I was sceptical about this one. Everyone knows how to think, don’t they? I’ve certainly read a few books on this subject in years past that made me feel like everyone was just stating the obvious. And so, despite some high praise for this book, I wasn’t confident it would have much in the way of insightfulness. I was so pleasantly wrong. It is very likely this will make my top 5 of 2025.

Clear Thinking is an exploration of “the art and science of making better decisions”. If you have at all followed my reading and reviews in the past 12 months, you’ll know how drawn I am to books that offer a scientific analysis to their subject matter (as opposed to those which offer vibes and thought bubbles). Give me sold, concrete fundamentals any day! This didn’t disappoint.

Parrish masterfully mixes in stories and examples with clear reasoning. If you would like to improve how you ‘think’, this book will definitely be of help. It’s full of practical application, too. He offers insight into why many of the common ways we engage in ‘thinking’, whether personally, or in a group context, are objectively less than ideal. And, thankfully, suggests better ways to go about it.

Ever been in a work team meeting where you are trying to respond to a perceived problem? The kind of situation that might arise in literally every staff meeting ever. The typical discussion begins with someone declaring what they think the ‘underlying’ issue is. The problem, as Parrish notes, is that the first attempt to define a problem is usually accepted as the correct one. People then quickly shift to solving the problem that was defined by the first person to speak. Of course, the way the problem was defined may be completely off the mark. And then everyone is wasting their time trying to solve a problem that doesn’t actually exist. Perhaps this sounds way too familiar to your own experience.

So what do to instead? Don’t ask people what the problem is (in a general sense). Ask them what they might know about the problem that no-one else does. This brings the nuanced understandings to the fore that might otherwise be missed. And don’t try and solve the problem in the same meeting that you try and define the problem. This radically increases the chances that you will misunderstand the problem in the first place. No-one wants to argue for more meetings, sure. But if the meetings are vastly more effective, then there is far less reason to dislike them.

Perhaps you’re dealing with a problem yourself – maybe at work, maybe personal. The temptation is to find someone who might have already solved this problem themselves, or someone you consider an expert in the subject. Don’t ask them what you should do about the problem. Ask them how you should think about the problem. This is infinitely more valuable.

As AI continues to become more prominent, so too does the research to suggest it is having detrimental affects on our ability to think clearly and critically. Parrish offers a map that is increasingly relevant for our age, to ensure we build the necessary skills in clear thinking.

Who wrote it

Shane Parrish is a writer and speaker.

Why I read it

Titles like this always intrigue me. Although sceptical initially, the sheer amount of positive reviews on the book convinced me to dive in. So glad I did.

What I liked

It’s easy to read. It’s practical. Highly relevant. Surprising in all the right ways. On a subject that I love to read.

What I didn’t

Nothing.

Major Takeaway

There was so much great stuff though the book. Perhaps the biggest takeaway for me was his reflection on how we evaluate the decisions we make. Parrish suggests that we typically evaluate whether we make a right decision based on the outcome. If things turned out well, it was a good decision. If things turn out badly, it was a poor decision.

I used to enjoy playing Texas Holdem poker back in the day (I still would, though haven’t played for ages). One thing I learnt from playing poker (note: I wasn’t actually very good at it) is that the ability to make good decisions is crucial. And the most common mistake bad players make is to assume that, if they win a hand, they made good decisions. A good poker player knows that this is definitely not the case. You should evaluate your decisions not on whether you won the hand, but on the process of how you made your decisions.

This applies to every decision we might make. The best way to assess whether we make good decisions is not by the outcomes, but by the thought processes that go into the decision making process. You may reach a poor outcome, but if your reasoning was sound based on the information you had, then you can still say it was a good decision.

Here’s the key from Parrish:

“If you want to learn from decisions, you need to make the invisible though process as visible and open to scrutiny as possible.”

Better decisions will only come from evaluating how you make decisions in the first place. It’s very easy to misrepresent our process in hindsight. So we should keep records of our thought processes, so we can later scrutinise them and learn from them. Otherwise, we’re bound to (unintentionally) rewrite history and how we thought about the problem before we knew the outcome.

One other great line that comes near the end of the book:

“Wisdom is not just about knowing how to get what you want; its about knowing what is worth wanting.”

As Parrish explains, most people are reasonably good at knowing how to get what they want (though perhaps not always successful at implementing that). But, he argues, the much more important skill (and much rarer) is knowing what is worth wanting in the first place. There’s not much point getting what you want, if what you want is not worth getting.

Who should read it

Everyone. This feels like a book that would benefit anyone who read it.