My favorite quotes from “Who moved my cheese?” by Spencer Johnson, a book that will change your perspective about everyday challenges.

I had the immense pleasure to read this book at work and an avid reader as myself could not help but to take note as she was reading it. I fell in love with the simplicity of the story and its powerful lifetime lessons and values. In fact, I became so infatuated with the book that I made my husband read it and I re-read it with my son. I cannot wait for my children to be older to read it with a more mature point of view to really understand it and gain more for it.

Who moved my cheese? is a small book very simple and easy to read. In this book, four characters, two mice, Sniff and Scurry, and two little people, Hem and Haw, are living in a maze mindlessly enjoying a seemingly everlasting stack of cheese. One day to their surprise and utter disbelief, the cheese suddenly disappeared. In a simple but quite ingenuous way, the Author developed these four characters to represent four different attitudes we humans can have when facing challenges, when facing change. Spencer Johnson takes us on the journey of these four characters as they strive to meet their need for cheese. He describes their actions, reactions, attitudes, their mindset, their challenges, their different approaches, and their discoveries all the while compelling us readers to dive into a needed self-reflection and retrospection.

In this book, the author refers to cheese as anything in your life that you really like, cherish, enjoy and want to have or keep having. It is in fact anything that makes you happy whether it is money, fame, family, love, etc. you name it. The maze is the world we live in with all the curves, the challenges and the blessings it bears. The book has countless important key lessons to understand and adopt such as : Understand that changes are part of life and you must expect it, keep your eyes on the prize to self-motivate on a continuous basis and never stop smelling your cheese.

Along his journey, one of the characters, Haw, wrote the quotes below known as “The Handwriting On The Wall” as he went into the maze looking for cheese.

1.       Having cheese makes you happy.

2.       The more important your cheese is to you the more you want to hold on to it.

3.       If you do not change you can become extinct.

4.       What would you do it you weren’t afraid?

5.       Smell the cheese often so you know when it is getting old.

6.       Movement in a new direction helps you find new cheese.

7.       When you stop being afraid, you feel good!

8.       Imagining yourself enjoying your new cheese leads you to it.

9.       The quicker you let go of old cheese, the sooner you find New Cheese.

10.   It is safer to search in the maze than remain in a cheeseless situation.

11.   Old beliefs do not lead you to new cheese.

12.   When you see that you can find and enjoy New cheese, you change course.

13.   Noticing small changes early helps you adapt to the bigger changes that are to come.

14.   Move with the cheese and enjoy it!

Each quote can stand alone, and once you read the book and find them within their contexts, they make much more sense and become one hundred time stronger.

I have enjoyed reading this book over and over again and discovering something new every time you. You can too! If you have not read this book it is a definite must. It is a gentle push in back and a friendly reminder to hold on to what we claim wanting, cherishing or even already have (our cheese). More importantly, it is about making sure that we take care of it while preparing ourselves or adapting to anticipated or unforeseen changes.

Have you already read “Who moved my cheese?” What is favorite part? What is your favorite lesson learned? Tell me.

If you have not read it yet, I am right here waiting for you. Go read it and come back to tell me what you think of it!

Bonne lecture!