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The Conventional Explanation For Jewish Success, Of Course, Is That Jews Come From A Literate, Intellectual Culture. They Are Famously "the People Of The Book." There Is Surely Something To That. But It Wasn't Just The Children Of Rabbis Who Went To Law School. It Was The Children Of Garment Workers. And Their Critical Advantage In Climbing The Professional Ladder Wasn't The Intellectual Rigor You Get From Studying The Talmud. It Was The Practical Intelligence And Savvy You Get From Watching Your Father Sell Aprons On Hester Street.

-Malcolm Gladwell

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The Conventional Explanation For

Malcolm Gladwell

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The Conventional Explanation For Jewish Success, Of Course, Is That Jews Come From A Literate, Intellectual Culture. They Are Famously "the People Of The Book." There Is Surely Something To That. But It Wasn't Just The Children Of Rabbis Who Went To Law School. It Was The Children Of Garment Workers. And Their Critical Advantage In Climbing The Professional Ladder Wasn't The Intellectual Rigor You Get From Studying The Talmud. It Was The Practical Intelligence And Savvy You Get From Watching Your Father Sell Aprons On Hester Street.

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I Suspect People Who Are Indecisive Are People Who Are Far Too Enamored Of Analysis In All Settings And Are Destroying Their Ability To Make An Instinctive Judgment Through Over-analysis And That's Dangerous.

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It Is Those Who Are Successful, In Other Words, Who Are Most Likely To Be Given The Kinds Of Special Opportunities That Lead To Further Success.

I Don't Want To Be Like The Angry Old Guy In The Corner Who Is Always Ranting And Raving About The Same Things - But I Don't Mind Doing That Just A Little Bit!

Our Unconscious Is Really Good At Quick Decision-making - It Often Delivers A Better Answer Than More Deliberate And Exhaustive Ways Of Thinking.

A Study At The University Of Utah Found That If You Ask Someone Why He Is Friendly With Someone Else, He’ll Say It Is Because He And His Friend Share Similar Attitudes. But If You Actually Quiz The Two Of Them On Their Attitudes, You’ll Find Out That What They Actually Share Is Similar Activities. We’re Friends With The People We Do Things With, As Much As We Are With The People We Resemble. We Don’t Seek Out Friends, In Other Words. We Associate With The People Who Occupy The Same Small, Physical Spaces That We Do.

Of The Great Entrepreneurs Of This Era, People Will Have Forgotten Steve Jobs.

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Choking Is About Thinking Too Much. Panic Is About Thinking Too Little. Choking Is About Loss Of Instinct. Panic Is Reversion To Instinct. They May Look The Same, But They Are Worlds Apart.

The Great Accomplishment Of Jobs's Life Is How Effectively He Put His Idiosyncrasies - His Petulance, His Narcissism, And His Rudeness - In The Service Of Perfection.

A Book, I Was Taught Long Ago In English Class, Is A Living And Breathing Document That Grows Richer With Each New Reading.

I've Always Been Baffled By How Much We Over-rate The Statistically Insignificant Differences That Separate Competitors At The Top End Of The Distribution.

That Fundamentally Undermines Your Ability To Access The Best Part Of Your Instincts. So My Advice To Those People Would Be Stop Thinking And Introspecting So Much And Do A Little More Acting.

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Sometimes Constraints Actually Create Success. Not Being Able To Swim Made Me Run. And Running Taught Me The Discipline I Needed As A Writer.

If You Look At The Careers Of Great Entrepreneurs And You Look At The Moment They Took Their Plunge, The Plunge Is Rarely A Great Financial Or Material Risk, It’s A Social Risk. At The Moment They Started Their New Businesses, Everyone Around Them Said ‘you’re An Idiot’.

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If You Don't Contradict Yourself On A Regular Basis, Then You're Not Thinking.

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Emotion Is Contagious.

Does That Mean We Should Give Up? Probably. But There Are Two Issues Worth Considering. The First Is - Is It Really True That Drugs Destroy The Integrity Of The Game?

Did They Know Why They Knew? Not At All. But The Knew!

When People In Authority Want The Rest Of Us To Behave, It Matters-first And Foremost-how They Behave.

There Is This Tremendous Body Of Knowledge In The World Of Academia Where Extraordinary Numbers Of Incredibly Thoughtful People Have Taken The Time To Examine On A Really Profound Level The Way We Live Our Lives And Who We Are And Where We've Been. That Brilliant Learning Sometimes Gets Trapped In Academia And Never Sees The Light Of Day.

