Every entrepreneur probably knows the famous Tim Ferriss, right? Well, if you don’t, he’s an Amercian author, entrepreneur, a public speaker, and even a self-proclaimed “human guinea pig.” He’s famous for his self-help books that he has published the past couple of years, which includes his bestseller ‘The 4-Hour Workweek,’ ‘The 4-Hour Body,’ and ‘The 4-Hour Chef.’ Ferriss is also an angel investor in Facebook, Twitter, StumbleUpon, Evernote, and Uber. Now that we’re done with introducing him to you, we’re gonna begin reviewing one of his recent books published in 2016 ‘Tools of Titans: The Tactics, Routines, and Habits of Billionaires, Icons, and World-Class Performers.’
By now, you’re probably asking what is this book actually about and how can it help? This book is the perfect read for those who’re working on boosting their productivity, through tools, tactics and some secrets based on top performers he interviewed such as Scott Adams, creator of the Dilbert cartoon, Writer Maria Popova, Actor Kevin Costner, and Reid Hoffman, co-founder of LinkedIn. His book is divided into 3 sections: Healthy, Wealthy and Wise, where it’s filled with pieces of advice shared by the aforementioned celebrities in addition to Ferriss’s own tips, such as the tools to sleep (Honey + apple cider vinegar before bed, one push up before bed, a 10 minute game of Tetris and more) as well as productivity tricks (Blocking out solid blocks of time for 2-3 hours and focusing on one major thing to do for the day to reduce procrastination). He also includes a suggestion of products to use (Chilipad devide, Nutribullet blender), documentaries, movies and videos to watch (The Cruise, Catfish, Scott Pilgrim Vs The World, Neil Gaiman’s “Make Good Art” commencement speech), articles to read (Drinking at 1300 feet, Kayfabe on edge.org, Peter’s laws) and a whole bunch of various recommendations.
Ferriss allows the reader to skip through his 650-pages long book to the bits they find interesting. The book tackles a variety of topics related to productivity, from focusing on your goals, confidnence, imagining your future, learning how to work on your tasks in an efficient manner, fixing your daily routines, easing stress and the importance of meditation and self reflection, tips on business tactics and personal growth, to even tips on how to raise your kids. Trust us when we say this book is literally inclusive!
These are some of the interesting quotes found in Ferriss’s book:
- “Being busy is a form of laziness – lazy thinking and indiscriminate action. Being busy is most often used as a guise for avoiding the few critically important but uncomfortable actions.”
- “The world is changed by your example, not by your opinion.”
- “His Message at a High School Commencement “You guys are programmed to succeed. The hardest thing you’re ever going to do in your life is fail at something, and if you don’t start failing at things, you will not live a full life. You’ll be living a cautious life on a path that you know is pretty much guaranteed to more or less work. That’s not getting the most out of this amazing world we live in. You have to do the hardest thing that you have not been prepared for in this school or any school: You have to be prepared to fail. That’s how you’re going to expand yourself and grow. As you work through that process of failure and learning, you will really deepen into the human being you’re capable of being.”
In conclusion, one cannot help but feel mind blown at the end of his book. It’s not your typical self help book that tells you to have a positive attitude everyday and force a smile on your face until you feel happy, but it provides you with actual practical skills that you can implement in your own life and see how your system evolves within the next few days, weeks or even a year.
This book costs about 6 BD in hardcover and and 4.5 BD in paperback, and is available on Amazon.com and the Book Depository.