Short thoughts on “How to Win Friends and Influence People” book

When I was browsing for books to read at the end of last year, I often saw many recommended “How to Win Friends and Influence People” by Dale Carnegie. The title arouses my interest and I was really curious and eager to learn if there are any tips that I can learn from. So I went to a big bookstore while travelling back in hometown in Kuala Lumpur and bought the book.

I bought the pocket size version and the book was really easy to read with many examples and i enjoyed reading it thoroughly. The tips on winning friends and influence people are practical and real. There are two main takeaways that I have from the book.

Be human

Before I started reading the book, my expectation is to learn new tips on ways of dealing with friends and co-workers. However, the more I progressed into the book, the tips are more like a reminders for all of us on how to be human. The tips are mainly on how to be nice to people, and how to be a decent, considerate human being.

The tips in the book are simple and can be easily picked up by anyone. Those simple tips make a lot of sense as being a genuine nice human where you care about your close ones, you’ll naturally be able attract people around you.

Timeless tips

I read this book without knowing who is the author and what year it was written in. I thought it was published fairly recent because it was a commonly recommended book to read for the year 2023 by many on social media. To my surprise, this book was first published in 1936! This book is more than 80 years old!

Then it got me thinking, because the tips suggested in the book of being a good human to your loved ones or your co-workers are easy to pick up and can be practiced daily, it made the book timeless and now even in the 21st century, it’s still a very relevant book to read.

In my opinion, this is a really good book and I would recommend to pick this up if you haven’t already. Let’s be a good human being and be nice to our friends, co-workers and family, and we will eventually be able to win friends and influence people.