5 Life Transforming lessons from #InsideBillsBrain Documentary
You open the door and as you plant your feet ahead to get inside the room. You stamp on something, you realize it is a chewd pencil. You look around and you see devices, books and all over the place. You see a young boy sitting and leaning on his chair reading a book, chewing his pencil, simply thinking and pondering. Before you are completely bewildered as to thinking where you are. Let me tell you, you were transported to Bill Gate’s room in his younger days.
We all know Bill Gates the founder of Microsoft for revolutionizing computers and impacting the world. As he now heads Bill & Malinda Gates Foundation and is actively engaged in finding solutions to the most pressing problems of our times. American Director Davis Guggenheim has made a great attemp to understand what makes Bill Gates tick through his Netflix Documentary #InsideBillsBrain. So let us decode Bill’s brain as I share these 5 life transforming lessons we can draw from this remarkable documentary.
(Image source: The Verge)
- #EternalOptimism: Hopefulness in the face of uncertainty
Bill’s sisters describe him as a “happy boy" because he was always smiling throughout his childhood. As he grew up and realized that life can be bumpy at times. He didn’t let his smile fade. He continues to smile and challenges himself to push harder with hope and a firm belief in his ability to give his hundred percent.
No matter what kind of problem is posed at him, he always starts working on solutions. His optimism fuels him with energy to approach all problems and challenges with rigour and an unflinching determination.
One of the Gate’s Foundation project is to work on converting human waste into energy to run the sewage plants in the developing world. While Bill continues to work hard, he also understands that there is a huge amount of wealth pledged by Warren Buffet into this project as he counts on Bill. In times of uncertainty, pressure, Bill Gates continue to look for possibilities and work harder.
So, no matter what problem we are into, all we have to do is smile, work harder and lead with hope for bright future.
2. #DeepWork: Read Work Eat Sleep Repeat
“You have to pick a pretty finite number of things to tell your mind to work on. You should decide whether you should care about.”
— Bill Gates
“Deep work" is a term coined by Author and Professor Cal Newport. It means working without distractions to produce an elite level of work.
In the documentary, the Director talks to Bill’s secretary and she shares how time is a commodity he cannot buy more of and that after his long day of meetings he locks himself up alone to brainstorm and think read and work harder undistracted to produce elite level of work. He is extreme to a whole new level that he goes on “Think Weeks” the time when he stills himself and spends his time reading and thinking his best.
As we continue to spend most of our times on phone juggling between tweeting, posting and DMs. This is a great reminder to look forward to having few hours of undistracted working and studying to produce elite level of work.
(Image source: Geek Wire)
3. Relentless Curiosity: A huge appetite for knowledge
“ Bill is joyous about learning things like no one I have met in my life. He doesn’t read one book about something, he’ll read like five books about something. Most of which are too dense for any mortal to read. And he reads really fast and synthesizes really well. The most amazing thing is he almost knows more than the other person he’s talking to about whatever it is, it’s unbelievable.”
— Mike Slade, Former Marketing Director at Microsoft
In the documentary one can see Bill’s study which is full of books on varied topics and he attempts to read complex content to think harder. This is where his relentless curiosity leads him to, it drives him to explore and experiment consistently.
The same curiosity helps him to be in a state of constant movement and most importantly to consume as well maintain all his learning in his system. His desire to learn has helped him be relevant.
What a great lesson to for all of us to read widely and commit ourselves to lifelong learning.
4. Integrated Thinking: It’s all about joining the dots
“One thing about Bill is he is a multi processor. He will be reading something else but will be processing at the same time.”
— Melinda Gates
We learned that Bill truly has a problem solving mindset and that he is intense.
Today, as we are in the knowledge economy where the knowledge is free. More than consumption of information it is about how we think hard and make sense of it. How we can connect the dots to innovate consistently.
It is also becomes imperative to pause amidst the chaos, untangle and sort through observations, experiences and insights and consider multiple possible interpretations and create meaning.
As Bill works hard to solve various problems of the developing world. He embraced the mess and make unusual relationships with different elements and integrate them to navigate through the complexities. Bill surely thrives on complexity.
It’s high time we embrace nuance and diverse perspective to integrate and innovate.
(Image Source: Geek Wire)
5. #Compassion: Doing well by doing good
“Bill seems like a shell from the outside, but inside there is really tender, warm hearted person, a very curious one.”
— Melinda Gates
Bill likes to be informed and understand complexities. His relentless curiosity constantly reminds him that the more he learns, the more there is to learn and absorb and implement.
This same curiosity keeps him intellectually humble constantly in search of new possiblities. After he left Microsoft and started full-time at Gates Foundation he realised that there are limited resources in the world and it becomes imperative to optimize them and that is what he does through his foundation work finding solutions to the most complex issues of our times.
It is his growing sense of empathy and compassion that helps him revolutionize and impact the world.
As we continue to sensitize ourselves with the most serious issues let us reflect and commit ourselves to doing well by doing good.
So, What’s inside Bill’s Brain?
Bill’s wife and his equal partner Melinda Gates says that it’s chaos. There is so much complexity in there. There is so much going on all the time. Bill can deal with a lot of complexity.
While I draw many lessons from Bill Gate’s journey except his remarkable intelligence which I believe we all can work on to a larger extent. Let us also remember that he too faced immense challenges and what truly makes him different apart from his brain is the fact that when posed with a challenge instead of giving up, he choose to work harder and to persevere.
The Documentary leaves us with a wise message from Bill’s Mother Mary Gates which is worth pondering.
“Each one of us has to start out with developing his or her own definition of success. And when we have these specific expectations of ourselves, we are more likely to live up to then. Ultimately, it’s not what you get or even what you give. It’s what you become.”