In this Book Thinkers video, host Nick Hutchinson recommends Josh Francis’s Center of Gravity, a book that translates military thinking into everyday life. Hutchinson highlights the book’s central message: never stop learning. He explains how the military’s habit of conducting after‑action reviews (ARRs) after every activity creates a disciplined feedback loop that civilians often lack. The discussion expands to three supporting principles: (1) regular practice and physical conditioning to prevent skill atrophy, (2) continual training on evolving tactics and equipment, and (3) maintaining a conscious, present mindset during actions. Hutchinson argues that these habits underpin the disciplined success of soldiers and can be adopted by civilians to improve personal and professional performance. He also notes Francis’s background as an Australian‑U.S. military veteran and mentions Francis’s other work, Battle Rhythm, reinforcing the appeal of military strategy for civilian audiences.
Chapters
Hello, Book Thinkers family! Today's book tip is going to come from Center of Gravity by Josh Francis. When Josh reached out to me and said, hey, would you take a look at my book? I jumped at the opportunity because I love military strategy and how it can be applied to civilian life. I've always found it very interesting that soldiers live much more disciplined lives than average people do, and there must be a reason why. So the subtitle of this book is The Principles Soldiers Use to Think, Act, and Achieve Success. There were many things that I thought I I could talk about once I read this book, but the one that I do want to discuss today in today's book tip and what I'm going to recommend is to never stop learning. So towards the end of the book, Josh starts to talk a little bit about after-action reports. And in his words, at the end of every activity, military activity, an after-action review, ARR, which is an assessment of the successes and failings of the activity, is conducted so that lessons can be learned and applied and implemented. I think this is fantastic, and I think it's something that we be practicing more in our everyday lives. We don't spend the time to sit down and reflect, to journal about our days, to understand what's working, what's not working, what made us feel good, and what made us feel bad. And I think that there's a huge gap between civilian life and military life where that's happening over there on that side of the spectrum all the time. And then when people come out of the military, they're taught to act in that way. And the reason that discipline works so much, I think, for people in the military is because they're always reflecting and they're always improving. And they're always going through that activity with a conscious mind, and they're always present in it, which is something that's a little bit different than civilian life, I think, sometimes. And he goes on to use a couple of examples. He says, it understands that— or the Army understands that as physical skills atrophy, soldiers should spend a lot of time practicing those skills— firing weapons, going through, you know, different courses and things like that. And that practice ensures that they maintain the expertise in the specific area discipline that they have in the military. Physical conditioning deteriorates, and that's why soldiers conduct physical training and conditioning, which help them whether they're in the desert heat or the freezing cold. You know, they're always physical conditioning, they're always ready for battle, because physical conditioning does deteriorate over time. But the more important one, and I think the one that most of us can relate to in my opinion, is that tactics and equipment change. So that is why soldiers undergo take courses and study the latest developing trends. The world is always moving, and if you learn one specific skill set and you think that that's going to apply and be relevant year after year after year after year, you're wrong. The world is changing, we're all changing, situations change, equipment changes, whatever the case may be. Somebody who learned a set of computer programming 10 years ago, that skill set might not be relevant to today's, you know, stack or whatever language people are writing in or whatever kind of updated technologies are available today. So that's why I think it's very important to always be learning, and that book kind of refreshed this fundamental for me, or this book refreshed that fundamental for me. So Josh, I think this was a really well-written book. I really like it. I have another one of your books, Battle Rhythm, over here, and I'm going to check that out soon. Center of Gravity, fantastic book. I'd highly recommend it to people, and there seems to be a group of people that's very interested in how military strategy can be applied to civilian life, like me. So if you're one of those people, I think this is a cool book. Josh, as I said a little bit earlier, is also or was a member of the Australian military, which worked very closely with the U.S. military. But there's, um, you know, it's a little bit of a different perspective, which I really did appreciate. All right, with that, go read something. Take care. Josh, great book. Everybody have a great day. Bye.
