his determination, and his good fortune, I don’t think he would be where he is now.

Plato was born of privileges. He wanted to be wrestlers and acquired “Plato” (means broad or flat), his ring name. He became the Socrates’ disciple for 9 years. Plato was heavily influenced by Pythagoras’ “All is number” thought.

Plato believes that everything we perceive around us is merely appearance. The true reality is the realm of ideas or forms from which this appearance derives. The Universal realm of ideas, which is perceived by the mind, is unchanging and eternal. Plato’s explanation of time – a “moving image of eternity” – is more than a profound religious explanation.

Plato founded the first university called Academy, where several of disciples learned his philosophy. His ideal republic resembles a Utopia where no one has private possessions and all men and women are equal. These were templates for communism and fascism in recent times.

Plato believed that human soul consisted of three distinct elements: 1) The rational element strove for wisdom, 2) the active spirit sought conquest and distinction, 3) the appetites craved gratification. The righteousness can be achieved only when each of the three elements of the soul fulfilling its own function.

In Plato, eros is regarded as the soul’s impulse toward good. In its lowest form this is expressed in our passion for a beautiful person (infatuation?). A higher form of love involves a union devoted a more spiritual aspirations, giving rise to social good (soul mate?). The highest form is devoted to philosophy.

Plato died at the age of 81. He was buried in the Academy.

This is a quick overview of Plato, his life and philosophy. It’s a good 90-minute read.

Something read in 90 minutes sounds very good. Who wouldn’t want to learn about a great person in 90 minutes. Of course, this book can only serve as an introduction due to its limited space and the Domino-Pizza promise.

Surprised to know that Aristotle tutored Alexander the Great, who did not pay much respect to his teacher. Aristotle is famous for his founding of “logic” and he first used the Arabic numbers, which helped to advance the math science.

Born rich in 384 B.C., Aristotle was a student of Plato and a graduate of the Academy. Disappointed by not being nominated to head up the Academy and his eventual branch off from Plato’s philosophy, he later found several of his own schools including Lyceum, MIT of the era. Where Plato’s approach to the world was essentially religious, Aristotle’s tended toward the scientific. He has a profound understanding of politics, this led him to adopt a pragmatic approach to politics, basically of moderation virtues or middle of the extremes.

The ironic thing is that his ideas were widely adopted by Islamic world, while the Western world sank into the Dark Ages. The Islamic world absorbed almost all of Aristotle’s teachings which became Islamic philosophy. He was wrong about the earth being the center of the universe and the world was made of 4 primary elements: earth, air, fire and water. But the bottom line is that there is no one true way to viewing the world, either scientifically or philosophically.

Aristotle later escaped to a small island after the death of Alexander to avoid the wrath of the mob. He died in Chalkis 30 miles north of Athen at the age of 62.

This is a decent “cheat sheet” on Aristotle. I enjoyed the ease-to-understand stories of Aristotle and it actually took me just about 90 minutes, give or take.

This is a 4-CD seminar audio recording. I must have picked this up from OverDrive. I thought the title was humorous. It never crossed my mind that humor was a business in itself – a profitable for the talented. Somehow, I perceived this is something you sort of being born with. But there are tricks and methods to this art.

The first couple of CD’s were live audio recording of Seinfeld co-producer, Peter Mehlman, on the inside story of the script making for Seinfeld episodes. My key take-aways:

Seinfeld Motto: no hugging and no learning – this is what entertaining is all about.
The main themes in the Seinfeld plot: Lies, schemes, Tragedies – disguised as comedy, philosophical discussion, and other miscellaneous one-liners.

Peter’s talk is very interesting. This has motivated me to watch all the Seinfeld episodes. Writing for George was easy, but hardest for Kramer and Elaine. Seinfeld has lots of scenes, compared to others; the pace was much faster than people would feel. There are roughly 3~4 plots in a 22-minute episode and it’s very difficult to tie them together. Most of ideas came from individual experiences from real people.

The other 2 CD’s were the lectures of Professor Mel Helitzer. He actually taught humor writing in universities. My key take-aways:
3 R’s of why humor?
1. Respect & attention – call attention to you ( not talented in sports, pretty, middle child, physical defficiency, mother to reach, sit in back in class)
2. Remember – people remember.
3. ? (not mentioned)

Why do we laugh? (I never thought I would laugh for the below reasons but it’s true.)
1. Surprise (shock-value joke, never saw it coming)
2. Superiority & incongruent (makes the listeners feel superior than the people got picked on, e.g. Candid Camera victims).

3 elements of humor writing: MAP
Material
Audience: will people understand and feel “superior.”
Performer: written for (can’t use Rodney Dangerfield’s material for Mel Brooks, e.g.)

Recipes of Humor Writing: THREES
Target: People you pick on. This one is less obvious to me.
Hostility: aggression.
Realism: some truth to what you say.
Exaggeration: makes it funny.
Emotion: the performer’s act.
Surprise: like “reverse.”

These 4 CD’s really put people behind the scenes of humor writing and comedy in general. The examples given were little dated as the audio was taped/published in 2004 and the Humor class was probably tapes in the 80’s, as many of Gary Hart jokes were cited. Otherwise, this has been a great lesson in humor for me. Enjoyed every minute of it.

Michael Oher (Williams) was an black teenager that was almost abandoned by his alcoholic mother and absentee father. If it were not for his special physical build perfectly fit for a left-tackle (quarterback’s blind side, thus the book title) and his unique athletic talent, he would probably go through life unnoticed by everyone as in his early life. Thanks to Big Tony, his family friend, who brought him to Briarcrest High School and managed to got him enrolled in the school, despite his near-zero scholastic aptitude. But without the love from his adopted white family: Sean & Leigh Anne Tuohy and their 2 kids, Collins & Sean Jr., as shown in the movie trailer, A Diamond in the Rough.

There were many sub-stories that built up the main story, including how the left tackle became the second highest paid position in football because the newer passing game trumpeted by Bill Walsh who made the quarterback a critical position. The history of football game was briefly described to establish the critical nature of the left-tackle, quarterback’s blind-side line of defense. How Michael managed to eked out high enough grade with BYU’s on-line course to pass the stringent NCAA college admission requirement was described in great details. The story then detours to describe how Steve Wallace became the most valuable left tackle for 49ers and won 3 Super Bowls. The story of Steve Wallace’s transformation came alive with Lewis’ magical narration.

I was hooked on Michael Lewis’ work after reading his Money Ball. This one is no exception. What a wonderful story of rags-to-riches! I particularly like that way the author got the readers interested with a “hook” and flash back to tell the story, instead of the usual chronological order. However, the story got a little long toward the end. The discussion about all the potential black athletes who never got a chance because they never made it to graduate from high school seems to leave room for future work. It also went to reinforce how lucky Michael Oher was, even with his talent.