Tim Ferriss’s The 4-Hour Workweek. Why did I read this book? It was all Tim and Mark‘s fault. Also, the fault of the UT librarian who displayed it prominently in the new books section.

After skimming about 2/3 of the way through, I took Tim Ferriss’s own advice from page 88:

Practice the art of non-finishing…Starting something doesn’t automatically justify finishing it…If you are reading [a book] that sucks, put it down and don’t pick it back up…

Great advice! I once wrote a post about walking out on bad concerts that suggested the same.

Like any self-help book, there are a few little fortune-cookie nuggets of wisdom. My favorite was a solution to some questions that have been puzzling me lately: What if I don’t know what I want? What if I don’t have any huge goals? Ferriss suggests, that I’m asking the wrong questions—that what I should be asking is, “What excites me?”

I like that.

The other good part of the book is the idea of a “Low Information Diet.” That is, get off the f***ing computer, don’t watch TV, try to limit your reading only to those things that truly give you pleasure and enrich your life.

Which is why I’m putting this book away and starting Lewis Hyde’s The Gift.