Wishing all of you a very happy new year (2023)!
Generally I share my reading list of the past year (2022) as a reflection on the year. This year to change things a bit, I share my reflections on my reading. A meta post.
If this is helpful or inspiring, all the more good.
In any case, I keep an up to date list of my readings here: https://krishna2.com/books and we don’t need Jan 1st to ring in to check that (or find suggestions or get ideas & inspirations).
Writing helps. You only know what you can write and teach – otherwise you just think you know.
It was in one of Mark Cuban’s blog that I read that ROI (return on investment) of reading is infinity. All you need is one book, one chapter, maybe even one paragraph or one line to make the difference in your life. I took it to heart.
Not that I was not reading before, it was preaching to the choir – but what this did was to flip a switch in my mind that it is okay to get books, any books, and not worry about the cost or if it just accumulates.
In Richard Hamming’s essay (“You and your research” - an absolutely fascinating essay that I read at least a couple of times every year - just like Steve Jobs’s 2005 Stanford speech) : he makes an interesting point of why published research papers are valuable to read. It is not just that there is a paper out there but it is the result of a series of harder and rarer sequence of events. One must be well-versed in a field, know what is important and what questions are worth asking, have an interesting idea, have a means to do experiments to verify the hypothesis, be able to convincingly frame it and write about it and have the peer review process vet it. As you can see, many of the earlier steps are fairly easy to do (/have). But it is the sequence all the way to the end that culls the weaker and makes the published paper more worth the time.
Given that Internet and Social Networks have made so easy any simple publishing and distribution, all one needs to publish their thoughts is a pulse and an email id to sign up for a social media account. If something is so simple that idiots can do, then idiots will. Not to diminish the wise ones using a pithy medium or idiots who write books (worse textbooks). I took the point being that it takes one enough dedication to learn a subject deep enough and to coherently form thoughts and write and even harder, revise and edit it and convince someone to publish. Especially watch out for the prologue, the foreword, the bibliography, the index, the author bio not to leave out the cover, the font, the diagrams and images and the layout – these all scream so loudly how much the author cared about the topic to explain / share with others when they too could be bingeing on the next cool series du jour on a streaming service.
I have learned a lot from Paul Graham’s (PG’s) essays and one of the validations was to not be afraid to geek or nerd out on a topic no matter how arcane or obscure it might seem to be. (One of the earlier writings on writing to think is from a PG essay too).
Scott Adams’s “how to fail at almost everything and still be successful” which is his memoir had an interesting point : Any field and especially arts & entertainment (& sports … so on) are so competitive these days that one needs to be in the 1% of the top 1% (maybe few more decimal to add for certain fields) to be very successful. As one would call it a very very long tail : something like 0.0001% of the actors make it big, likewise go on to professional sports, published authors, famous singers .. so on. He realized that he was definitely not in the top 10% in any of his hobbies/passion Comedy or Drawing / Sketching or his then profession as a software engineer / manager / techie. But he felt he was in the top 25% in all these three and a combination of the three (Dilbert Comics), yielded an amazing hit! This example also taught me that folks we admire for certain books might also be not agreeable on other things (in this case political leaning). A good lesson to keep apart the art and the artist. Had to learn to be like the mythical swan that can take the milk and leave behind the water.
Some of my most favorite book (or a whole series / a dozen or few to follow) had been from seemingly simple serendipitous circumstances or conversations. Here are a few examples.
“da da da dum….” : A lot folks who hears this hum can identify it as the epic opening of Beethoven’s Fifth Symphony. It was probably 2001 when I was riding with one of my best friends from school (Madi) in his Mitsubishi Eclipse (which had this out of the world audio system) and I heard this familiar piece. But the next 10 minutes of what followed changed my life. After a 30 second rendition, Prof. Robert Greenberg would come on to explain why this piece is so iconic, why makes it special, what do the various sequential set of notes denote, how Beethoven took the smallest of units of music phrases (notes a third apart) and weave it into one of the greatest imaginations of the human mind …. suddenly a whole new world opened to me - that there are books / audio books / courses where they teach “Music Appreciation”. That these once upon a time inscrutable “you get it or not” complex classical pieces have a much benign aspect to it. They are “learnable”. They are meant for everyone. Anyone can learnt it if they put their mind and follow down the rabbit hole. How could we get more of this awesomeness?
He had borrowed this from library. These CD series were $450 (on any one topic/course! My poor graduate friend and I (not as poorer per se at that point as I was earning but I had a big negative five digit loan balance so in a way, I was poorer) were even ready to split this high cost to get this course – but we decided to not splurge and get to this later when we were better off.
A decade would pass by when I had all but forgotten about this that I got to learn about Audible. Which would eventually be acquired by Amazon. Which would have lots of Great Courses Lecture Series taught by eminent professors in a simple manner - college education for anyone willing to listen. And on top of all this, it would be just one audible credit for a course, so just $15 / course. And on top, you can sometimes get these on deals for half the cost. Oh, and there, lo and behold was Prof. Greenberg and his courses, of which one was “Beethoven Symphonies” in which one of the lectures is the fifth symphony exposition that I had heard.
