2022 in Books

Storytelling, Leadership, Predicting The Future, and Faithfully Asking Questions

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I originally posted this on my personal website with links to my past reading lists and thoughts.

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A Year For Stories

I would consider myself a bibliophile. When it comes to both buying books, and reading books I am more solidly established in the buying camp. Every time I go into a bookstore, I can’t help but buy something. Especially when it’s an independent bookstore, my interest in Bookstore Economics kicks in, and I have to support local business. In terms of reading books, I certainly hit a downward trend line during COVID. I was reading ~40 books a year, often with the bulk of my reading during my commute. When COVID hit, I lost a lot of that consistency and am now reading ~12-15 a year.

On top of that, 2022 marked my first year consistently writing. I’ve written a post every week this year for Investing 101, writing 115K+ words and growing it to 10K+ subscribers. It’s certainly one of the most consistent things I’ve done and, while the quality of the writing certainly varies, it’s something I’m proud of.

Between having my third kid, starting a new job, writing consistently, and moving, I’ve found myself without nearly as much time for reading. I’m reminded of that every time I have a conversation with my sons about how much they love reading. In particular, my son Dax has started reading literary classics like Captain Underpants and Dog Man. Recently, we were driving and saw a deer run across the road. “Dad! Why is that deer our here jaywalking?” In moments like that, you realize that as soon as your kids start to read they’re exposed to ideas that you had nothing to do with. “Where did you learn what jaywalking is?”

So, in addition to trying to consistently engage with my sons on the ideas they’re being exposed to, I also sat down for my annual tradition of reflecting on the themes that seemed to emerge from my reading this year. I never set out with themes, I sort of pick what I read fairly haphazardly. But I always seem to find a set of themes fairly organically, maybe its in part just what I happen to be thinking about and noticing already.

Themes

Storytelling

I continued my goal from last year of trying to read more fiction, with almost 50% of the books I read this year being fiction. I also continued my obsession with Brandon Sanderson, having read 6 of his books last year, and 4 this year. I have massive respect for the storytelling skill that Brandon Sanderson has. Beyond fanciful storytelling, this whole year for me I kept coming back to this idea that storytelling can often be just as important as reality. Perceived reality is craftable.

In The Founders, Mike Moritz was on the board of PayPal from Sequoia, and has a great quote about Elon Musk: “Elon, as the world knows today, is a very gifted storyteller. And some of the stories even come true.” I may touch more on my reflections on Elon Musk in some future writing, but I see this as one of his greatest skills: being able to paint a vivid picture of the future.

In a similar vein, in The Ride of a Lifetime, Bob Iger said to his board about Disney, “As Animation goes, so goes the company,” while they were considering the acquisition of Pixar. You can abstract that to storytelling being the lifeblood of a company like Disney. I would argue that is true of almost any company.

“Tell me your story, and I’ll tell you how successful you’ll be.”

Leadership

Many of the people doing the storytelling in the books I read this year were doing so in the role of a leader. Whether fictional characters leading rag-tag bands of bridgemen, or CEO’s of Fortune 500 companies. The principles of leadership so often revolve around storytelling as well. Rallying people to believe in something, and then executing towards that belief.

Bob Iger had a handful of pearls in The Ride of a Lifetime, but this one stuck with me in terms of storytelling for yourself and the people around you:

“Optimism emerges from faith in yourself and in the people who work for you. It’s not about saying things are good when they’re not, and it’s not about conveying some blind faith that “things will work out.” It’s about believing in your and others’ abilities.”

Predicting The Future

When it comes to predictions, it’s typically true that “the only thing they all have in common is that they’re wrong.” Specific predictions can amount to little more than guesswork, but understanding frameworks for how the world works can increase the likelihood that you at least won’t be surprised by certain outcomes. As I reflected more on some global topics, I read books like 2034, and China in 10 Words, and continue to feel a sense of apprehension about global politics.

Reading The Greatest Minds and Ideas of All Time wasn’t originally part of my attempt to better reflect on what’s going on in the world, and what that mean for the future. It was a book I read as part of a book club. But as I was reading it, I couldn’t stop thinking of this quote about history.

“Those who cannot remember the past are condemned to repeat it.

When I reflected on the ideas in Greatest Minds, you see frameworks from Dante, Kant, Plato, Confucius, and more, and you can’t help but appreciate how much of the world around us is dictated by human nature. If we did a better job of studying human behavior, we would probably all be better at predicting markets.

Faithful Question Asking

In a very different vein from what I read that most often makes it into my work, and writing, I spent a fair bit of time this year thinking more deeply about questions and faith and the honest pursuit of truth. I belong to the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-Day Saints, I believe in Jesus Christ, and a spiritual purpose in everything around us.

I’m also politically fairly liberal, and ideologically I’m deeply skeptical of blind belief in anything (whether its Jesus, Elon Musk, or creatine.) I think every perspective can, and should, be reasoned out. I love this quote from Charlie Munger:

“I feel that I'm not entitled to have an opinion unless I can state the arguments against my position better than the people who are in opposition. I think that I am qualified to speak only when I've reached that state.”

So when I choose to believe in a deity that I can’t see or hear with my physical senses, and I’m confronted by fairly intelligent atheists that deride all forms of organized religion, I’m forced to be very thoughtful about why I believe what I believe. I read books specifically to better understand the process of questioning my own religion so that I can justify why I believe it.

To see my full list of books I read in 2022, and a quick blurb on my takeaways, check out my personal website.

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