What is the main message of The Third Door?

The main message of The Third Door is to remind readers that success is attainable through unconventional approaches and relentless perseverance.

How long does it take to read The Third Door?

The reading time for The Third Door varies depending on the reader's pace. However, the Blinkist summary can be completed in just 15 minutes.

Is The Third Door a good book? Is it worth reading?

The Third Door is a worthwhile read for those seeking inspiration. It offers a fascinating exploration of unconventional paths to success.

Who is the author of The Third Door?

The author of The Third Door is Alex Banayan.

The Third Door Summary of Key Ideas and Review

Name: The Third Door
Rating: 4.4 (115 reviews)
Author: Alex Banayan

Introduction

What’s in it for me? Learn how the most successful people in the world launched their careers.

Success in life, business or almost any field you choose, is like getting into a nightclub. There are always three doors: The first door is the main entrance, where almost everyone queues, waiting and hoping to get in. The second door is the VIP door, where the celebrities and billionaires slip straight through.

And then there’s the third door. Most people don’t even know it exists, but it does. You have to step out of line, run around the back of the club, bang on the door, maybe sneak through a kitchen. You’ll need a little chutzpah and a little initiative, but there’s always a way.

The world’s most successful people went through the third door, ignoring the queue in their determination to get ahead. In these blinks, you’ll follow the path of an ambitious young man on his quest to track down and interview some of the most successful people in the world and learn the secrets of how they got ahead.

In these blinks, you’ll learn

how braving an important phone call got Bill Gates’s career off to a flying start;
how re-engineering your sleeping pattern could give you a competitive advantage; and
why biting off more than you can chew isn’t necessarily a bad idea.

Key idea 1 of 10

Bill Gates inspired the author to go on a quest for the secrets to success.

Alex Banayan was supposed to become a doctor. At least, that was his parents’ plan for him. But at 18 years old, a month into college as a pre-med, he realized this wasn’t the path for him.

One day, while reading a biography of Bill Gates instead of studying, Banayan started wondering. Bill Gates had become the richest man in the world and revolutionized the software industry. But how? How did he go from a regular 18-year-old kid, just like Banayan, to becoming the wealthiest man in the world? Banayan started looking into other successful people: How had Steven Spielberg, a guy who didn’t even get into film school, ended up as one of the most successful directors in history? What did Lady Gaga do to pivot from waiting tables to nailing her first record deal in 2006?

Banayan couldn’t find a book that gave him the answer to these questions, so he decided to write it himself. Why not? He’d arrange interviews with Bill Gates and of other legends, travel across the US to meet with them, write up his discoveries and share them with his entire generation.

Getting the interviews was one thing, getting to them was quite another. The hard part, he quickly realized, would be funding the travel to all those interviews.

But as luck would have it, the game show The Price is Right was being filmed a few miles away. Winning the show was how he’d fund his quest.

Some googling told him that the wackier the behavior at casting, the more chance of getting selected for the show. So when he turned up on set, Banayan hugged janitors, danced with security guards and flirted with old ladies. It worked, and he got selected. He didn’t actually know how to play the game though, so began chatting to his fellow contestants. One kindly old woman, who said she’d been watching for 40 years, took a shine to him. She advised him to always guess low, as guessing too high would get you eliminated.

Hours later, with studio lights shining in his face, Banayan won the final prize – a sailboat, retail price $31,188, which he sold days later for $16,000. His quest could begin.

Key idea 2 of 10

Meeting Tim Ferriss taught the author how to be persistent in the right way. Eventually.

After reading Tim Ferriss’s phenomenally popular book The 4-Hour Work Week (2007), Banayan became obsessed with meeting the author.

At a conference where Ferriss was speaking, Banayan hid in a bathroom during the speech, realizing that its location gave him the best chance of intercepting Ferriss as he came off stage. When Ferriss finished talking, Banayan sprung out and snatched a quick chat. Ferriss seemed interested in Banayan’s mission and said he’d get in touch.

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Key idea 3 of 10

Qi Lu, a software superstar, got his break by finding extra hours in the day.

