Everyone appears to have an internal dialog. Many mistake this for consciousness; others have a range of explanations. Including paranoid ‘voices’, superego, devil, god and stern parent.
My internal voice is benign, even friendly, most of the time. I often think of my internal voice as a guardian angel. Most recently my guardian angel has played an ironic joke on me.
That is what the image on the right is about.
A year ago I published a book that summarizes my 55 years as a business consultant with over 2,000 clients around the world and my role as a thinker about the nature of commerce. The book has an outrageous title: The Most Important Book in Human History.
In hopes of getting reviews, I sent out dozens of review copies with a ‘charming’ and personalized letter. It was my fervent hope to be reviewed The most important reviews would have been in the weekend Wall Street Journal Review section or the Claremont Review of Books.. So far, no reviews by any of the book reviewers I sent copies to.
Now the ironic joke my fantasy guardian angel has played on me. Which you can see here.
A longtime close friend in Japan, Yuzawa Saburo, who has been a Japanese Ambassador and is currently retired, is on the board of the main Japanese development organization. Yuzawa san, ordered a printed version of my book and wrote a review for The World Economic Review. Almost the kind of review I would dream about.
Except, as an ironic joke by my guardian angel, the The World Economic Review is in Japanese and is certainly not read outside of Japan. And probably rarely inside Japan.
Thanks anyway. I enjoy the irony.
The review itself emphasizes my book’s focus on commercial innovation arising from societies that lack an hereditary elite (only the U.S. and Israel), are open, love markets and are diverse. Japan is hereditary but promotes talent with upward marriage, is among the most open societies on the planet and has loved markets for over a thousand years.
But only the Japanese think they have diversity. By diversity they point to the great differences between a person from a rural area on the Southern Island of Kyushu and a Northern prefecture such as Aomori. The Japanese can recognize the very different accent. Just as Americans can tell a Boston accent from a Texan.
Yuzawa san in his review of my book suggests that that is the kind of diversity I mean.
It is not. To me diversity can be ethnic, like an Indian or Finn or it can be religious like a Mormon and an Anglican, or just the difference between a young Bryn Mawr alumna and an old Sacramento Junior College machinist.
I did get a review in a relevant global journal. Thank you Yuzawa san. Thank you very much.
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