Six Thinking Hats - Edward de Bono

About the Book


There are six coloured hats corresponding to the six directions of thinking:
white, red, black, yellow, green, blue

Why did author chose hats as the symbols for the directions of thinking?
There is already a strong association between thinking and 'thinking hats' or 'thinking caps'. The value of a hat as a symbol is that it indicates a role. People are said to be wearing a certain hat. Another advantage is that a hat can be put on or taken off with ease. A hat is also visible to everyone around.

The results of using the Six Hats method are -
(1) Power - 
with the Six Hats method, the intelligence, experience and knowledge of all the members of the group are fully used. Everyone is looking and working in the same direction.
(2) Time Saving -
with parallel thinking, every thinker at every moment is looking in the same direction. The thoughts are laid out in parallel. You do not respond to what the last person has said. You simply add another idea in parallel. In the end, the subject is fully explored quickly. Later on, if it is essential to decide between the two, a decision is made. So there is not argument at every step.
(3) Removal of Ego -
with the Six Hats method you exert your ego by performing well as a thinker under each of the hats.
(4) One Thing at a Time -
with the Six Hats method, we try to do only one thing at a time. There is a time when we look for danger (black hat). There is a time when we seek new ideas (green hat). There is a time when we focus on information (white hat). We do not try to do everything at the same time.

The colour of each hat is also related to its function -

White Hat
White is neutral and objective. The white hat is concerned with objective facts and figures.

Red Hat
Red suggests anger (seeing red), rage and emotions. The red hat gives the emotional view.

Black Hat
Black is sombre and serious. The black hat is cautious and careful. It points out the weaknesses in an idea.

Yellow Hat
Yellow is sunny and positive. The yellow hat is optimistic and covers hope and positive thinking.

Green Hat
Green is grass, vegetation and abundant, fertile growth. The green hat indicates creativity and new ideas.

Blue Hat
Blue is cool, and it is also the colour of the sky, which is above everything else. The blue hat is concerned with control, the organization of the thinking process and the use of the other hats.

The three pairs of hats:
White and red
Black and yellow
Green and blue

Two main purposes to the Six Thinking Hats concept -
(1) To simplify thinking by allowing a thinker to deal with one thing at a time.
(2) To allow a switch in thinking

About the Author


Edward de Bono is widely regarded as the leading authority in the direct teaching of thinking as a skill. He originated the concept of lateral thinking and developed formal techniques for deliberate creative thinking. He has written sixty-two books, which have been translated into thirty-seven languages, has made two television series and there are over 4,000,000 references to his work on the Internet.

His instruction in thinking has been sought by some of the leading business corporations in the world such as IBM, DuPont, Shell, Ericsson, McKinsey, Ciba-Geigy, Ford and many others. He has had a planet named after him  by the International Astronomic Union and was named by a group of university professors in South Africa as one of the 250 people in all of history who have contributed most to humanity.

Dr de Bono's key contribution has been his understanding of the brain as a self-organizing system. From this solid base he set out to design practical tools for thinking. His work is in use equally in the boardrooms of some of the world's largest corporations and with four-year-olds in school. His design of the Six Hats method provides, for the first time, Western thinking with a constructive idiom instead of adversarial argument.

The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand

About the Book


This instant classic is the story of an intransigent young architect, his violent battle against conventional standards, and his explosive love affair with a beautiful woman who struggles to defeat him.

Here is a novel about a hero - and about those who try to destroy him.

Moral


Do not lead a second-hander life.

"The code of the creator is built on the needs of the reasoning mind which allows man to survive.
The code of the second-hander is built on the needs of a mind incapable of survival."

"The first right on earth is the right of the ego. Man's first duty is to himself. His moral law is never to place his prime goal within the persons of others. His moral obligation is to do what he wishes, provided his wish does not depend primarily upon other men. This includes the whole sphere of his creative faculty, his thinking, his work. But it does not include the sphere of the gangster, the altruist and the dictator."
"A man thinks and works alone. A man cannot rob, exploit or rule - alone. Robbery, exploitation and ruling presuppose victims. They imply dependence. They are the province of the second-hander."


