Most useful book

sfoster

sfoster

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The most useful book I've ever read was Dale Carnegie's "How to win friends and influence people."

en.wikipedia.org

How to Win Friends and Influence People - Wikipedia

en.wikipedia.org en.wikipedia.org

Implementing the techniques in this book many years ago, I talked my way into a FREE transmission repair at Aamco.
Those things are expensive!

Details: I paid them to rebuild my mustangs transmission 18 months earlier - with a 12 month warranty - I was 6 months beyond their obligations and they wanted to charge me. I asked to speak with the manager, got the owner, and charmed my way into a free repair practically quoting some of the more charming parts of this book , parading as my own organic dialogue.
 
Hmmm, is it the Bible, or the Dictionary of Cultural Literacy? Actually, I'm going to go with Save The Cat. I'm always referencing it, even at work today. I was having a conversation about how big obstacles and strong villains make a story better. My buddy asked, "Why obstacles?" I told him that most audiences relate more to a character that has to fight through obstacles to get where she/he needs to be, because for most people, real life is full of obstacles.
 
Cool. Yes, how to get stuff from other people is a useful skill. But, I think, there are other useful skills as well, like:

en.wikipedia.org

How to See Yourself as You Really Are - Wikipedia

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Dale Carnegie meet Dalai Lama :). Anyway.

Looking back at books that were really useful, and one stands out, that i ran across in a garage sale when i was ten or so. I can't find the specific book, but it was about how to memorize stuff, and it detailed the Major System, a mnemonic device which i have used ever since for stuff like cramming dates for tests, or for not forgetting a hotel room number.

For example, around six months ago I was in this hotel, and i still know the room number: 271. The way the system works: in English there are essentially ten possible consonant sounds, each is assigned a number, and vowel sounds are ignored. Thus, any number can become a word, and every word or phrase is a specific number. 2 is "N," seven is "K" or hard "G," and one is "T" or "D." 271, then, is N K D = Naked. Then I close my eyes and form a memorable image: I'm in the hotel hallway, and i can't remember which room i was in, and I happen to be . . . naked. Yipe! What if i run into some people? How am I to get to the front desk to ask? Anyway.
 
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Spike said:
For example, around six months ago I was in this hotel, and i still know the room number: 271. The way the system works: in English there are essentially ten possible consonant sounds, each is assigned a number, and vowel sounds are ignored. Thus, any number can become a word, and every word or phrase is a specific number. 2 is "N," seven is "K" or hard "G," and one is "T" or "D." 271, then, is N K D = Naked. Then I close my eyes and form a memorable image: I'm in the hotel hallway, and i can't remember which room i was in, and I happen to be . . . naked. Yipe! What if i run into some people? How am I to get to the front desk to ask? Anyway.
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So the first thing to note is that there are memory championship competitions, so this stuff is studied, qualified and quantified.


The most common way to remember stuff is the Method of Loci aka Memory palace.
What you're talking about is the 2nd most common called the Major system.

There's a brilliant example of the Method of Loci being used in the film Dreamcatcher

 
And . . . I like the joke, but feel i have to defend the Dalai Lama, the only "spiritual" leader I can think of who is, I'm pretty sure, a genuinely cool guy. The circulation and subsequent outrage over the tongue thing was a willful misinterpretation of Tibetan language and culture, and of the Dalai Lama himself--and almost certainly Chinese propaganda.

www.vice.com

Tibetans Explain What ‘Suck My Tongue’ Means. It’s Not What You Think.

“It seems that many people, forced into an environment of e-connections, have completely forgotten what human connection means.”
www.vice.com www.vice.com
 
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Spike said:
And . . . I like the joke, but feel i have to defend the Dalai Lama, the only "spiritual" leader I can think of who is, I'm pretty sure, 100% a cool guy. The circulation and outrage over the tongue thing was a willful misinterpretation of Tibetan language and culture, and of the Dalai Lama himself--and almost certainly Chinese propaganda.

www.vice.com

Tibetans Explain What ‘Suck My Tongue’ Means. It’s Not What You Think.

“It seems that many people, forced into an environment of e-connections, have completely forgotten what human connection means.”
www.vice.com www.vice.com
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Futurama Squinting GIF


If it's such a ~"mainstream and normal" thing to say in their culture... why issue an apology for it?

The Dalai Lama recently courted controversy over a video clip that showed his interaction with a young boy who asked for a hug from him. His office later issued an apology letter, stating "His Holiness wishes to apologize to the boy and his family..."
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This article seems very questionable - they fixate on the language aspect - which would be totally believable if he didn't stick his tongue out.
When your tongue's actions line up with your words, it's rather dubious to blame your behavior on an english language barrier.
 
sfoster said:
If it's such a ~"mainstream and normal" thing to say in their culture... why issue an apology for it?

This article seems very questionable - they fixate on the language aspect - which would be totally believable if he didn't stick his tongue out.
When your tongue's actions line up with your words, it's rather dubious to blame your behavior on an english language.
Click to expand...

Don't want to start a thing, here, but the "why issue an apology" thing is pretty easy to understand, and doesn't imply anything. And they don't exactly say it's "mainstream and normal," but rather, that its real meaning is understandable, coming from an old guy in this particular culture. And the Vice article (as well as many other, perhaps more pointed explanations) does explain the tongue thing as an old Tibetan tradition relating to some black-tongued dude. It's a stretch to go from something that strikes us as weird, to saying the 87 year old Dalai Lama was trying to initiate an erotic encounter with a little boy. But, again, not wanting to start a thing. I myself can be pretty harsh, probably unfairly, on Popes and Priests and Gurus and such. :)
 
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Spike said:
Don't want to start a thing, here, but the "why issue an apology" thing is pretty easy to understand, and doesn't imply anything. And they don't exactly say it's "mainstream and normal," but rather, that its real meaning is understandable, coming from an old guy in this particular culture. And the Vice article (as well as many other, perhaps more pointed explanations) does explain the tongue thing as an old Tibetan tradition relating to some black-tongued dude. It's a stretch to go from something that strikes us as weird, to saying the 87 year old Dalai Lama was trying to initiate an erotic encounter with a little boy. But, again, not wanting to start a thing. I myself can be pretty harsh, probably unfairly, on Popes and Priests and Gurus and such. :)
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I appreciate getting to the truth on matters. I don't want to misrepresent someone else!
 
Im not sure if useful is the right word, but I'm thinking of a few of the books, around mid high-school age, that turned me on to the possibility of extravagant, funny, voice-heavy, writing--the kind of books and writers you love, just for the joy: Portnoy's Complaint, Catcher in the Rye, and Sirens of Titan (and then all of Vonnegut to date.)

And a few years later, that turned me on the the possibilities of extravagant, word-heavy, explorations of life through language: Look Homeward Angel *, Henderson the Rain King, (and then the rest of Saul Bellow to date.) and the stories (and the few novels) of John Cheever.

Aye aye aye, while I'm at it--sentimental and nostalgic--as a kid, 7 to 10 or so: Wizard of Oz, Charlottes Web, A Wrinkle in Time, Tom Sawyer, and then Huckleberry Finn.

* Oh lost, and by the wind grieved, ghost, come back again.
 
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