James D'Souza

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  • The Glass Bead Game – Hermann Hesse

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      The Glass Bead Game is a book that works on several levels. It’s in five sections and is (on the surface) about the life of one central character – told from a biographer’s view. The Myers-Briggs personality test is based four dimensions (extraversion-introversion, sensing-intuition, thinking-feeling, and perceiving-judging) which originally came from Jungian psychology. Hesse…

  • A Christmas Carol – Charles Dickens

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      Over Christmas as part of my school’s reading challenge, I read A Christmas Carol – the original – for the first time. You can get a copy here.

  • The Checklist Manifesto – Atul Gawande

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    This book is a call to action to use the humble checklist. Written and researched by a surgeon in the US, Gawande supports his idea with numbers from research including: at least 60 percent of patients with pneumonia receive incomplete or inappropriate care from their doctors. A checklist is a list of actions to be…

  • The Great Dune Trilogy: Part One: Dune – Frank Herbert

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    I just finished The Great Dune Trilogy: Part One: Dune. It’s an edition with all three (epic) books as one volume..at some point I’ll start the second.

  • The 5 Love Languages – Gary Chapman

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    This book is by a marriage counsellor – but do not let that put you off. The author suggests that each of us has one of five ‘Love Languages’. Our primary Love Language is our preferred method for giving and receiving love. I discovered these concepts after being married over ten years – and they…

  • Happy – Derren Brown

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      Derren Brown – best-known as an illusionist – outlines the rigorous application of stoic philosophy to increase our happiness on an everyday level. In one psychology experiment he references, the mortality rate of a group of residents in a nursing home was twice as high when they had all their decisions made for them.…

  • Sway – Pragya Agarwal

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    I’m currently reading Sway by Pragya Agarwal. Already and uncomfortably, I’m noticing my own (unconscious) bias as I thought the author was a man. Get your copy here.

  • Man's Search For Meaning – Viktor Frankl

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      This book is a reflection on the author’s time in concentration camps, and its deeper lessons for life. During his three years in four camps, and given his background in neurology and psychiatry, he created a new approach in psychotherapy.  Logotherapy is Frankl’s theory that finding meaning in life is our primary motivator. He…

  • Rest – Alex Soojung-Kim Pang

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      This book proposes viewing rest as an active lifetime requirement. Across two parts (Stimulating Creativity and Sustaining Creativity) the author uses meticulous research and detailed case studies of the strategies used by wildly creative people across history. Rest is when the brain switches on a Default Mode Network (DMN) and cognition becomes inward focused.…

  • Essentialism – Greg McKeown

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      This book is an invitation to simplify. Greg McKeown outlines three principles that get underneath the tactics of time management: explore, eliminate, and execute. Essentialism is developing our self-awareness and clarity to allow us the disciplined pursuit of less. Using personal stories (the author shares how he interrupted the birth of his child to…