2025's readings

Atomic Habits

It’s a series of personal observations and experiences buildings habits. James then makes an efforts into explaining the psychological foundation behind how a habit is formalised and maintained over time. Such small changes are proven to give remarkable results through compound effect.

Building a habit should always start with asking yourself: what’s your identify. If your habits are in the oposite direction to the person you want to become, then it’s time to change. Then James come up with 4 laws of Habit: make it obvious, make it attractive, make it easy, and make it satisfying. The first 3 are all about how to make habits happens in the first place, and the last one is how to make it last. Through out the book, James provides with very powerful yet simple method to stick with a good habit or stop a bad one. The most important I found is about priming your environment. It makes a habit obvious and easy to start. If it helps building and bolding your identify, by itself, it’s attractive and satisfying to see you’re building and reaching it.

The author also points out an extremely important fact, that building a habit, or broader, a career, a life, success is not all about dealing with failure, it's about falling in love with boredom too. With boredom, there it comes with two ways to think about it: either we stick with boredom and find a meaning through suffering, as Viktor has mentioned in his “Man’s search for meaning”, to always stay at the edge of your ability by making it slightly more challenging, according to the Goldilocks rule to find the peak of motivation.

Thinking, fast and slow

This book has amazed me in many ways. Daniel Kahneman, a Nobel Laureate in psychology and economics, has revealed the hidden processes behind our thinking in such a profound yet accessible manner. It feels as though the book has helped me understand myself better, offering alternative ways of thinking about work, life, well-being, and most importantly, happiness.

Throughout the book, Kahneman introduces two characters that symbolize our modes of thinking: System 1 (our fast, automatic, intuitive thinking) and System 2 (our slower, effortful, and often lazy reasoning). He also distinguishes between the experiencing self and the remembering self, shedding light on how differently we perceive and evaluate our lives depending on which "self" is in charge. Through these lenses, Kahneman illustrates just how biased and irrational we can be in our thinking and decision-making.

It's difficult for me to summarize the long list of cognitive biases he explores—such as anchoring effects, narrow framing, or excessive coherence—but the key takeaway is striking: many of our decisions are wrong, and we don't even realize it. This includes how we assess our happiness and well-being. Kahneman writes, “Nothing in life is as important as you think it is while you are thinking about it,” emphasizing the power of focus and how it distorts our judgment.

Most impressively, he shows that these biases are not flaws to be eradicated, but intrinsic to our human nature. There’s not much we can do to completely overcome them—but we can become more aware. His practical suggestions become especially valuable in high-stakes situations or moments of self-reflection. For example, before making a decision, we can ask ourselves:

• “Is this number an anchor?”
• “Would my decision change if the problem were framed differently?”
• “Am I using the base rate properly in this prediction?”

At work, structured methods like reference-class forecasting and premortems can help counteract bias. Kahneman points out that we are often better at spotting errors in others than in ourselves, writing: “You are more likely to learn something by finding surprises in your own behavior than by hearing surprising facts about people in general.” In that sense, he suggests treating our decision-making like gossip: imagine how someone else would critique the choice you're about to make.

Personally, the most valuable lesson I took from this book is a deeper understanding of well-being and happiness. Kahneman highlights how we often overvalue peak experiences or endings, and how we neglect the duration of our emotional states. This insight reminds me that my experiencing self—the one who lives through each moment—is the one truly living my life, not the remembering self who judges it in retrospect. I need to remind myself that my happy moments far outnumber the suffering ones, and that I should not let fleeting lows overshadow a deeply fulfilling life. I want to cherish my present more, value the people I love, and feel even more grateful than I already am.

Man's search for meaning (Viktor E. Frankl), and The diary of a Young Girl (Anne Frank)

Two Books, One Message: On the Meaning of Life

Two books I coincidentally read earlier this year share the same historical context and deliver one of the loudest messages about the meaning of life — though coming from two different people at very different points in their lives. Viktor Frankl was a university professor in neurology and psychiatry before being imprisoned during WWII. Anne Frank was just a teenager at the time. While Frankl survived the camps and later wrote his book to share his story with the world, Anne died at the age of 16 — the best age to be alive.

Despite all their differences, the core message is the same: Life only makes sense — and is only truly livable — when it has meaning. Counterintuitive as it sounds, the meaning of life is not a question we ask; rather, life is a question, and we answer it through the way we live. Just like happiness or success, meaning is not something to pursue, but something that ensues — it comes as a result of how we engage with life in each moment.

According to Frankl, we discover meaning in three main ways:

• Through work,
• Through experiencing something or encountering someone, and
• Through our attitude toward unavoidable suffering.

Work is perhaps the most accessible way to find meaning. Without it, we risk falling into an “existential vacuum” — a state of boredom and inner emptiness. We face this in both our personal and professional lives. That’s why people sometimes quit jobs even after a raise or promotion — because something deeper is missing. Often, it’s not more money or status people want, but a mission — a sense that their work matters.

