Self Help Book #10 – How Lance Does It

Posted on December 22, 2011 by James


What is the elixir of greatness? How can we live strong? In How Lance Does It, Kearns paints a vivid portrait of a man whose sheer willpower and determination are the stuff of legend. Hagiography is unnecessary, since the history of Lance Armstrong speaks for itself: seven consecutive Tour de France victories and one inspiring victory against cancer. Kearns leverages the insights he has gained from his friendship from Lance to identify the key traits that have helped him achieve these epochal, monumental achievements.

The joy of this self help book is the pen portrait it offers of one of the world’s greatest sportsmen; not just of Lance’s days of glory on the Tour but of his relentless daily discipline and the highly evolved support infrastructure that is the breakfast of champions.  Kearns is not foolish enough to claim that anyone, given sufficent focus, could walk the path that Lance has trod. He concedes that natural physiologies like Lance’s are unique. Yet genetics in and of themselves guarantee nothing. It is mental focus that enables all of us to make the most of whatever talents we have.

The four “Lance success factors” that Kearns identifies are a positive attitude, clarity of purpose, specialised intelligence and pure confidence. These qualities may not be innovative or novel per se, but when consistently applied with a ferocity of determination, they can work miracles. We can all learn to “avoid bad air” and follow the champion’s mantra of striving to be “honest, correct and real”.

So many self help books thrive on the myth of the instant pay-off, the easy path to greatness. How Lance Does It reminds us that the road to heaven is paved with relentless sweat and toil. In a fascinating detour, Kearns explores the competitive world of Japanese baseball and its team commitment to visible effort, or doryoku. This entails repetition of pitches and unyielding discipline under the hot summer sun, a far more rigorous regime than is practised in America. And in the same way Kearns argues it was “Lance’s unwavering focus in training and love of all aspects of the cycling lifestyle – his doryoku” which made all the difference.

Lance Armstrong turned mountains into level ground. Brad Kearns shows that his real secret was raw talent mixed with sheer hard work. This may not be the instant path to power that some other self help gurus crave, but for this reviewer it has the virtue of being honest, correct – and real.


Categories: American Self Help Authors, Brad Kearns, Classic, Lance Armstrong, Practical Self Help Tools, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #9 – Mental Strength

Posted on December 20, 2011 by James

Many can write; few can do. Iain Abernethy is an urgent and compelling writer, simply because he has demonstrated the art of the possible. As a decorated martial arts expert and 5th Dan Karate Black Belt, he has proved that consistent and diligent focus can yield results. Abernethy’s core argument is that success is much like resistance weight training; progressive effort and overload will build muscle over time. Gradual and purposive steps outside the comfort zone slowly boost confidence and then a snowball effect results.

Mental Strength is written like an instruction manual. There is no fluff or feel-good popcorn; rather an honest and highly useful treatise on how to build your capabilities. Resilience doesn’t fall like manna from heaven – it has to be earned. Breaking through the thick fog of reflexive mental resistance is not pleasant, but it is a necessary condition for progress. A reinforced self-image and carefully planned action steps need to work in tandem to enable true change. This may not be a sexy or glamorous formula, and the 10,000 hours of concentrated effort that many authors cite to achieve excellence in any field rarely are. Yet it delivers results in spades.

I learned three valuable insights from Abernethy. The first is pithy and hard-hitting: “delay can be dangerous”. The corrosive effect of time, the passivity of the complacent life, ensures that so many of us miss out on the fierce urgency of now. If we truly wish to achieve our dreams, then the clock is ticking. The second lesson Abernethy teaches is honesty. We are not gods, but men and women born to try and fail and try again. This realism should give us strength, and a day of resilient optimism is better than a month of wishful thinking, or a year of turgid negativity.

His final insight is that intention and independent thought requires real mental strength. To escape a suffocating culture that revels in mediocrity, hard work is called for. We are urged to reject received wisdom and develop our own narratives. Contrarians of the world unite, for you have nothing to lose but your chains. Let me cite Abernethy: “As we grow older and more indoctrinated in mediocre thinking, it becomes harder and harder to think independently. To lead truly happy lives we need to be able to reject conventional thinking and be prepared to go against the crowd”.

If you prefer your self help manuals suntanned, shallow and glitzy, look elsewhere. If you are looking for an adrenalin shot of honesty, by a man who has achieved excellence in a professional arena outside the motivational circuit, then Iain Abernethy is the writer for you.


