Short Book Club – Who Moved My Cheese?
Title of the book: Who moved my cheese?
Author: Dr. Spencer Johnson
The genre of the book: Self-help
Key Characters of the book: Two mice Sniff and Scurry and Little people Ham and Haw.
The setting of the book: A gathering (reunion of old friends), a maze with different cheese stations with Station C and Station N the main ones.
The plot of the book: Who moved my cheese is a fable about four characters who live in a maze and they all love cheese. When the cheese disappears, Scurry and Sniff enthusiastically head out into the maze to find new cheese. On the other hand Hem and Haw feel betrayed and complain. They waste their time and energy hoping the old cheese will return. Hall realizes the old cheese won’t return so he sets out into the maze in search of new cheese. He writes what he learns on the walls hoping that He will follow him. Eventually, he discovers new cheese and sees that Scurry and Sniff were already there. Cheese a metaphor for what you want to have in life. It could be a good job, a loving relationship, money, or health. The very core message of the book is this: things constantly change so we must adapt. This story brings us to a few lessons on Change:
LESSON 4:Adapt To Change Quickly
Your personal opinion about the book: As Spencer Johnson rightly said that “Life moves on and so should we”. We all need to change with time and situations. If we don’t do that; we will not be able to survive and our life either will stop or come to an end. This book has some powerful lessons in a very simple language and a story that we can all relate to. That makes it easy to understand and apply (if one is willing to).
Have you read something like this before? Can you talk about that experience ?:
I don’t remember reading any similar book but FISH is one book that has some similarities. I definitely relate to my own experiences. All of us including me at some point in our lives have lived like Sniff and Scurry and Hem and Haw. I myself have lived these characters in different phases of my life.
Should people read this book ?: Anyone can read this as this relates not to work only but personal lives as well. The story depicts anything a human strives for. It could be money, fame, reputation, happiness, success, achievements, or anything else.
Key takeaways: There are many lessons that we can relate to. Fear of change can paralyze anyone from moving forward. Don’t let it. You need to reflect and pushed forward is where the growth happens. I have a victim mentality at one point in time but one needs to take charge of their lives and don’t let anything happen because of any external factor. We at times take things for granted but it’s where we find it difficult to understand the reasons for our failure and take hold back of circumstances. We think that wrong happens because of others but don’t see our shortcomings. At the same time become complacent when we get success and think that we have achieved everything in life. What is required to be done is Monitor change. Prepare for change. Change quickly. Adapt. And Enjoy Change. Don’t over-complicate things. Don’t use complexity to run from what you don’t want to do. Don’t get bitter and blame anyone or anything else for where you are in life.