Surely You're Joking, Mr. Feynman!

Instagram's engineering director, Jim Everingham, recommended this book to me in a recent 1:1 to help me understand the process of finding new ideas to be excited about working on. There's a story in here about Feynman letting his mind wander and play, watching dishes rotate in the cafeteria, and discovering new physical laws because of it.

I've always admired Richard Feynman, and his set of Physics lectures has been on my to-read list for at least a decade. And after reading this book, I admire him even more. He's a mathematical and scientific genius, which makes it no surprise that he occasionally comes off as stubborn and arrogant, but I was delighted to also read about how humble and insecure he was throughout his life. At times when he was burned out, he thought he might be a fraud, that everyone could see right through him, that he would never have another good idea. Like myself, he'd say what was on his mind in academic discussions, only to wonder whether his ideas were totally off the wall, and if he'd be embarrassed for sharing them.

I loved most of this book; it's an easy read because the stories are outrageous and Feynman is a really funny, personable guy. Some of my favorite parts were:

• The chapter on teaching as a way of getting new ideas: If you're teaching a class, you can think about the elementary things that you know very well. These things are kind of fun and delightful. It doesn't do any harm to think them over again. Is there a better way to present them? Are there any new problems associated with them?...The questions of the students are often the source of new research. They often ask profound questions that I've though about at times and then given up on, so to speak, for a while. • His thoughts on living up to others' expectations: “‘You know, what they think of you is so fantastic, it's impossible to live up to it. You have no responsibility to live up to it!' ... I am what I am, and if they expected me to be good and they're offering me some money for it, it's their hard luck.” • His constant delving into other subject areas, such as music and art. His learning to be quite good at things he thought he had no talent at (to the point where he was selling his art for a lot of money). By exploring totally unrelated fields, he could draw new lessons on how they compared to physics (such as art being learned by osmosis, vs. experimental physics being taught by techniques)

Feynman loves science and the scientific method. I thought I understand the scientific method, now I understand it better. He also loves learning, and thinking, and creating new knowledge. This man was at the top of his craft, and this book was an inspiring read because of it.