When a contact at Microsoft said he could get Banayan an interview with Qi Lu, Banayan wasn’t sure what to think. Any interview was good news, but he’d never even heard of this guy.

But Banayan’s interest was piqued when he learned that Lu was one of the tech world’s rising stars.

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Key idea 4 of 10

A world champion boxer showed how hidden reservoirs of determination could make the difference between success and failure.

After his initial success in talking to Qi Lu and Tim Ferriss, Banayan hit a brick wall. Qi Lu had helpfully passed on an interview request to Bill Gates, but the message came back that Gates wouldn’t meet. Banayan embraced “Qi Time,” getting up at six o’clock every day to write more cold emails requesting interviews. But the only consequence of more emails going out was more rejections coming back in.

Eventually, “Sugar” Ray Leonard, a six-time world champion boxer, agreed to an interview at his California mansion. Banayan had written to the boxer saying that he believed the younger generation could learn from his advice.

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Key idea 5 of 10

Biting off more than you can chew can catapult you to success.

It’s always good to have a mentor in life. For Banayan, that mentor was Elliott Bisnow. A 20-something kid who dropped out of school and built a company, Bisnow Media, with his dad, that would go on to sell for 50 million dollars in 2016. In 2008, Bisnow also co-founded Summit Series to provide fun conferences for entrepreneurs and the world’s elite.

Impressed at how much Bisnow had achieved so young, Banayan got in touch. They met days later in LA and quickly became friends. Bisnow helped Banayan access a world of entrepreneurs and taught him invaluable lessons. The key one was to bite off more than you can chew.

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Key idea 6 of 10

Sometimes you have to find your own path to success, instead of trying to out-Amazon Amazon.

When Banayan tried to approach Bill Gates for an interview, he got this message from Gates’s office: he would never get an interview while he didn’t have a publishing deal.

So Banayan set out to find a publishing deal. The key to this was finding a literary agent. From that point on, Banayan’s motto was “get a literary agent, get Bill Gates.”

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Key idea 7 of 10

Bill Gates offers lessons in how to break through your discomfort zone and achieve early business success.

After securing his book deal, Banayan eventually persuaded Bill Gates’s office to set up an interview.

Researching ahead of the meeting, Banayan discovered an incident that he felt explained Gates’s early success. It resonated with Banayan, who had always suffered from nerves when he needed to make an important phone call or conversation. The lesson? Sometimes you have to break through your discomfort.

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Key idea 8 of 10

A day shadowing Zappos CEO Tony Hsieh taught the author to embrace ego and ask for help.

One day, at a party hosted by his friend, Miki Agrawal, founder of the period-proof underwear business THINX, Banayan saw Tony Hsieh, CEO of online shoe retailer Zappos. Hsieh was walking around with a clipboard that had “Wishes List” written on it, explaining that, for one day, he was acting as fairy godmother.

When Hsieh asked Banayan what he wished for, Banayan knew straight away. I want to be the Zappos CEO for the day, he said. His 20th birthday was coming up soon and he wondered if he could shadow Hsieh. Hsieh was a little surprised, but agreed.

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Key idea 9 of 10

The author learned from Warren Buffett and Dean Kamen that sometimes you need to think again to solve a problem.

Banayan pursued Warren Buffett for an interview for months. He even flew to Buffett’s hometown of Omaha, Nebraska, in the hope of bumping into him, only to discover he arrived at the same time as the worst snow-storm for 30 years.

Banayan never met the “Oracle of Omaha,” and instead spent time in his hotel room shivering from the cold. Having read everything there is to know about Buffett, he picked up a few lessons in success.

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Key idea 10 of 10

Steve Wozniak showed that there are different ways to be successful in life.

After hearing who Banayan was interviewing, one man said he didn’t feel worthy of being on the list. He was also, by some distance, the happiest guy Banayan had met.

Steve Wozniak was, alongside Steve Jobs, the co-founder of Apple. But unlike Jobs, or Gates, or Buffett, Wozniak has never been seen as a business tycoon, largely because he left Apple in 1985.

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