This is going to be the first of a number of posts concerning learning from a direct, non-fiction 7 Ways to a Long Happy Life, Tony Robbins way and the abstract, applying through critical thinking, the writings of Shakespeare, Dante and contemporary authors like Bret Easton Ellis or Pamuk all in the context of what this blog is about: reaching goals and finding success and happiness and reaching that polymath or near polymath level.
So a little background: When I search through the web and I read success oriented blogs I see a lot of things in the style of: 12 Ways to Improve Your Business Acumen, 10 Ways to Assess Your Risk Tolerance, How to Build Your Own Empire, or 5 Steps to a Better Retirement. Also talking to business minded people, whether already successful or on their way to success, about their reading, they seem disinterested when the conversation moves to my thoughts on whether I agree or disagree with a concept in an Ayn Rand or Albert Camus work. The say: “I don't really have time for fiction.” As if Shakespeare were John Grisham! or Dickens a summer movie… but I digress.
This post and the posts that will eventually follow it are not put downs on the very popular non-fiction ‘How to Make Yourself Better at X' industry. In fact I buy and read many such books and subscribe to many blogs that have that kind of theme. I'm a huge fan of Tim Ferriss, for example. My argument won't be that literature is better or that non-fiction is bad. My thesis here will be simple: Do not put literature, or art in general, down because you think it lacks practical applications for your success. Your are wrong and you put yourself at a great disadvantage.
There will be many reasons and thoughts about why in the coming weeks.
