Book Review for Entrepreneurs: The Monk Who Sold His Ferrari
TL;DR
- All about how to lead a happy and contented life, narrated relatably.
- Highly effective techniques have been mentioned.
- Convincing motivations and explanations provided for each technique.
- Written to be easily remembered
- Chapters 7 and 9 make this book unique.
- A perfect book that teaches aspiring entrepreneurs to lead a life of balance, happiness, discipline and purpose.
- Worth multiple readings.
Introduction
Julian Mantle, a hotshot litigator, collapses during a court session due to a massive heart stroke. He takes this event as a wake up call, auctions away his worldly possessions and heads to India in search of spirituality and answers. His journey leads him to a cult of Himalayan sages. He learns their techniques for leading the best of life and lives with them for a while, in exchange for a promise: to return back to the western world and teach their ways to those in need. He returns to his homeland, and decides to meet his ex-apprentice, John, a younger-brother figure, and bless him with the ancient knowledge of the Sages of Sivana. These teachings are the core content of the book.
The Fable
After setting up the scene from chapters one to five, the core content of the book begins. In chapter six, Robin Sharma presents an extremely short fable that, without context, makes no sense. Each event of the fable represents a virtue; a segment of the Sivana knowledge. This fable is the condensed content of the whole book and the rest of the book is all about explaining each event of this fable.
Each chapter from here teaches the importance of a virtue and techniques to emboss them into our life.
The Virtues
Chapter 7 employs a green garden to metaphorize the human mind and teaches us the importance of being the master of our mind and techniques to take care of our thoughts. Robin Sharma presents a beautiful and thought provoking point of view at the working of the human mind, preaching that each thought is a physical entity that can be controlled with practice, and we can’t afford even a single negative thought.
Chapter 8 is about finding and following the purpose of our life, explaining the importance of setting goals and quoting that the purpose of life is life of purpose. The author provides a broader, unique and logical meaning to “setting goals”. The author urges the readers to take risks and pursue small passions and hobbies in order to realize our purpose.
Chapter 9, the lengthiest and the most influential chapter of the book is about being the best version of oneself by constant self improvement, or Kaizen, as the Japanese named it. Robin Sharma presents The 10 Ancient Rituals of Radiant living, which when practiced for a month can truly be life changing. I personally followed these and have seen drastic changes in my thought process and improved sense of satisfaction and happiness. The author also talks about constantly pushing ourselves outside the comfort zone to become a better person, everyday.
Chapter 10 talks about the power of discipline and will-power and Chapter 11 talks about the importance of time and balance of life. The content of these chapters is what we find in almost any self-help book.
The author professes that our ultimate purpose here on earth is to help fellow beings and the quality of one’s life ultimately comes down to their quality of contribution to the world. He explains that embracing the present and savoring every moment is the key to perpetual happiness. These are the final two virtues elaborated in the book.
Review
The content of the book could be simply put into a few pages of rules for good life, but the narration, elaboration and explanation provide the motivation to embrace the ideas and techniques. Throughout the book, Robin Sharma does what he does best; motivating and teaching the readers to become their best, in the best way. Regarding the story of the litigator-turned-monk, it is not one of success, but of the failure caused by obsessive pursuit for success and the success that realizations from this failure paved the way to. It invokes the readers to retrospect their own journey and state, and feel an urge to improve.
For young entrepreneurs, who could easily get lost in their endeavor and forget themselves, this book would be a friend who would constantly remind the need for balance and happiness in the intense and non-linear journey of entrepreneurship.
About the Author (from robinsharma.com)
Robin Sharma is one of the world’s premier speakers on Leadership and Personal Mastery. For nearly 20 years, many of the most well-known organizations on the planet, ranging from Nike, GE, Microsoft, FedEx, PwC, HP and Oracle to NASA, Yale University and YPO have chosen Robin Sharma for their most important events. Sharma’s books such as The Leader Who Had No Title have topped bestseller lists internationally. He is a global phenomenon for helping people do brilliant work, thrive amid change and realize their highest leadership capacities within the organization so that personal responsibility, productivity, ingenuity and mastery soars. Sharma has been ranked as one of the Top 5 Leadership Experts in the World in an independent survey of over 22,000 businesspeople and appears on platforms with other luminaries such as Richard Branson, Bill Clinton, Jack Welch and Shaquille O’Neal.
