Of Tools of Titans Part II

Following on from my last blog here’s another five nuggets from Tim Ferris’s book Tools of Titans.

I realise as I wade through this book it is fast becoming my favourite self development/business book of all time.

Here we go :

1.Failure is Overrated

What I found in the book about failure is really interesting.

One of his interviewees says this :

“I think failure is massively overrated. Most businesses fail for more than one reason. So when a business fails, you often don’t learn at all because the failure was overdetermined. You will think it failed for reason 1 but it failed for reasons 1 to 5. And so the next business you start will fail for Reason 2 and then for 3 and so on.

“I think people actually do not learn very much from failure. I think it ends up being quite damaging and demoralising to people in the long run and my sense is that the death of every business is a tragedy”.

2. Understanding Competition

The book talks about taking the right perspective on the time you have to work at a business. It notes there will also be someone somewhere in the world who can outwork you - often many people.

“So I think every day, it’s something to reflect on and think about “How do I become less competitive in order that I can become more successful”.

In short the book argues that you have to work out how to work more cleverly than others rather than longer.

3. Generating Ideas

At P238 there is pure wisdom about how to generate new ideas. It claims you should actually sit down and list really bad ideas and to try to find as many as possible. Eventually, you’ll realise that a few in amongst them are actually very good and some may be grounding breaking and of a type that could make you a fortune.

4. Generating Ideas Part II

James Altucher talks about focusing on the creative parts of the brain and giving it a regular work out. Ferris states “James recommends the habit of writing down 10 ideas each morning in a notebook. This exercise is for developing your “idea muscle” and confidence for creativity on demand so regular practice is more important than the topics.

I like this a lot.

5. No Need to Explain your Nos

The world doesn’t need your explanation on saying No. Altucher says :

"I don’t give explanations anymore, and I’ll catch myself when I start giving explanations like “Oh, I’m sorry, I can’t make it. I just say I can’t do it”.