Well Well Well! As part of my target for 2017, I have decided to read a book every month and review it on my website. To all my friends who have set target of 100 or more books, I am surely not trying to enter into any competition, that’s far far away from my dreams. But, I do respect all you bibliophile friends of me.
Oh! getting back to topic. For the month of January I chose to read “Who moved my cheese” by Spencer Johnson, Kenneth H. Blanchard. Well, as procrastination beats me more times then I beat it, I was already past 15 days in the month of January, and with a real busy schedule at my work, I was looking for a book no more then a 100 pages and that was what brought my attention to this little masterpiece. I had heard a lot about this book from one of my senior and friend at work.
The story as it appears is about four characters Sniff, Scurry both depicted as mice and Haw and Hem who are human metaphors, all the characters are always on the quest of finding cheese for their survival. But as the story progresses Hem and Haw find a very large cheese storage and kind of stick to the place. They actually forget to move along and fall so much in love with this station that they don’t notice that cheese here started to finish and rot after certain time. Both happen to be in great distress and though halfheartedly but one of them decides to move ahead while he still can, and search for another cheese storage in the maze. He tries to convince Hem, but Hem sticks to the present station and he is afraid to go out there in the maze. The story is about the ups-and-downs that Haw goes through while trying to locate another cheese station and his realizations that he makes along the way.
What Spencer is actually trying to indicate through this nicely woven story of our life around material attractions is that all these attractions have a lifespan (shorter or longer) and it is us who must know when it is time to move ahead in search of a new cheese / attraction. The longer we will resist to accept the change the more problem we will have when dealing with the change. As a IT professional I see many technologies coming into industry and many getting stale in due course of time, and you simply cannot progress by sticking to it, because in a few years the legacy systems might change and you need to be up-to-date with what might swipe-in. I believe that same things happen in other kind of industries also.
One might face these kind of situations in personal life, business or other places. Believe me that it indeed is difficult to know the point when you have to start looking forward to something new, but that’s where self-analysis will help you, take a peek at your life from the perspective of another person who knows everything about you and your work.
This book is surely a fine read and I give it a five star. Below are few of my beloved quotes from the book:
- The more important your cheese is to you, the more you want to hold on to it.
- If you do not change you can become extinct.
- What would you do, if you weren’t afraid?
- When you are afraid things are going to get worse if you don’t do something, it can prompt you into action. But it is not good when you are so afraid that it keeps you from doing anything. – Haw
- Smell the cheese often so you know when it is getting old.
- Movement in a new direction helps you find new cheese.
- When you stop being afraid, you feel good.
- Imagining yourself enjoying your new cheese, leads you to it.
- The quicker you let go of old cheese, the sooner you find new cheese.
- Old beliefs do not lead you to new cheese.
- He knew that when you change what you believe, you change what you do. You can believe that a change will harm you and resist it. Or you can believe that finding New Cheese will help you and embrace the change.
- Noticing small changes early helps you adapt to the bigger changes that are to come.
Well, that’s a lot of cheese everywhere. But go ahead and give it a shot, who knows if you are also sticking to something which you shouldn’t.
If you have made it till here, I appreciate your patience, and thank you for reading. Let me know through your comments below about anything you liked or anything you might want me to improve(even about my English, it is bad I know!). Cheers!
