Reviews and Comments

This is an interesting story of how one family grew into one of the wealthiest and most financially impactful families in the 18th and 19th centuries. They leveraged the patriarch's wealth into three divisions: one in Austria, one in Paris, and one in London. The London house got its start in textiles, which I thought was interesting because that's exactly what Warren Buffett did when buying Berkshire Hathaway (a group of struggling textile plants).

The Rothschilds essentially financed governments because there were no central banks at the time. They filled this role and singlehandedly created the bond market. At the time, governments needed money to fill the gaps between tax collections.

Additionally, many governments needed money for their armies to either go to war or prevent it. The Rothschilds often time financed peace by helping countries fortify their armies.

As with all successful people, the Rothschilds faced scrutiny. They were a tight-knit Jewish family that intermarried to keep the businesses together. They were one of the few Jewish families that did not convert to Christianity, which increased the scorn.

This is the best book I have read all year. But don't read it if you don't want to change.

This book does a great job of removing excuses and exposing the fragile house of cards we use to protect our core identity.

With a simple story about not getting the baby at night, the author exposed how a humble thought of action can be turned into blaming others for your inaction. The catch is that the humble thought to help only came from you, and the decision not to act also came from you. That is when we have let ourselves down by not responding to our initial instinct. Then, we spin a narrative of excuses and blame to rationalize ourselves to ourselves.

Once you see this pattern, it shows up everywhere.

It's been a real eye-opener, as it has made me reevaluate the excuses I've made for my career, my marriage, and my health.

So, if you're not ready to confront some uncomfortable truths about yourself, this might not be the book for you.

This is an excellent story of two warriors who loved to battle from entirely different cultures.

Custer needed the spotlight and had to tell tall tales (i.e., Individualism and an extravert ) Crazy Horse pledged to do nothing that would harm the community (i.e., community and introvert).

Custer was impulsive, demanding, and had the rigor of the US Calvary. Crazy Horse was a leader who could only influence his men.

Things that could have changed history If the Indians had attacked the trains and supply lines, fewer people would have come headed west. They also didn't have a killer instinct when they could have overcome forts. Custer's impulsiveness and self-centeredness caused him to squander opportunities. He needed the recognition, and he didn't do reconnaissance. In Custers last stand, Crazy Horse got his men to follow to the high ground, and Custer's men drove too hard and were tired going into battle. Crazy Horse won the strategic battle

Things that shocked me The Sioux could pack up their entire community in hours and move to the next spot. They traveled long distances, often 20 to 30 miles a day.

I finished Market Mind Games and this is what stuck out.

We are emotional beings and are driven by deep emotional patterns (The author calls these emotional fractals) and entire markets are influence by human psychology.

Emotional fractals is a really interesting concept. Basically that our emotional patterns create consistent outcomes. In other words it is the "Why does this always happen to me" syndrome.

How I put this in my own words is that we follow the following process.

Human Beings > Human Feelings > Human Doings > Human Explaining or Rationalizing

The problem comes when we only recognize the action "Human Doings" and then explaining those actions.

Growth happens when you realize your body noticed something (Human Beings), your mind tried to make sense of the body's signal (Human Feelings).

NOTE: The mind isn't always accurate at this stage of the process.

Then in order to alleviated the emotion an action is taken (Human Doing), which may or may not just be repeating bad patterns. The last step is explaining our actions and most of the time we are just making up a story for internal consistency and not the thinking about what our body did and how our mind defined that signal. Growth happens when you analyze the what lead to action and why.