The second path to meaning is through experiences or human connection. And above all, through love: love for nature, for art, or for another person. In both books, we see this clearly. Frankl writes, “He who has a Why to live for can bear almost any How.” For him, the thought of his wife — the hope of seeing her again — kept him alive despite the unbearable suffering of the camps. For Anne, it was her love for life, her dreams of becoming a writer, the idea of returning to school, seeing her friends again, and maybe even her connection with Peter — all of this gave her strength to live and write throughout two years in hiding. Everyone, without exception, has something — a what or who — to love and to live for.

The third, and most powerful, source of meaning is how we respond to suffering. This is a uniquely human potential — to transform tragedy into triumph. When facing unavoidable suffering, we are challenged to change ourselves, to grow, and to give our pain a purpose. As Frankl puts it, “Everything can be taken from a man but one thing: the last of the human freedoms — to choose one’s attitude in any given set of circumstances.”

Life, even in the darkest times, is full of meaning — if we are willing to see it. The stories of Frankl and Anne Frank remind us that we don’t need to wait for a “perfect” life to find purpose. The process of living — working, loving, enduring — is already an answer to the question of meaning.

Never split the difference: Negotiating as if your life depended on it

This book on negotiation turned out to be the perfect continuation of this year' reads. Written by a former FBI hostage negotiator, it continues the psychological journey I started with Thinking, Fast and Slow, but takes it from the realm of theory straight into actions.

What surprised me most was how negotiation is less about persuasion and more about empathy. It's not a battle to win or lose — it’s a dance, one where listening is your strongest move. Voss builds his method around this core idea: the best negotiators listen deeply, reflect back emotions, and create trust. Techniques like mirroring, labeling, and asking calibrated questions (e.g., “How can we solve this together?”) aren't just tricks — they are tools for connection.

Here are a few ideas that stayed with me:

• Negotiation is not about getting to “yes” — it’s about getting to “that’s right.” When someone says “you’re right,” they may just be appeasing you. But when they say “that’s right,” they feel understood — and that's where real alignment begins.

• Being empathetic doesn’t mean being soft. Voss teaches tactical empathy — the kind that acknowledges emotions without giving in. You can say “it seems like this deal puts a lot of pressure on you” and still hold your position. It’s about validating their perspective, not surrendering yours.

• Power comes from preparation, not aggression. One of the most grounding concepts is BATNA — Best Alternative To a Negotiated Agreement. Knowing your walk-away point not only gives you leverage but also keeps you calm. You don’t negotiate well when you’re desperate.

• People are loss-averse. Just like Kahneman pointed out, people fear losses twice as much as they value gains. That’s why emphasizing what the other side stands to lose — if no deal is reached — is often more effective than promising benefits.

• But perhaps the deepest insight is this: negotiation is a life skill, not just a business one. It’s about navigating conflict, managing emotion, and building cooperation — whether it's with a boss, a partner, or even a child. It’s less about being clever, and more about being human.

After reading this book, my next challenge will be to see everyday conversations differently. I'm keen to trying seeing more going on beneath the surface, be patient and curious to uncover them, and to expect outcomes to be not only more successful but more meaningful.

Hyperfocus: How to Work Less and Achieve More — Chris Bailey

Despite what the title suggests, this book isn’t just about intense focus — it’s a smart, concise guide to mastering two distinct modes of attention: Hyperfocus and Scatterfocus. Both are life-changing when understood and used intentionally.

"You become what you give your attention to. If you yourself don’t choose what thoughts and images you expose yourself to, someone else will." — Epictetus (Discourses)

This 2000-year-old insight feels even more urgent today, in a world of endless distractions and information overload. Bailey builds on this idea by identifying the four different places where your attention can go:

Since attention is limited — at both work and home — the goal is to spend as much time as possible on Purposeful Work, delegate or minimize Necessary Work, and eliminate the rest whenever possible.

Hyperfocus: Single-Tasking with Intention

Hyperfocus is the state of deep, intentional concentration on one meaningful task at a time. The book provides practical advice on how to create the right environment, minimize distractions, and — most importantly — choose the right tasks to enter this state.

Key principles:

• The Rule of Three: Identify no more than three high-impact tasks for the day.
• Prioritize tasks that are challenging enough to engage your attention, but not so difficult that they cause overwhelm.
• Approach work with a clear intention about where your attention should be.

Bailey also shares valuable tactics for setting up your workspace and habits to support this mode, including the role of meditation in expanding your attention span.

Scatterfocus: Intentional Mind-Wandering

Scatterfocus was a new and refreshing concept for me. It’s a purposeful form of mind-wandering that unlocks creativity, problem-solving, planning, and recovery. The book outlines three modes of Scatterfocus:

• Capture Mode: Let your mind wander freely, capturing interesting thoughts as they appear.
• Problem-Crunching Mode: Hold a problem loosely in mind and allow ideas to surface naturally.
• Habitual Mode: Engage in enjoyable routines (like walking or cooking) while remaining open to ideas or insights.

The ability to benefit from Scatterfocus is linked to the size of your attention space — and practicing Hyperfocus helps expand it.

An especially interesting insight was Bailey’s take on boredom. Rather than avoiding it, he suggests embracing boredom as a trigger for creativity and Scatterfocus. In our device-filled world, opportunities for boredom (and the creative breakthroughs it often leads to) have become rare.