As Rilke wrote, “[In these books] a world will come over you, the happiness, the abundance, the incomprehensible immensity of a world. Live a while in these books, learn from them what seems to you worth learning, but above all love them. This love will be repaid you a thousand and a thousand times, and however your life may turn,—it will, I am certain of it, run through the fabric of your growth as one of the most important threads among all the threads of your experiences, disappointments and joys.”
A helpful reminder! Enjoyed this article a lot. Arthur Brooks (HBS professor) tells his students to read at least 15-20 minutes of what he calls "wisdom literature" (Stoics, Montaigne, Dostoevsky) to build the right zoomed-out perspective on life.
Also I'm reminded of this quote too by James Baldwin:
"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, who had ever been alive.”
Brendan, I’m reading Arthur C Brooks ( is he the same you mentioned) book, Build the Life You Want, the Art and Science of getting Happier. Very wise and thoughtful.
even more helpful reading this a few days after the election. + 1 to "sensible human things" and for the benefits of reading. I've been taking back up reading long form blogs (including this one) and it's made me a lot more grounded in my own thinking. Thank you!
Great article Packy. I love those connection moments!!
Regarding retaining information - I highly recommend Tiago’s Forte book on the topic, ‘Building the Second Brain’. It really changed my life.
As for recommendations, many useful ones come from inside the book themselves. Every time a book is mentioned in another book I read, I write it down (I have a spreadsheet). This is the reason for many of my ‘random comnection’ moments.
Great post. How do you find and discover these books by the way? I buy most books from Amazon and their recommendation algorithm often fails to surface really good books. I wish there was a better social book recommendation system, where books read by fellow like-minded people (in my case, tech startup entrepreneurs and founders) are recommended
I actually recently dumped a bunch of my essays into Claude and asked for personalized recommendations, which is where I got a bunch of them. But you can also just tell it "I want to learn more about X" or "I've read and loved these 5 books, what else do you recommend?"
I do exactly the same, ChatGPT has been so far the best possible advisor for me on what to read. It’s just super spot on. Some people might get scared by having an AI that somehow is “biasing you” on what to read but I feel great anyways.
Another clever way is reading the book’s references and you might land on even more interesting books.
Awesome piece Packy. As a EU reader and even being deeply concerned by the US election that have so much impact on Europe, I learnt not to bother on things I can not control
That’s said, what about building a reading list related to your substack ? All the great book you recommend
Thanks for the post, Packy. A very timely reminder to focus on what counts and a beautiful way to put things into perspective in a moment of national or even global tension.
One of your best posts ever - such an incredible reminder that we have agency and choice and that even something as small as choosing to read, or read about a subject in a focused manner, can lead to those "puzzle piece" moments that make all the difference
Could not agree more with the premise of this post as I am a cranky Gen Xer. After several hours on Twitter (I have barely been there since the transition to X) it was a great relief to actually read a book and consume an argument that got to take place in paragraphs.
If what you are afraid of like me is the end of the liberal Jewish American dream then you should try to fight it as much as possible and find the allies that are going to help you do so.
Thanks, Packy. What a wonderful reminder and encouragement.
This post should be shared a couple of weeks from now when everyone is getting over the results of the election and looking ahead to how they will play the new rules being established.
When reading books and building your knowledge/research about niche topics like Vertical Integrators, do you take notes and maintain a database to review later (like how David Perell teaches in WOP. Doing the final cohort right now)
Asking this because I found reading a book needs focus to just read and understand, while noting down can be a whole other neural process that needs to be done separately.
Not sure if you've talked about this publicly, but would love to learn. Research-based writing hasn't been talked about much during WOP (aside from writing from abundance)
Amen! My all time books list: https://www.tomwhitenoise.com/bookshelf
As Rilke wrote, “[In these books] a world will come over you, the happiness, the abundance, the incomprehensible immensity of a world. Live a while in these books, learn from them what seems to you worth learning, but above all love them. This love will be repaid you a thousand and a thousand times, and however your life may turn,—it will, I am certain of it, run through the fabric of your growth as one of the most important threads among all the threads of your experiences, disappointments and joys.”
