Think Straight - Darius Foroux

 Darius has already written seven books and this one is said to be an international no 1 bestseller and is published by Penguin and has an attractive title for someone who is muddleheaded like me and it was slim and had small chapters with illustrations - so I braved it. Overall, it was very underwhelming. More like a motivational talk about how to be successful.

The by line says - 'Change your thoughts, change your life' which is something we have been told from the time of 'The Secret' or 'You Can Heal Your Life' or maybe some of our ancients. Darius says that the emphasis must be on 'deciding' to choose one thought over the other. He says we can control what we think. All we have to do is decide. He says he changed is life by changing his thoughts - 3 years before he wrote this book he was stuck and now he is not.

To think straight he says, stay grounded, look at facts and listen to other perspectives. One can do this by training one's mind. He says when things go wrong don't worry, think through (like the time he rented a house and went there and the landlady went back on her commitment and he panicked and then thought straight and got himself an AirBnB which worked out just fine because the landlady gave him the flat in the end).

Other things he says to think straight is to understand that life is not linear, that we must filter our thoughts, that we must connect the dots by making enough dots, and stop thinking 'useless' stuff. Focus thoughts on what is in your control (desires, action, words, thoughts, intentions) and let go those outside your control.      

His personal experience was these two useful thoughts 

- think about how to solve a problem at hand
- think about using your knowledge to improve your life

Don't make decisions based on your beliefs. Always check for facts vs assumptions. Don't make quick decisions - take your time.Also, draw your thoughts he says.

Be yourself he says - not what you should be. Ask yourself what are you good at, what are you passionate about, what do you dislike. Reflect by keeping a journal.

Somewhere we went into his Money Rules - don't buy stuff you don't need, save 10% of what you earn every month, have a no debt policy, invest early and don't be stingy in spending on yourself.

You think best when you are not thinking he says - which makes sense. He insists that we must take care of the details for good work. 

Finally he says we must take thinking out of the equation by being clear about what we are doing and why - that way we end up with decisive and purposeful action.

He also says we must not live with regrets - we only regret what we did not do (so do what's on your list right now).Also, don't look back - for nostalgia don't keep old stuff, throw it all away, don't get stuck.

Focus on effective thoughts which lie in the domains of

- making your life better
- giving your career and business a boost
- visualising your future
- thinking new ideas
- solving problems
- coming up with fun things to do with family and friends

All this is about inner calm, about thinking straight. Then he says, think beyond yourself and gives the nice story of William James, a renowned psychiatrist, who gave credit on the idea of 'Principle of Pragmatism' to his old colleague Charles Sanders Peirce, who had fallen from grace and thereby resurrected him.

... 

As I discovered, there was precious little in the domain of how to think straight. Would have liked to go deeper into the how of it, actual examples which drove home the point, that one big thing that we take away when we say ' hey, this is what this book is about'. It goes all over the place which is not what I expected. The ones I will remember are the illustration of the mess and the straight line, the points about effective thinking about what one could think about, what one need not think about, and the story of William James.

And Penguin, how can you make an edit mistake in the foreword itself! (..that I longer live my life that way!)

 My take on thinking straight is that it happens when we take ownership. When we own things, are held accountable, we think straight because we are responsible for the results. When we are accountable for the results of our actions, we tend to think straight, or we mess it up. Either way we learn.

And that's where MS Dhoni's greatest advise on how to became a better decision maker comes - make more decisions and you will become a better decision maker. You will make mistakes but you will learn to keep your eyes open, to study the landscape, to watch out for the details and to take calculated risks instead of hoping. You make dots by going into things with passion, with eyes and heart wide open, and when we look back those show up as dots because we owned those moments and decisions.

The rest, I will save up for my book!