As You Wish by Cary Elwes

As You Wish: Inconceivable Tales from the Making of The Princess Bride by Cary Elwes details the activity behind the scenes surrounding his participation in the movie production of the Princess Bride. He details the struggles of William Goldman and Rob Reiner to get the picture made. It appears to a be a twisted Hollywood game of Red Light Green light. Both Cary and Wallace Shawn were unnecessarily worried about being dumped from the picture.

To maximize the enjoyment of this book, I recommend reading the Princess Bride by William Goldman and watching the movie prior to reading or listening to the audio version of this book.  The audio book adds to the enjoyment with contributions from several of the cast members. Cary also does a spot on impersonation of Rob Reiner among other cast members

The cast and the crew were universally grateful to be part of the picture. Andre the Giant in particular thoroughly enjoyed the experience. In this case a good script, a great cast, an excellent director, and a good studio produced a timeless picture for all generations. A movie that studio executives had no clue how to market when it originally came out. Thanks to VHS and DVD the show found a second life. 

Cary Elwes - As You Wish - 39 minutes

The Princess Bride reunion - 30 minutes

Remembering Andre the Giant - 4 minutes

The Princess Bride by William Goldman

The Princess Bride: An Illustrated Edition of S. Morgenstern's Classic Tale of True Love and High Adventure as relayed by William Goldman offers an additional back story to the movie based on the book directed by Rob Reiner. William Goldman is a masterful storyteller having written several Hollywood screenplays including Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid and All the President's Men.

The illustrations add a nice touch to the text. This addition also includes some of William Goldman's thoughts on the movie adaptation to the book. The book also has a brief additional story about Buttercup's baby.

I appreciated the addition of the back stories for Inigo and Fizzig. Some parts of the book were changed for the movie. The Pit of Despair in the movie was originally the zoo of death in the novel. and some of the lines were lifted from other parts of the text and given to another character. This is an excellent book to read to the whole family.

Film vs. book - 15 min. 

A Walk in the Woods by Bill Bryson

A Walk in the Woods: Rediscovering America on the Appalachian Trail by Bill Bryson describes his late 1990's journey through parts of the Appalachian Trail with his somewhat trusty but less physically fit sidekick Katz. He doesn't sugar coat the experience as he deals with the elements, the insects, the people, and the psychological effects of consecutive days spent in the wilderness.

We follow his preparation for the trip and the concerns he has for his personal safety. He meets a colorful cast of characters on the trail, discusses the history of the trail, and critiques the current trail management. It was interesting to find out that each state and region manages their part of the trail differently.

Bill occasionally drops out of the trail to get provisions and clean up. The towns and places to stay are carefully described. As it turns out I spent some time close to the trail in Vermont within a few years of his journey.  I also found the mountains in Vermont to be very agreeable along with occasional trips to Bob Newhart's Vermont Inn and the Von Tramp family home.

A movie loosely based on the book starring Robert Redford, Nick Nolte, and Emma Thompson was released in 2015 to mixed reviews.

A walk in the woods - Retracing Bryson's steps - 18 min.

An AT hikder reviews the Movie a Walk in the Woods -7 min. 

The Law of Happiness by Dr. Henry Cloud

Law of Happiness, The: How Spiritual Wisdom and Modern Science Can Change Your Life by Dr. Henry Cloud (Dec 27 2011) - According to Dr. Cloud our happiness is roughly divided into three broad categories with different weights attached to them based on the best available research.

• Genetic set point (50%)
• Circumstances (10%) - this condition is temporary (The new car smell wears off)
• Practices (40% - Activities under people's full control

People and society focus on chasing the 10%. These are the "if only's."  If only I get this article published, I get this new house, I get this raise, or I win the lottery will I be happy. These changes will temporarily move the needle up a maximum of 10% before dropping back to the natural resting state.  

The thirteen principals of happiness captured by Robert Wainner at Coach 4 Leadership deal with the 40% of practices that are under our control.

I'm going to condense them into smaller number.

1. Pursue your purpose and set meaningful goals allowing time for focused attention to achieve a state of flow while being fully present. 
2. Be grateful and count your blessings without comparing to others.
3. Fully engage in relationships while being selective about who you allow in your life.
4. Give within your means with joy and purpose. Forgive to free yourself from the burden of unforgiveness.
5. Guard what you think and talk about as this will shape your future.
6. Develop a faith with a solid foundation tested by circumstances.

 

Math of Happiness - 8 minutes

Skin in the Game by Nassim Nicholas Taleb

Nassim Nicholas Taleb's book, Skin in the Game: Hidden Asymmetries in Daily Life uses the wisdom of Hammurabi's code and Roman Law to analyze problems with people profiting while transferring the risk of loss to others.