About the Author


Ayn Rand's unique philosophy, Objectivism, has gained a worldwide audience.

The Essentials of Objectivism

My philosophy, in essence, is the concept of man as a heroic being, with his own happiness as the moral purpose of his life, with productive achievement as his noblest activity, and reason as his only absolute. 
- Ayn Rand

Objectivism is an integrated system of thought that defines the abstract principles by which a man must think and act if he is to live the life proper to man.

Ayn Rand first portrayed her philosophy in the form of the heroes of her bestselling novels, The Fountainhead (1943) and Atlas Shrugged (1957). She later expressed her philosophy in nonfiction form.

The List Of Books/Novels Read By Me In The Year 2011

(1) The Fountainhead - Ayn Rand (Modern Classic) - Bestseller for Decades


(2) Six Thinking Hats - Edward de Bono - The International Bestseller

Date a girl who reads

"Date a girl who reads. Date a girl who spends her money on books instead of clothes. She has problems with closet space because she has too many books. Date a girl who has a list of books she wants to read, who has had a library card since she was twelve.

Find a girl who reads. You’ll know that she does because she will always have an unread book in her bag.She’s the one lovingly looking over the shelves in the bookstore, the one who quietly cries out when she finds the book she wants. You see the weird chick sniffing the pages of an old book in a second hand book shop? That’s the reader. They can never resist smelling the pages, especially when they are yellow.

She’s the girl reading while waiting in that coffee shop down the street. If you take a peek at her mug, the non-dairy creamer is floating on top because she’s kind of engrossed already. Lost in a world of the author’s making. Sit down. She might give you a glare, as most girls who read do not like to be interrupted. Ask her if she likes the book.

Buy her another cup of coffee.

Let her know what you really think of Murakami. See if she got through the first chapter of Fellowship. Understand that if she says she understood James Joyce’s Ulysses she’s just saying that to sound intelligent. Ask her if she loves Alice or she would like to be Alice.

It’s easy to date a girl who reads. Give her books for her birthday, for Christmas and for anniversaries. Give her the gift of words, in poetry, in song. Give her Neruda, Pound, Sexton, Cummings. Let her know that you understand that words are love. Understand that she knows the difference between books and reality but by god, she’s going to try to make her life a little like her favorite book. It will never be your fault if she does.

She has to give it a shot somehow.

Lie to her. If she understands syntax, she will understand your need to lie. Behind words are other things: motivation, value, nuance, dialogue. It will not be the end of the world.

Fail her. Because a girl who reads knows that failure always leads up to the climax. Because girls who understand that all things will come to end. That you can always write a sequel. That you can begin again and again and still be the hero. That life is meant to have a villain or two.

Why be frightened of everything that you are not? Girls who read understand that people, like characters, develop. Except in the Twilight series.

If you find a girl who reads, keep her close. When you find her up at 2 AM clutching a book to her chest and weeping, make her a cup of tea and hold her. You may lose her for a couple of hours but she will always come back to you. She’ll talk as if the characters in the book are real, because for a while, they always are.

You will propose on a hot air balloon. Or during a rock concert. Or very casually next time she’s sick. Over Skype.

You will smile so hard you will wonder why your heart hasn’t burst and bled out all over your chest yet. You will write the story of your lives, have kids with strange names and even stranger tastes. She will introduce your children to the Cat in the Hat and Aslan, maybe in the same day. You will walk the winters of your old age together and she will recite Keats under her breath while you shake the snow off your boots.

Date a girl who reads because you deserve it. You deserve a girl who can give you the most colorful life imaginable. If you can only give her monotony, and stale hours and half-baked proposals, then you’re better off alone. If you want the world and the worlds beyond it, date a girl who reads.

Or better yet, date a girl who writes."

— Rosemary Urquico

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