I would go on to soon start with “How to listen to and understand great music”, to the immortal music and life of Johann Sebastian Bach, about Opera, Mozart and Haydn and ….. and be forever changed by Classical Music and this way of teaching and then binge on about two dozen more Prof. Greenberg courses and I cannot imagine life any other way. One of the ways to split my life would be BCM / ACM : Before Classical Music and After Classical Music. Of course, this is Western Classical music (Indian classical music was something that I grew up with from a young age and did not need any convincing. It was the case of enjoying and then later understanding whereas Western Classical music, I had to go from enjoying it just a bit to understanding it to enjoying it a lot).
The way I got to Audible itself is a story of the serendipity I talked about earlier. So the next story. One of the wisest and smartest colleagues I have had is Sam from Ironport (back in early 2000s). I kept in very good touch with him and in every one of the conversations I had with him, I would come away learning something new. In one such lunch, we ordered Pizza and he would tell me it is not the cheese that is the problem but the dough. Then he told me about Gary Taubes and low-carb hypothesis. And I read Taubes’s Good Calories, Bad Calories (and later, “Why we get fat”) and followed low-carb diet. Since I followed south Indian vegetarian diet, I cannot avoid carbs. Lunch was my heavy meal. So I figured if I walk for half an hour to an hour about 30 minutes after lunch, I can burn most of the immediately burning carbs that I had just consumed. And I definitely got much healthier! (right before this part was the highest weight I had on the scale and while I have yo-yo-ed over the years, 11 years later, I am still 20+ pounds lighter).
Remember this was all in 2011-12!!! (way before everyone and their cousin would start doing but more often talking about low-carb and IF). Yes, Sam would again introduce me to Dr. Jason Fung and Intermittent Fasting about 4-5 years later – which too I followed and still follow today. Sam was also the one to introduce me to python, functional programming, async programming, types and bitcoin. [oh yeah, he introduced me to bitcoin in 2014 – if only I had listened!! :)]. But that one conversation was the start of all the health and biology related books to follow.
Anyways, back to the walking after lunch … after a while the route gets routine … so I started listening to audio books and I would borrow from library (in CD, then transfer to itunes then to phone…) – that made the walks way more enjoyable. In fact, I would look forward to the walks to continue where I left off. It was a fantastic positive feedback loop. Soon audiobooks would also take over my commute. Which is why I never hate the commute time (i do dislike the driving stress in bay area traffic) – it is precious and I try not to take or make phone calls.
Rewinding a bit, it was 2003 or so and Lavanyaa was preparing for her CFA exams. Now this is one hard exam and she would prepare 12-14 hours a day. I had not much to do and hence would start going through her Finance books – a subject I had never learnt about. That’s how I got interested in Options, futures, and derivatives as a whole and a slew of books starting with Michael Lewis’s Liar’s Poker to Andy Kessler to LTCM debacle and many others.
Then there was Kishore, from a sports group we were part of. I recognized his name and asked about and turns out we were distant relatives. AS I joke to anyone who asks, “we are distant relatives and close friends”. We had many common friends. After I joined Google, we both would keep telling each other that we should meet for lunch but kept putting that off. And then one day, he sends a message, “krishna, let’s make this happen within the next week since I am leaving Google”. So we meet for lunch and immediately in a few minutes, we talk about Vedanta (again, not surprisingly, the conversation always starts in some form of “what are you reading? or doing these days?”). We extend lunch and go for an hour walk where he would introduce me to Swami Paramarthananda and Swami Sarvapriyananda. Also to a resource of books and lectures – well, think that as another way to split my life : BVG and AVG : Before Vedanta Guru and After Vedanta Guru. I continue to learn and read and listen to the commentaries by Swami Paramarthananda. If I talk anything about vedanta or say something that seems good (or wise) or useful, I attribute it to learning from him. [anything not so is my fault of not understanding or explaining clearly]. This is also what led me to Bhagavad Gita and the Upanishads. This is going to be the topic of many of my posts to come this year – so stay tuned.
It was during a similar beginning of the year financial discussion with a group of best friends (Anand, Srikrishnan & Durgi), that we were talking roth/conversion that would lead to a series of finance books that forever alter my philosophy of investing. Hopefully that would set us up for a better retirement. Let’s see. It is also similar conversation that would lead to hiking (of all places to Half Dome in Yosemite and Mt. Whitney) and photography (not in that order).
It was Rich who would introduce me to history of the valley, VCs, startups and Search Engines. Tom who would introduce me to Bill Bryson (starting with “Short history of nearly everything” in 2011). Good friends like Saumya & Harini who would introduce me to not only books that I would not have picked by myself but even to genres that I was not familiar with. Then there are folks like Aravindan or Ramesh who are eclectic polymaths who have a title to recommend anytime on any topic. Or Mano who introduced me to Genghis (my most recent write up).
There are many many times when Savit would ask me a question or about a topic during our school rides, and that would lead to a new book (or series of books). Some of which we listen during our school-commutes and laughed a lot and learned a lot too.
