Johnny Caraveo

The Last Lecture by Randy Pausch is a short book compiled together from a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University.  The book contains accounts of Randy Pausch’s life, who was diagnosed with a terminal cancer.  The lecture he gives in his book is directed towards his three kids and wife.  The lecture is about his life’s experiences, life lessons, and about following your childhood dreams.

The book is sad because you know Randy’s fate, yet he is optimistic and positive, not a drop of melancholy is etched in his writing.  His experience with terminal cancer and how he wants to be remebered to the world and most importantly to his children and loving wife is touching, to say the least.  His lecture was done in an auditorium with a quickly prepared powerpoint and an audience of students, friends, family, and co-workers.  It have been circularing around the internet and can be found here: The Last Lecture- YouTube

Randy Pausch writes about enabling your childhood dreams and how important it is to keep “dreaming” and “dream big.”  He also tells the readers about how you need to help enable others dreams as well.  I could not agree with him more.  Helping other people with their goals and dreams is something that I have been doing since childhood.  It just feels good.

He offers wisdom such as,

“When you see yourself doing something badly and nobody’s bothering to tell you anymore, that’s a bad place to be.  You may not want to hear it, but your critics are often the ones telling you they still love you and care about you, and want to make you better.”

I am also a vivid supporter of wikipedia and agree completely with him when he says in his book “Wikipedia is a perfectly find source for your information…”

My favorite excerpt from this book is a quote Randy gets from Seneca a roman philosopher which states: 

“Luck is what happens when preparation meets opportunity”

Since the professor was a computer scientist I was expecting the book to be a little more technical but overall the presentation is quick, effecient, and clear.  Randy says that the book was created for his family to remeber him after his passing.  There are a few funny parts where Randy is being sarcastic and the way he tells stories is really unique -like when he tells the story of him and his wife almost dieing in a baloon ride- which the way he tells the story is extremely hilarious.

Overall the book is inspirational to those who are wanting to learn more about enabling dreams, accomplishing goals, and dealing with terminal cancer.

After reading The Last Lecture I learned that Randy Pausch passed away on July 25, 2008, R.I.P.

Jon M. Huntsman is a modest boy from Blackfoot, Idaho.  He grew up learning lessons that would lead him to create a multi-billion dollar chemical business.  What he says is simple; back to the basics -when it comes to morale code.

Jon’s book, Winners Never Cheat, takes on corrupt business practices and teaches it’s readers that even in our modern times virtues like integrity, courage, honor, and respect are integral parts of a succesful business. It tells the reader that since childhood we all have a moral (subcouncious) compass that guides us, wether we listen to it or not is up to our councious selfs.

The book provides value to those those who are seeking to be genourous in their business practices.  It speaks briefly about business management and gives several childhood and young adult examples of what leadership should be.  Jon M. Hunstman seems like a very extraordinary person and it would certaintly be an honor to know him or anyone else from his family for that matter.  I purchased the book to read about Jon’s “3 R’s” of leadership; risk, responsiblity, and reliability.  I will say that the book was a little lacking in describing and talking about risk, which is the main reason I bought the book, but it covers the other two R’s perfectly.

The book goes on to say that trust is an invaluable  part of business and it warns that:

“Trust, should not be blind. Save blind faith for religion.”

What it meansby this  is that you should be aware of whom you give your trust too.  Don’t leave it up to chance and don’t give your trust to just anyone. When Jon speaks about trust he goes on to say that words are binding and that keeping your word is one of the most important actions that define great character.

In my favorite part, Jon speaks about philantrophy and how it is important for the individual to give back to his society.  He speaks about his genours contributions to multiple schools, hospitals, and organization that were created to find a cure for cancer.  He states that:

“Philanthropy is plain good business. [Because] It energizes a company.”

He goes on to say that one does not have to be rich to give.  That one of the most valuable things we can give is time.  

A notable excerpt from the book is a poem Jon quotes entitled “No Man Is an Island”:

No man is an island,
No man stands alone,
Each man’s joy is joy to me,
Each man’s grief is my own.

 

We need one another,
So I will defend
Each man as my brother,
Each man as my friend.

This book is recommended for those who are interested in ethos, business, leadership and those who want to learn more about the way Mr. Hunstman’s mind works.

Ayn Rand’ book entitled Philosophy: Who Needs It is an excellent introduction to Ayn Rand’s objective philosophy.  She gives many examples on how her objective philosophy allows individuals to live a more practical, rational, and conscious life.  In the book she summarizes her philosophy and explains why other forms of thinking are contradictory and ultimately unpractical.

She boosts reason as the highest human value and goes after those with superficial knowledge:

“Reason is the only objective means of communication and of understaning among men; when men deal with one another by means of reason, reality is their objective standard and frame of reference.  But when men claim to possess supernatural means of knowledge, no persuasion, communication or understanding are possible.”

As is Ayn Rand’s signature, she is always introducing her other projects in her current work. That is something to look forward to in her books.  She always explains her  ideas clearly and describes WHY she thinks that way.  Here is my favorite excert from her other book Atlas Shrugged:

“You seek escape from pain.  We seek the achievement of hapiness. You exist for the sake of avoiding punishement. We exist for the sake of earning rewards. Threats will not make us function; fear is not our incentive. It is not death that we wish to avoid, but life that we wish to live.”

In Philosophy: Who Needs It, she takes on many complex problems that have been plaguing humanity: false religion, goverment involvement in economics, government stiffling of individual freedoms, contradictory philosophies, wrong moral codes and plenty of other controversial subjects.  Even though she takes on these hard subjects she never loses her focus on explaing why objective thinking can be the solutions to these problems.

I will state that in her book Ayn Rand predicted the current economic state and blames it on too much government interaction with the economy.  Which logically I would have to agree.

Ayn Rand goes on to show that the current system rewards those who are lazy, unmotivated, and ultimately without integrity.  She brilliantly states:

“Whome would these men fear most, psychologically -and least, existentially?  The brilliant loner -the begineer, the young man of potential genius and innocently ruthless integrity, whos only weapons are talent and truth.  They reject him “instinctively” saying that “he doesn’t belong” (to what?), sensing that he would put them on the spot by raising issues they prefer not to face.  He might get past their protective barriers, once in a while, but he is handicapped by his virtues -in a system rigged against intelligence and integrity.”

The book is an excellent source for those who are interested in thinking clearly, objectively, and those interested in integrity and Ayn Rand’s philosophy.