Have you ever stumbled across something right in front of your nose, only to realize it was there all along? That’s exactly how I felt when I read Who Moved My Cheese by Spencer Johnson. For 10 years, I had this book lying around, but I never felt curious enough to read it. After reading it, I wish I had done so much earlier, as it contains some really valuable lessons.

Who Moved My Cheese is a parable about two little people and two mice in a maze, searching for cheese. It is a simple story, but each character represents a different attitude towards change, with cheese being what we consider success. This story can be directly applied to your own life and will help you stop fearing what lies ahead and thrive in an environment of change and uncertainty. Let’s look for that cheese!

Lesson 1: Stop Thinking Too Much about Your Cheese and Start Chasing It

The two mice inside of our maze are Sniff and Scurry. They spend most of their time running up and down the corridors of the maze, looking for cheese. Hem and Haw, two little people, also spend their days in the maze, but not because they’re hungry – they think finding it will make them feel happy and successful. However, because of their complex brains, they think a lot about how they can find the cheese the fastest, which strategies will work best in getting through the maze, how to keep track of those strategies, what finding the cheese will feel like, and when they’ll finally find it.

Life is the same. Every minute you spend wondering what success looks like, how to get it, whether it’s possible and how you’ll feel in the future is a minute not spend working towards it. Humans are complicated beings, but that doesn’t mean we have to make everything complicated. Be more like a mouse and just start running!

Lesson 2: Even the Biggest Cheese Doesn’t Last Forever, So Try to See Change Coming

Sniff and Scurry soon found a big stash of cheese at Station C, and even though they enjoyed snacking a bit of it every day, they kept paying attention. The amount of cheese kept declining, slowly, but steadily, every day. Once they realized they were about to run out, they decided to move on of their own accord and soon found another huge cheese at Station N.

When Hem and Haw found station C, however, they settled there, and quickly grew accustomed to the new status quo. The cheese fest they indulged in every day soon became the center of their lives, as they thought it was the fair reward for all their hard work. They were so preoccupied with the cheese that they didn’t notice how it was disappearing, one piece at a time, and how some corners of it even got moldy. One morning, they woke up, only to find someone had moved their cheese.

This left Hem and Haw sad, depressed, feeling treated unfairly and in denial. Instead of venturing out to find new cheese, they kept returning to Station C, getting ever hungrier and weaker.

No supply of cheese can last forever. Change is always bound to happen, sooner or later. Instead of fooling yourself that things will stay the same forever, always keep an eye open for change.

Lesson 3: Don’t Worry, There’s Always New Cheese to Be Found. The Minute You Start Moving Things Will Improve

The best part about cheese isn’t that once you’ve found it you’re set for life. It’s that there’s always more cheese to be found. Haw eventually got sick of sitting around, so he decided to go looking for new cheese all by himself.

Once he started moving, his situation instantly got better. Yes, he just found a few bits and pieces of cheese here and there at first, but this was a lot better than doing nothing and being paralyzed by fear. After having found the courage to move on despite your fears once, fear’s grip on you will never be as strong as it used to be.

Haw realized the accumulated fears in his mind were a lot worse than even the biggest challenges he encountered. Full of confidence, he kept exploring the maze, until he eventually found Sniff and Scurry at Station N, where the three of them shared the new cheese they had found.

Who Moved My Cheese Book Review

Who Moved My Cheese is a fantastic book. It is a management book, and many a manager has told this story to his team to inspire them, but it’s just as valuable for you as an individual. It describes a simple pattern of embracing change, finding success, looking out for more change and then embracing it again, which will help you cultivate a much more optimistic attitude about life. A really cool book!