Leisa Michelle

Nerdy Monologues of an Autodidact

38 Books in 12 Months

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When I moved to Poland on August 30th, 2015, I decided to make a list of goals for myself. One of them was to read 15 books within the following year. It turns out that I read 38 books. That comes out to 7,942 total pages read or 209 pages per book on average.

Just… why? Why did you do this?

I dropped out of college in January 2015. Lots of factors played into my decision, but the biggest problem I had with university was that I wasn’t learning enough and I wasn’t learning what I wanted. So since dropping out of school, my education has been exclusively in my own hands. If I want to learn new things, I have to consciously set aside the time to do so. It happens that books are my favorite way of learning. Reading is awesome. I do a lot of it.

So without further ado, please enjoy the fun graphs and master list of all the books I read (with the link to the review I wrote of each book, if applicable) presented below.

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Being Like Water – Reflections on Dylan Thomas, Lao Tzu, and Hermann Hesse

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This post is a part of my Personal Development Project for May 2016.

Usually when I finish a good or truly awesome book, I’m immediately gripped by the need to write about it. I have to spend a couple hours just pouring out my thoughts and feelings in an Evernote document before I’m able to feel any sort of peace. And actually, it’s not uncommon for me to have to go through this process multiple times before I even finish the book. It doesn’t matter whether the book was a treatise on economics or religion, or was a Shakespearean play or a YA novel. I always have something to say or note or think about afterward.

But most unusually, when I finished Steppenwolf by Hermann Hesse, I didn’t have anything to say. I didn’t have anything that I actively wanted to write about. I felt the weight of the work and was consumed in simply remembering it for days on end, but I didn’t actually feel that prickling need to write about it or record my thoughts. It was bizarre. But I just trusted myself and went with it, assuming I would never write anything about Steppenwolf and how much it affected me (I wanted to say “how it changed my life”, but that’s a bit too dramatic).

While on a walk the other day though, I realized there is indeed something I really want to say. And the novel Steppenwolf is largely responsible for the insight that I had:

We can’t alter or control the world as much as we would like to.

It’s just not possible. And it’s okay. Good, even. If we were all-powerful, if we had the insight or ability to make everything “just work right”, then we’d miss out on a lot of beautiful things in life. We’d miss out on community and camaraderie and love. These things require trust, vulnerability, and a lack of control.

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On Being Great vs Becoming Great

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This post is a part of my Personal Development Project for May 2016.

The world will allow you to follow your dreams once it realizes that it's too late to stop you.

-TK Coleman

I recently came across this video by TK Coleman on “Being Great vs Becoming Great”.

Basically, being great means that you produce tangible things of value. TK uses JK Rowling as an example of someone who is great. When she has a new book published, everyone flocks to the store to buy it. Her greatness is tangible — it’s a book on the shelf. We can touch it and read it and learn from it and pass it on to others.

Becoming great, in contrast, isn’t tangible. Becoming great is a long process that you have to commit to day after day. It’s not glamorous by any means. People will get on your case while you’re in the process of becoming great. They may tell you to grow up or stop being so boring.

TK says that when you tell someone you can’t hang out because you’re in a concert the next morning, they go, “Ahh, yeah cool! No problem! Next time then.” When you tell someone you can’t hang out because you want to practice your guitar, then they say, “Come on, man. Don’t be that way. Come out and have fun with us.”

People react positively to greatness that’s already established, and they’re less understanding of the actions required for becoming great.

The Paradox of Dreaming: You get the most support for your dreams when you least need it.

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On the Unconscious and Empathy

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The following stream-of-consciousness style essay is inspired by The Charisma Myth by Olivia Cabane. You can read my summary and review of the book on Goodreads.

The point of The Charisma Myth was to help the reader adjust their body language to reflect their interests and desires. And it was interesting for me to read not just as a means of self-development, but also as a means of self-awareness and interpersonal awareness.

Obviously, people don’t always mean what they say. But the opposite is true too. Sometimes people do mean what they say, and if you read too deep into the language used or body language exhibited (even if the assessment is completely subconscious), then you can easily misunderstand people.

To use an example from the book: You scrunch your face after I say how important personal privacy is in the context of government surveillance. I can assume that you reacted that way because you don’t like what I said. But maybe the sun is just in your eyes. Another example: Someone asks you how long you’re going to be “stuck” in your current job. You can assume that they think you’re powerless over your situation, or that they disapprove of the work you’re doing. But maybe they’re just trying to be funny, or maybe they didn’t give their word choice much thought. It’s easy to misunderstand people when we delve too deep into things.

And it can be hard to say exactly what you mean. You don’t think in words or language, so speaking involves several encoding and decoding processes. Things quickly get lost in translation. And everything gets more complicated when you yourself don’t even know what you mean.

Unconscious Processes

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“Revolutionary Parenting” – No More Punishments

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I don’t usually listen to podcasts (they’re uncomfortable to take notes on), but today I did. I started up Isaac Morehouse’s podcast episode entitled “Revolutionary Parenting” this morning just to hear what “revolutionary parenting” actually was. I was planning to Google whatever came up in the first 10 minutes of the discussion, turn off the podcast, and then keep reading what Google gave me. But I was completely entranced after a couple minutes of listening to Kevin Geary and Isaac bounce back and forth parenting philosophies that toss traditional ideas of punishment out the window.

“Parenting without punishment and reward” wasn’t a new concept for me when I started listening to this podcast episode. I meet a lot of educators and psychologists that practice NVC (nonviolent communication) and advocate primarily the use of empathy in child rearing instead of rewards and punishments. But the idea (and reality!) of not punishing your kids never gets stale for me. It’s incredible to consider what society would be like if we raised a generation of kids without punishing or shaming them for misbehaviors and so-called “bad choices.”

Why do we even punish kids?

According to conventional wisdom, when a kid does something wrong or bad, he needs to be punished. He didn’t do his homework? Grounded. He hit his sister? Grounded. He knocked over the china while playing ball? Grounded (or shamed with an unnecessarily brutal or accusatory talk). Maybe he’s spanked. Maybe he’s sent to bed without supper. Somehow, in some way, he’s punished.

We rationalize punishment by saying that all actions have consequences. We see ourselves, adults, as the judges of morality, good choices, and good behaviors. We uphold the law. If we don’t teach that actions have consequences, our kids will never learn that, right?

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