His advice, trust no one who offers advice but is not exposed to the negative consequence. People who build bridges or repair helicopters need to sleep under the bridge or fly in the helicopters. Rulers of countries used to fight in battle and put their life on the line. This affected their calculation about going to war. 

He advocates the silver rule: Do not do onto others what you would not want them to do to you. Beware of the advice of people who are reviewed by their peers and not by their customers. Restaurants survive and die based on their ability to satisfy their customers. Pundits and writers play to their peers and are insulated from the negative side effects of their advice.

He also points to the Lindy Effect.  If something has survived a long time it is likely that it will continue to last. By this reasoning advice on longevity from a person who has lived more than a hundred years will carry more weight than the advice from a controlled study that does not take into account the multiple variables of real life. He points to the large number of peer reviewed studies showing a significant effect that were later found to be erroneous when tested years later.

The Lindy Effect should not be confused with the Thanksgiving Turkey Effect. Do not assume that current conditions will continue indefinitely. A turkey before Thanksgiving thinks the farmer is a great person. Circumstances change and the turkey is no longer around to modify the assessment of the farmer.

His discussion about the power of a minority view to disproportionately effect the behaviors of others in society is interesting and thought provoking.  The rare condition of severe peanut allergy has caused schools and air lines to modify their access to peanuts and peanut butter.

This book is his current capstone to Black Swan, Fooled by Randomness, and Antifragile. He frequently refers to these books in the text and having a familiarity with these text will help in understanding his points.

Animated book review of Skin in the Game - 3 min.

Skin in the Game explained - 3 min. 

Ron Paul interviews Nassim Taleb about Skin in the Game - 32 min. 

The World of George Orwell by Professor Michael Shelden

Professor Michael Sheldon offers a series of lectures for the The Modern Scholar: World of George Orwell.  The lecturer provides information about George Orwell's life experiences and how they shaped his writing. One of his earlier books, Down and Out in Paris and London, was based on his own personal experiences fitting in with the street people of both cities.

His experience in the Spanish civil war as part of the socialist alliance in Homage to Catalonia gave him insight into the control that Joseph Stalin had over factions of the socialist groups. Stalin determined that the socialist forces that Orwell fought with were not sufficiently loyal to Moscow and spread rumors about the group that caused other socialist military groups to attack them. George and his wife escaped Spain and eventually returned to London.

George worked for the British Ministry for Information which helped him develop a similar organization for his book 1984.

He finished his book Animal Farm near the end of World War II. Several publishers sympathetic to the Soviet Union attempted to block the book from being published as they recognized the harsh critique of Stalinist Russia underlying the satire in the book.

George Orwell a life in pictures - 88 min.

20 Orwell Quotes - 3 min. 

Fail Fail Again Fail Better by Pema Chodron

Fail, Fail Again, Fail Better: Wise Advice for Leaning into the Unknown by Pema Chodron is based on the text of a lecture and the subsequent interview digging deeper into the topic of failure. Fear of failure causes us to pull back from stretching and growing.

At our 50th Anniversary Minnesota 4-H Ambassador Reunion one of the 4-H leaders Brenda Shafer described 4-H as a safe place to fail and fail again. By taking risks and failing we can grow and get better. One of the mottos of 4-H is to make the best better this occurs because we risk failure. 

Pema talks about not letting external circumstances control levels of happiness. Events initially viewed either positively or negatively often may later be seen to be to be the exact opposite as circumstances change  She encourages us to be comfortable with ambiguity and to not force judgment.

She notes that out of a painful and vulnerable experience of failure ugly things such as addiction, violence, self destructive behavior can emerge. In others, courage, compassion and kindness are brought out. We can use these painful spaces as an area of self assessment and change.

Fail Again - 1 min.

Ugly Things - 1 min. 

Search Inside Yourself by Chade-Meng Tan

The book, Search Inside Yourself: The Unexpected Path to Achieving Success, Happiness (and World Peace) by Chade-Meng Tan describes the lessons from the Search Inside Yourself program developed at Google with the help of Daniel Goleman. This book was a recommendation from a Happiness video clip by the creator of Tammy's Library.

The book is a lively, playful and engaging read punctuated by drawings and cartoons which ably bring out the concepts discussed in the book. Several exercises also help individuals to apply the ideas in the text.

I took part in an exercise requiring me to describe my ideal future five years from now if the current expectations in life are met or exceeded. Describing a vision for the future helps shape the present. It is important to be as specific as possible and share the vision with others in order to maximize the benefits.

He provides excellent advice to respond to an emotional trigger transitioning from attentional control to cognitive change.  Slow time down by observing your own response, reframe or reinterpret the situation and use humor, curiosity or meshing (Richard Ingram) to finally accept the situation.  This example of reframing (Teenagers who egged my house) came from my SCTV online satire class assignment.

 

Search Inside Yourself - 26 min.

Search Inside Yourself - 54 min.