A helpful reminder! Enjoyed this article a lot. Arthur Brooks (HBS professor) tells his students to read at least 15-20 minutes of what he calls "wisdom literature" (Stoics, Montaigne, Dostoevsky) to build the right zoomed-out perspective on life.
Also I'm reminded of this quote too by James Baldwin:
"You think your pain and your heartbreak are unprecedented in the history of the world, but then you read. It was books that taught me that the things that tormented me most were the very things that connected me with all the people who were alive, who had ever been alive.”
Brendan, I’m reading Arthur C Brooks ( is he the same you mentioned) book, Build the Life You Want, the Art and Science of getting Happier. Very wise and thoughtful.
even more helpful reading this a few days after the election. + 1 to "sensible human things" and for the benefits of reading. I've been taking back up reading long form blogs (including this one) and it's made me a lot more grounded in my own thinking. Thank you!
Great article Packy. I love those connection moments!!
Regarding retaining information - I highly recommend Tiago’s Forte book on the topic, ‘Building the Second Brain’. It really changed my life.
As for recommendations, many useful ones come from inside the book themselves. Every time a book is mentioned in another book I read, I write it down (I have a spreadsheet). This is the reason for many of my ‘random comnection’ moments.
Great post. How do you find and discover these books by the way? I buy most books from Amazon and their recommendation algorithm often fails to surface really good books. I wish there was a better social book recommendation system, where books read by fellow like-minded people (in my case, tech startup entrepreneurs and founders) are recommended
I actually recently dumped a bunch of my essays into Claude and asked for personalized recommendations, which is where I got a bunch of them. But you can also just tell it "I want to learn more about X" or "I've read and loved these 5 books, what else do you recommend?"
I do exactly the same, ChatGPT has been so far the best possible advisor for me on what to read. It’s just super spot on. Some people might get scared by having an AI that somehow is “biasing you” on what to read but I feel great anyways.
Another clever way is reading the book’s references and you might land on even more interesting books.
Awesome piece Packy. As a EU reader and even being deeply concerned by the US election that have so much impact on Europe, I learnt not to bother on things I can not control
That’s said, what about building a reading list related to your substack ? All the great book you recommend
Thanks for the post, Packy. A very timely reminder to focus on what counts and a beautiful way to put things into perspective in a moment of national or even global tension.
awesome piece!
One of your best posts ever - such an incredible reminder that we have agency and choice and that even something as small as choosing to read, or read about a subject in a focused manner, can lead to those "puzzle piece" moments that make all the difference
Any thoughts on the benefits of physically reading vs listening to audiobooks. I’ve yet to see a good concise breakdown of the benefits.
I'm a big physically reading, albeit usually on kindle/ipad to highlight. I just really like the ability to highlight.
On my part, I've been reading "The Toolbox" by Jacob Harold.
It's "palate cleanser" :)
Could not agree more with the premise of this post as I am a cranky Gen Xer. After several hours on Twitter (I have barely been there since the transition to X) it was a great relief to actually read a book and consume an argument that got to take place in paragraphs.
If what you are afraid of like me is the end of the liberal Jewish American dream then you should try to fight it as much as possible and find the allies that are going to help you do so.
hahaha the beautiful juxtaposition of telling people to read more and misspelling the subheader!
Enjoyed this read, Packy!
Thanks, Packy. What a wonderful reminder and encouragement.
This post should be shared a couple of weeks from now when everyone is getting over the results of the election and looking ahead to how they will play the new rules being established.
great piece, nice job :)
Hi Packy, question as a budding business writer:
When reading books and building your knowledge/research about niche topics like Vertical Integrators, do you take notes and maintain a database to review later (like how David Perell teaches in WOP. Doing the final cohort right now)
Asking this because I found reading a book needs focus to just read and understand, while noting down can be a whole other neural process that needs to be done separately.
Not sure if you've talked about this publicly, but would love to learn. Research-based writing hasn't been talked about much during WOP (aside from writing from abundance)
I highlight in Kindle and then review highlights in Readwise, but don't do much note taking.