Categories: Bodybuilders, British Self Help authors, Classic, Iain Abernethy, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #8 – Eat That Frog!

Posted on August 12, 2010 by James

Eat That Frog! is a masterly and polished production, a self help book that not only pitches well but delivers real and lasting value. Brian Tracy is a doyen of the self-improvement and sales movement, a speaker who fulfils that quaint and rather old-fashioned virtue of delivering on the spiel he preaches. There is one concept that forms the heart of the book and which inspires the alluring, attention-grabbing title: get the most important task of the day done first. In a world that relishes complexity and thrives on the esoteric, this kind of direct, simple advice is exhilarating. There are no mantras to memorise, complex tasks to perform or obscure psychological theories to grapple with.

Simplicity is power, and Occam’s Razor showed us long ago that the simplest and quickest solution is usually the best. Tracy expands this basic idea by delivering a series of punchy and downright revolutionary premises: apply the Pareto (80/20) rule to every task; obey the law of forced efficiency, leverage your special talents and knock down your key constraints. The power of focus and concentration is awesome, and the power of consistent focus applied relentlessly over time can genuinely change the world.

That is of course, as long as it focuses on the right things. The Pareto rule, as advocated by Richard Koch, shows how focusing on the “vital few” inputs can multiply and leverage the impact and results of any activity, in some cases with exponential force. Constantly evaluate your actions and goals to ensure that you are really targeting these key actions. Apply “zero-based thinking” at every opportunity – if you were starting from scratch, is this what you would be doing?

The key to achieving all this is the power of habit, which is why it is important to develop “frog-eating” as a daily routine. Of course this assumes that we have some degree of autonomy or control over our work schedule, and the ability to attack problems with limited interruptions. I would argue that seizing control of your working environment is a key to making Tracy’s approach deliver maximum benefits.

Self-books don’t get any more concise than Eat that Frog. In just 130 pages, you will find enough distilled wisdom to pad out five volumes in the hands of any other author. The time management principles expounded here are an essential counterpart to the idea of lifestyle design that Tim Ferriss and others advocate. The secrets and tools are all contained within this book – as ever, they must be applied consistently and fearlessly to yield maximum benefit. Let us close with one of the many quotes that pepper this inspiring and compelling self help book.

“When every physical and mental resource is focused, one’s power to solve a problem multiplies tremendously” – Norman Vincent Peale

Clarity is power. Eat that frog.

Categories: American Self Help Authors, Brian Tracy, Classic, Lifestyle Design, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #7 – The Four Hour Work Week

Posted on July 24, 2010 by James

Tim Ferriss is an iconoclast and a visionary. He starts with the radical premise that a life of corporate drudgery and wage slavery is neither necessary nor essential to lead the good life. In the Four Hour Work Week he offers a tantalising and alluring promise – that in return for working less than we ever dreamed of, we can live a lifestyle that surpasses all our expectations.

How realistic is the promise? Ferriss has the enthusiasm of a youthful evangelist, and those of a more conservative bent and family responsibilities may not see the point of a life gallivanting around the finest tango bars of Buenos Aires or living like a king in achingly hip Berlin. Yet the lifestyle choices are almost beside the point; the fact is that Ferriss offers a wake-up call for just about everyone who has got too comfortable in their mental assumptions.

His key insight is that mini-retirements, defined as times of maximum enjoyment, travel and engagement with the world, need not be endlessly deferred until the distant horizon of the pensionable years. In this he chimes with the gap year ethos that has become a rite of passage for Western students and many rootless twenty and thirty-somethings. He makes the scarcely original but still accurate point that employees can become trapped like a hamster on a wheel, living in expensive locales (New York, London) and spending up to and beyond their income. Free yourself from the tiresome burden of location specificity and earnings can soar.

The counter-argument, of course, is that the very buzz and network effect of living in an expensive global hub creates wealth, ideas, and rewarding social interaction. Even blogging from a pristine beach in Goa may lose its appeal after a while.

Ferriss makes some shrewd points on time management. Much of the book focuses on destroying the culture of ineffectual presenteeism that still breeds in so many organisations. Using a double-lock approach inspired by the 80/20 principle , he advises focusing purely on your “critical few” objectives, but also setting short, clear deadlines. This focuses our effort and also neutralises Parkinson’s Law that work expands to fill time available. The remaining chapters deal with the mechanics of setting up automated Internet income streams, split-testing advertisements and expounding various other concepts for scraping back valuable time while still in paid employment.

