It’s common knowledge that when you exercise, you become stronger. You increase your power.
There’s a book by Maria Duduman, “Exercises of love”.
The title might let you think that it’s an exercise of love, that you will know how to love more, by exercising small but continuous acts of love.
It might be.
But, to me, the book is about courage.
I tried imagining myself in some situations in the book. I found that I don’t have nearly as much courage as the author.
Life can be hard for everyone. But not everyone can grow stronger.
To me, the book is an act of courage, first of all. Yes, love also.
There’s a quote I like:
Răul poate să-l facă oricine, cât de nevolnic ar fi. Binele însă e numai pentru sufletele tari și firile călite. Răul: lapte pentru copii; binele: carne pentru adulți. (Nicolae Steinhardt, Jurnalul fericirii, Editura Mănăstirii Rohia, Rohia, 2005)
Evil can be done by anyone, no matter how incapable they may be. But goodness is reserved only for strong souls and hardened characters. Evil: milk for children; goodness: meat for adults. (Nicolae Steinhardt, Jurnalul fericirii, Editura Mănăstirii Rohia, Rohia, 2005)
While reading the book, I got a lot of emotions. I don’t think it’s easy to read.
A funny quote:
“It’s tough to make predictions, especially about the future.” ― Yogi Berra
When you read the book, it’s easy to say “Hmm, that’s so obvious, I would never do that mistake.”. Yes, looking backward mistakes seem silly. When you actually put them in a context – they are not that obvious.
The book is written in a business context, but it’s mostly about life stories. Quite inspiring.
At some point, I read something by Rand Fishkin – he prefers to read book summaries for business books, as most books of this kind (business) tend to expand on a very simple idea – you can get the most value by reading a summary.
I think this book is the exact opposite – many different ideas are condensed in a small space.
Finally, it’s nice to put the book in context – to see how it fits the recent history of Romania.
I enjoyed reading the book.
If you want to become more powerful, to have more courage, it might be an idea to read something about exercises of courage. Or, because they tend to be very similar, of love.