I Became Convinced That Knowing Lots Of People Was Kind Of Skill, Something That The Diligent Can Overcome.

As A Writer, I Know That - You Write A First Draft And Then Put It In A Drawer. The Longer I Can Put It In A Drawer, The Better Off I Am. So I Structure My Writing So That Things Can Sit.

Flom Had The Same Experience...he Didn't Triumph Over Adversity. Instead, What Started Out As Adversity Ended Up Being An Opportunity.

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I've Been In Auditions Without Screens, And I Can Assure You That I Was Prejudiced. I Began To Listen With My Eyes, And There Is No Way That Your Eyes Don't Affect Your Judgement. The Only True Way To Listen Is With Your Ears And Your Heart. (p.251)

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My Highest Compliment Is When Someone Comes Up To Me To Say, "my 14-year-old Daughter, Or My 12-year-old Son Read Your Book And Loved It." I Cannot Conceive Of A Greater Compliment Than That - To Write Something That As An Adult I Find Satisfying, But Also That Manages To Reach A Curious 13- Or 14-year-old.

You Don't Manage A Social Wrong. You Should Be Ending It.

It Wasn't An Excuse. It Was A Fact. He'd Had To Make His Way Alone, And No One - Not Rock Stars, Not Professional Athletes, Not Software Billionaires, And Not Even Geniuses - Ever Makes It Alone.

The Face Is Not A Secondary Billboard For Our Internal Feelings. It Is An Equal Partner In The Emotional Process.

The Tipping Point Is That Magic Moment When An Idea, Trend, Or Social Behavior Crosses A Threshold, Tips, And Spreads Like Wildfire.

When Writing, You Can't Break Physical Rules. You Can't Have People Come Back From The Dead. That's Cheating. I Am A Kind Of Narrative Fundamentalist In Many Ways.

In Fact, Researchers Have Settled On What They Believe Is The Magic Number For True Expertise: Ten Thousand Hours.

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That Is The Paradox Of The Epidemic: That In Order To Create One Contagious Movement, You Often Have To Create Many Small Movements First.

Our Unconscious Reactions Come Out Of A Locked Room, And We Can't Look Inside That Room. But With Experience We Become Expert At Using Our Behavior And Our Training To Interpret - And Decode - What Lies Behind Our Snap Judgment And First Impressions.

First Impression

You May Hate Hillary Clinton And You May Have Good Reason For Hating Hillary Clinton, But Hillary Clinton Is One Person Who Even If She's Elected Will Be Gone One Day And You Still Have The Task Of Keeping American Democracy Going.

Outlier Are Those Who Have Been Given Opportunities-- -and Who Have Had The Strength And Presence Of Mind To Seize Them.

Presence Of Mind

Performance Ought To Improve With Experience, And Pressure Is An Obstacle That The Diligent Can Overcome.

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We Don't Know Where Our First Impressions Come From Or Precisely What They Mean, So We Don't Always Appreciate Their Fragility.

As Human Beings, We Always Expect Everyday Change To Happen Slowly And Steadily, And For There To Be Some Relationship Between Cause And Effect.

Cause And Effect

We Overlook Just How Large A Role We All Play--and By 'we' I Mean Society--in Determining Who Makes It And Who Doesn't.

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An Innate Gift And A Certain Amount Of Intelligence Are Important, But What Really Pays Is Ordinary Experience.

Shortly After The Birth Control Pill Was Approved For Public Distribution, One Woman Wrote To John Rock, Its Inventor, "you Should Be Afraid To Meet Your Maker." Rock, Despite Being Catholic Replied, "my Dear Madam, In My Faith, We Are Taught That The Lord Is With Us Always. When My Time Comes, There Will Be No Need For Introductions."

Through Embracing The Diversity Of Humans Beings, We Will Find A Sure Way To True Happiness.

I Don't Think People Are Averse To Thinking About Things In A Deep Way, But We Have Limited Time And Opportunity To Think About Things In A Deep Way. I Think That's Why There Is An Appetite For Non-fiction - It Gives People The Opportunity To Reexamine Ordinary Experience And Be Smarter About It.