The Four Hour Work Week may remain an impossible dream for many, but the sheer enthusiasm and infectious joy of this book will inspire many to take action that enriches their lives and find personal happiness. As such it is one of the most innovative self help books of the moment.


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Self Help Book #6 – The Magic of Thinking Big

Posted on July 2, 2010 by James

“Life is too short to be little” – Disraeli

David Schwartz opens this self-help classic with the charming story of his young son who blurts out that when he grows up, he wants to be a Professor of Happiness. This optimism sets the tone for a very warm and uplifting book.

It’s worth mentioning up front that the book is very dated, even anachronistic. To me, that is part of its charm, evoking a picture-perfect post-war Americana of chrome, consumerism and optimistic salesmen (think of ABC’s “Mad Men”). There are tales of World War II veterans, men in $100 silk suits and grand industrial corporations.

Don’t let the period setting fool you. The book is far ahead of its time in recognising the power of self-talk, verbal conditioning and visualisation to deliver concrete results. He proclaims a philosophy of continuous improvement that might still seem radical coming from a lean production or quality guru thirty years later. As the title suggests, this book is about daring to believe and think big in a world of pettiness, mediocrity and sniping comments that strive to cut the tall poppy down to size.

Here are ten key lessons and soundbites from the book -

  1. Life is too short to be little
  2. Belief triggers the power to do
  3. Others see in us what we see in ourselves
  4. Your mind is a thought factory. Take control of the production line!
  5. Stickability is 95% of ability.
  6. Action cures fear
  7. Practice adding value to things (well, I’m trying with this review..;-)
  8. In the face of inertia, apply the attitude of “I’m activated”
  9. Defeat is a state of mind, nothing more
  10. Set goals to get things done

I have applied some of his simplest insights, which have proved to be remarkably beneficial:

  1. Deliberately circulate in new groups and keep growing your circle of friends. This is one recipe for a happier life.
  2. Never complain about the weather, since it only spreads negative thoughts and after all it you can’t change it!
  3. Give genuine compliments to people. The law of reciprocity will reward you…eventually.

In summary, this is a self-help gem. I have an affectionate regard for the genre and this book may not be your cup of tea. Yet many of the core ideas that motivational speakers like Tony Robbins and Jack Canfield have developed have their roots in this rich heritage of positive thinking literature.

Yes “The Magic of Thinking Big” is dated. It’s also timeless.

Categories: American Self Help Authors, Classic, David Schwartz, Practical Self Help Tools, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #5 – HUNGER – The Wisdom of Mike Mentzer

Posted on July 2, 2010 by James

The Wisdom of Mike Mentzer by John Little with Joanne Sharkey (McGraw Hill,2005)

Mike Mentzer (1951-2001) was not just another bodybuilder. Despite boasting one of the most perfectly developed bodies in the history of the sport, his primary contribution was as a philosopher, a sage and a public intellectual.

He defied the lazy stereotype of the muscle-bound, uneducated bodybuilder through his eloquence and intelligence. This book showcases his legacy – in the fields of nutrition, training and building body mass. Above all, it explains the scientific and philosophical underpinnings behind his famous – and allegedly unnervingly effective – Heavy Duty Training regime. You don’t have to be a fully-fledged bodybuilder to appreciate this book. If you just enjoy free weights training at the gym, this book will capture your imagination.

Mentzer believed that self-improvement was the most crucial human aspiration – and this applied to all areas of life; body mind and spirit. As an Objectivist in the school of Ayn Rand, he believed in the fundamental nobility of man. Bodybuilding was more than public art; it was the expression of basic human desires for HUNGER – Height, Uplift, Nobility, Grandeur, Exaltation and Reverence. The body was a form of communication and the key was to send the right message.

And that’s all in the first chapter of this unique portrait. The second chapter draws a sharp contrast between Mentzer’s positive, inspirational ideals and the more wily approach of his great rival, Arnold Schwarzenegger. The Austrian Oak was infamous for his psychological tactics and game-playing to gain advantage over the competition. Arnold’s skills brought him tremendous success and proved powerful enough to propel him to Hollywood stardom and a successful political career as governor of California; but Mentzer fans believe he lost something in the process. Mike Mentzer, the authors argue, renounced the Machiavellian path and instead strove for the betterment of the sport above all things. His collaboration with protégé Dorian Yates in the 1980s can be seen as part of this altruistic mission.