Great courses is the gift that keeps on giving – one course leading to another – How to read Shakespeare, History of the universe/world/humans, Bible / Quran / Dhammapada, Books that changed the world, Great classics, the Meaning of Life, Greatest wars, Psychology, Philosophy, Mind, Economics!
And many many other friends, too many to name, who from various groups would here and there introduce me to a new book, new author, new topic. The list grows never ending. (almost like this bleddy post which I was hoping would be a short one …but I can’t seem to stop). I cannot thank them all enough! Life would be boring without friends and books.
As I have mentioned, I love Audible. Now great courses has its own streaming app : Wondrium. Buffet all you can listen & learn indeed! (ironically and not so surprisingly I now listen less on that). I use the Kindle App on the iPad as my reading medium. I have given away 100s of my dead tree books and almost always prefer ebook since I can carry my whole library with me anywhere for a constant weight. [At about 2000 books, it is not just travel carrying, it is also a physical constraint on the real estate at home]. As I (only partly) joke, the biggest inheritance I leave to Savit will be my kindle password. It works for me.
One of my recent interesting reads is “How to live on 24 hours a day”. More a novella (or long essay than a book). Time is the truest equanimous giver. Everyone gets the same. You get one day at a time (or one second at time, pick your denominator). Not just you, everyone, who are around you, or who ever lived, get exactly the same. You cannot save up nor can you borrow. You get it when you get it and it is expended immediately whether you want it or not, whether you like it or not. It is up to each one of us to use it wisely and make the best of it. It is about picking up reading non-fiction classics.
Anyways, 24 hours a day, 8 hours to sleep, 8 hours of work or whatever the day-duty is, leaves 8. About 4-6 of that for getting ready, doing mandatory stuff for sustenance, commute, care, what not. That leaves roughly 2-4 hours every day for each of us to use to our liking. Time spent in one thing is time not spent in another. We all make that sacrifice or compromise or choice.
That brings me to all the things I don’t read or do. Cutting sports was the easiest do (for me). Going from an ardent NFL fan to Lombardi trophy champion (okay, it was just an office fantasy football league) to now I barely watch only the afc/nfc championship games and superbowl. (no other sports like nba, nhl, mlb … etc). I haven’t watched any cricket in the last many years (I knew of a t20 world cup only because friends post about it). Watched only the second half of world cup soccer final (but it was a long worthwhile & interesting one). Movies & TV had to go next. For the large part, I am at about 3-4 hours of tv a week. Now and then I get into a tv-binge mode and catch up on important or most recommended movies / series and then go back to my reading cocoon. Definitely not to say reading is somehow superior. Reading is also just yet another “content consumption”. Reading can be just as equivalent to junk food and mindless, useless or even worse detrimental if not done with thought. But the chances that average reading does more good than average many other things.
Given the internet and social media, audio, video and streaming of music, tv and movies, not to leave out the zillions of blogs and websites and news sites – everything has become about content. We are consuming content all the while. Especially in the 2-4 hours and another 2-4 hours (in micro-increments spread through out the way). What we consume seems to be the only choice.
Once again, we cannot beat time. Nor biology. It took a while to realize even simple math. Even if I have another 50 years and read 200 books a year, I still would read only 10,000 more books. That’s already at the high end of the optimistic projections. Very likely the true number of books left is less than half that.
Too short to be wasting reading things that don’t matter. (unless I make a “yay junk food” choice and indulge). That hard fact, I had to stop being interested in everything. So hard core finance, economics, psychology, world war 1 & 2, romans, all of England & France kings and wars, huge chunk of arts & entertainment, almost all fiction, most of the classics – all had to go. Of course, when new facts (or thoughts) present, it is easy to revise the opinion. so no big deal.
I like to think of my main reading interest classified as healthy, wealthy and wise – as the purported Benjamin Franklin quote goes. It also nicely maps to one of my favorite books : Herman Hesse’s Siddhartha : “I can think, I can wait, I can fast” (very roughly, wise, wealthy and healthy in the reverse order of the original quote).
Healthy and Wealthy can be set up to some level and then it is a matter of following through. Very less to do for the latter - and a constant effort for the former, if the book / advise are to be followed. But the Wise part – now that’s always a work in progress. The search for truth is eternal. Follow the one who is seeking and run away from the one who says he has found it (as the witty quip goes).
Happiness, peace, truth, love, knowledge -> are they any different? They are a jumble of nodes in an acyclic graph as it would seem but when zoomed out would all appear completely within a close circle called life.
The point of it all is to be happy and to be at peace. That comes from the right knowledge. Which is (or can be) from books & reading. The purpose of reading is not more reading nor the purpose of knowledge more knowledge. Hence the measure is not in reading or number of books read. Those are but proxy metrics to a larger goal. It is action. It is the implementation of the knowledge to one’s very life. To lead the happy moral life. To be of happiness and help to one’s family, to your friends and to society.
So that concludes my free-form reflecting for now.
Now for the wish.
May your new trip around the Sun be filled with many happy trips in your thinking by your wonderful experiences - be it meeting friends, traveling places, listening to music or dancing or watching or reading books.
Happy reading! Happy new year!