Anyone Who Has Ever Scanned The Bookshelves Of A New Girlfriend Or Boyfriend- Or Peeked Inside His Or Her Medicine Cabinet- Understands This Implicitly; You Can Learn As Much - Or More - From One Glance At A Private Space As You Can From Hours Of Exposure To A Public Face.

I'm In The Storytelling Business, And So You're Always Drawn To The Unusual. And Early On, I Discovered That's The Easiest Way To Tell Stories... If You Come Up Through A Newspaper As I Did, Your Whole Goal Is To Get A Story On The Front Page, And You Only Get Something On The Front Page If It's Unusual.

...if You Work Hard Enough And Assert Yourself, And Use Your Mind And Imagination, You Can Shape The World To Your Desires. (151)

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The Band-aid Solution Is Actually The Best Kind Of Solution Because It Involves Solving A Problem With The Minimum Amount Of Effort And Time And Cost.

That's Your Responsibility As A Person, As A Human Being - To Constantly Be Updating Your Positions On As Many Things As Possible. And If You Don't Contradict Yourself On A Regular Basis, Then You're Not Thinking.

It's Not About How Smart You Are. It's About Your Values.

You Can't Concentrate On Doing Anything If You Are Thinking, “what's Gonna Happen If It Doesn't Go Right?

Change Your Mind About Something Significant Every Day.

Changing Your Mind

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First Impression

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I Have A New Way Of Doing Things, And I Don’t Care If You Think I’m Crazy.

Nothing Frustrates Me More Than Someone Who Reads Something Of Mine Or Anyone Else's And Says, Angrily, 'i Don't Buy It.' Why Are They Angry? Good Writing Does Not Succeed Or Fail On The Strength Of Its Ability To Persuade. It Succeeds Or Fails On The Strength Of Its Ability To Engage You, To Make You Think, To Give You A Glimpse Into Someone Else's Head—even If In The End You Conclude That Someone Else's Head Is Not A Place You'd Really Like To Be.

Success Is Not A Random Act. It Arises Out Of A Predictable And Powerful Set Of Circumstances And Opportunities.

What Track Needs To Figure Out: How To Engage Us Between The Races. Instead, The Entire Off-the-track Conversation Is About Doping. This Is How You Kill A Sport.

So Long As The Stereotype Is Used As A Way Of Understanding How To Fix The Problem As Opposed To Demonizing A People Or Writing Them Off, Then I Think It's Ok.

Understanding The True Nature Of Instinctive Decision Making Requires Us To Be Forgiving Of Those People Trapped In Circumstances Where Good Judgment Is Imperiled.

Instead Of Thinking About Talent As Something That You Acquire, Talent Should Be Thought Of As Something That You Develop.

I'm Totally Engaging In Cultural Stereotyping, No Question About It. But I Think It's Ok Because I'm Doing It For A Reason, For A Good Reason.

By Shifting The Balance Away From The Individual We Open The Door For The Individual. Because We Make It Obvious That Anyone Can Do It Given The Right Circumstance.

Our Intuitions, As Humans, Aren't Always Very Good. Changes That Happen Really Suddenly, On The Strength Of The Most Minor Of Input, Can Be Deeply Confusing.

An Aggressive Drug-testing Program Would Cut Down On Certain Abuses, But Its Never Going To Catch Everyone - Or Even Close To Everyone.

I Worry That Track Is Going To Enter Into An Impossibly Complicated Stage, Where Our Understanding Of The Complexities Of Human Physiology - And Our Ability To Accentuate And Exploit Them - Is Going To Make The Notion Of Pure Competition Impossible.

Bad Improvisers Block Action, Often With A High Degree Of Skill. Good Improvisers Develop Action.

Do You See The Consequences Of The Way We Have Chosen To Think About Success? Because We So Profoundly Personalize Success, We Miss Opportunities To Lift Others Onto The Top Rung...we Are Too Much In Awe Of Those Who Succeed And Far Too Dismissive Of Those Who Fail. And Most Of All, We Become Much Too Passive. We Overlook Just How Large A Role We All Play—and By “we” I Mean Society—in Determining Who Makes It And Who Doesn’t.

An Incredibly High Percentage Of Successful Entrepreneurs Are Dyslexic. That's One Of The Little-known Facts.

If People Disobey, Don't Ask What Is Wrong With Them, Ask What's Wrong With Their Leaders.

Superstar Lawyers And Math Whizzes And Software Entrepreneurs Appear At First Blush To Lie Outside Ordinary Experience. But They Don't. They Are Products Of History And Community, Of Opportunity And Legacy. Their Success Is Not Exceptional Or Mysterious. It Is Grounded In A Web Of Advantages And Inheritances, Some Deserved, Some Not, Some Earned, Some Just Plain Lucky - But All Critical To Making Them Who They Are. The Outlier, In The End, Is Not An Outlier At All.

The Entire Principle Of A Blind Taste Test Was Ridiculous. They Shouldn't Have Cared So Much That They Were Losing Blind Taste Tests With Old Coke, And We Shouldn't At All Be Surprised That Pepsi's Dominance In Blind Taste Tests Never Translated To Much In The Real World. Why Not? Because In The Real World, No One Ever Drinks Coca-cola Blind.

The Issue Isn't The Accuracy Of The Bombs You Have, It's How You Use The Bombs You Have - And More Importantly, Whether You Ought To Use Bombs At All.

Extreme Visual Clarity, Tunnel Vision, Diminished Sound, And The Sense That Time Is Slowing Down. This Is How The Human Body Reacts To Extreme Stress.

Instinct Is The Gift Of Experience. The First Question You Have To Ask Yourself Is, 'on What Basis Am I Making A Judgment?' ... If You Have No Experience, Then Your Instincts Aren't Any Good.

The Single Most Important Thing A City Can Do Is Provide A Community Where Interesting, Smart People Want To Live With Their Families.

When I See Someone Who Reads Something Of Mine And Draws Something Out Of It That's Very Different From My Perspective, I Think That's Actually Cool. Sometimes It's Worrisome When You Feel They Badly Misinterpret It, But It Just Says That They're Thinking, And They're Bringing Their Own Interpretation To Bear On It. [...] That's Part Of The Wonderful Thing About Putting Words Into The World, And If I Was Worried About That, I Couldn't Be A Writer.

It Is Those Who Are Successful, In Other Words, Who Are Most Likely To Be Given The Kinds Of Special Opportunities That Lead To Further Success. It’s The Rich Who Get The Biggest Tax Breaks. It’s The Best Students Who Get The Best Teaching And Most Attention. And It’s The Biggest Nine- And Ten-year-olds Who Get The Most Coaching And Practice. Success Is The Result Of What Sociologists Like To Call “accumulative Advantage.

When You're An Underdog, You're Forced To Try Things You Would Never Otherwise Have Attempted.

There’s This Powerful Phrase In The Legal World, “difficult Cases Make Bad Law.” The Exception Is The Difficult Case. You Can’t Generalize Them By Definition. So Although They Are Fascinating, They Don’t Solve Any Problem Because They’re So One Of A Kind.

We Cling To The Idea That Success Is A Simple Function Of Individual Merit And That The World In Which We All Grow Up And The Rules We Choose To Write As A Society Don't Matter At All.

There Is A Simple Way To Package Information That, Under The Right Circumstances, Can Make It Irresistible. All You Have To Do Is Find It.

If We Think About Emotion This Way - As Outside-in, Not Inside Out - It Is Possible To Understand How Some People Can Have An Enormous Amount Of Influence Over Others. Some Of Us, After All, Are Very Good At Expressiing Emotions And Feelings, Which Means That We Are Far More Emotionally Contagious Than The Rest Of Us.

In A Country That Never Wins Anything: In Canada, If One Of Our Athletes So Much As Makes The Final In A World Championship, We Declare A National Holiday.

The Biggest Mistake We Make Is Trying To Square The Way We Feel About Something Today With The Way We Felt About It Yesterday. You Shouldn’t Even Bother Doing It. You Should Just Figure Out The Way You Feel Today And If It Happens To Comply With What You Thought Before, Fine. If It Contradicts It, Whatever. Life Goes On.

Courage Is What You Earn When You've Been Through The Tough Times And You Discover They Aren't So Tough After All.

I Interviewed One Of The Most Powerful Lawyers In The World And He Told Me, "at The Time, It Was The Worst Thing In The World Not To Be Able To Get A Job At A Fancy Law Firm, But It's The Greatest Thing That Ever Happened In My Life." It Was A Humble Acknowledgment Of How Forces Much Larger Than Himself Shaped His Career. I Really Wanted To Bring That Point Home.

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