Part II of this work covers his controversial but very popular High-Intensity Training regime. Traditionally, bodybuilders had been slaves to the gym, training relentlessly for six hours a day with the huge cost in time and energy this involved. Mentzer realised that the rate of improvement was related to the intensity of the training rather than the frequency, and preferred to train once every four or five days but at very high intensity levels. He realised the enormous demands that bodybuilding placed on the human system and that adequate downtime and rest was essential.

Mentzer summarises his philosophy thus: “You can train hard or you can train long – you just can’t do both. And it so happens that it takes hard training to build big muscles”. The High-Intensity training philosophy (brand marketed as “Heavy Duty”) was one of the most controversial and successful development in the sports in the 1980s and Dorian Yates became its most notable exponent.  The reader should however consult the disclaimer at the start of the book before trying to apply any of Mike Mentzer’s training ideas.

The book details a number of training programmes (including Mike’s most productive routine) before closing with a question and answer session on his Heavy Duty Training ideas.

“The Wisdom of Mike Mentzer” is illustrated on virtually every page with pictures of Mentzer in his prime, the living embodiment of his own beliefs on human potential. It is a time travel machine to the last years of the golden age of bodybuilding – expect to see a large number of quintessentially Seventies moustaches and retro photos.

Mike Mentzer died a sudden death from cardiac complications on the morning of June 10, 2001.This book is part testament and part inspiration. It captures a perfect moment in time, when everything seemed possible.  It is a genuine, even moving account of a bodybuilding legend from people who knew him. Through this book, his legacy lives on.

Categories: Bodybuilders, Mike Mentzer, Practical Self Help Tools, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #4 – The Luck Factor

Posted on July 1, 2010 by James

What if working hard, setting goals and being talented actually didn’t work? Dr Richard Wiseman, a respected academic, has a shocking, subversive theory – success is not determined by any of the things we believe it is. In fact, success is quite often down to simple, dumb luck.

Read the Sunday Times Rich List and you can half guess it to be true. Why have these entrepreneurs, these financiers, made it – from a talented pool of millions? Yes, luck has made kings and ruined careers.  It’s truly the ambrosia of the gods – sweet, bitter and wilfully capricious all in one.

The Luck Factor is a bold attempt to grab Lady Luck and wrestle her to the ground. It’s less a book than an experience – full of interactive exercises and opportunities to participate.  Go with it.

Dr Richard Wiseman is no fly-by-night success guru. He’s a respected academic at the University of Hertfordshire and has catapulted himself into a TV career through his intriguing and radical psychological theories.

He cites the story of U.S. President Harry Truman, a bankrupt shopkeeper whose luck turned for the better in his late thirties. He ascended to the White House when the incumbent Roosevelt suddenly died, and became the victor-hero of World War Two. Truman then beat Dewey in 1948 in a result so unexpected that the newspapers had already printed the headlines “Dewey Defeats Truman”. Luck aided and abetted Harry Truman at every step of his political career.

Dr. Wiseman has a ruthlessly bipolar view of the world. You’ve either got luck or you ain’t. His rigorous scientific training shines through, as he strips away all the mysticism and superstition about luck to distil it to a set of core principles that anyone can learn. Here they are:

1.  Maximise chance opportunities in your life. My favourite example here is of a man who keeps a jar especially for coins he finds on the street – and fills the jar to the brim regularly. Wiseman’s astonishing conclusion is that the more likely you are to choose a new dish at a restaurant, the more likely you are to succeed.

2.    That old chestnut, intuition. I am reminded of a recent character in the U.K. version of “The Apprentice” whose intuition frequently led her miserably astray, so will not offer any further comment!

3.    Expect good fortune. We have all heard of the “self-fulfilling prophecy”. How many times have you heard a friend say: “She’s in a relationship with X – he’s no good, but she doesn’t believe she deserves anyone better”. Without high self-esteem, luck will probably be elusive.

4.    Transform bad luck into good. Everyone has obstacles and challenges, but it’s how we respond to them that really matters.

So what will you learn from this book? First – beliefs matter.  He cites the Chinese-American death rate from cardiac arrest spikes on the fourth of the month, which many consider unlucky. There is no equivalent spike among other American ethnic groups.  Wiseman cites an old German proverb: “No-one is luckier than him who believes his own luck”. Secondly, embrace the importance of the alchemy of transforming bad luck into good – of breaking the downward spiral and taking positive, concrete action to improve your life.

The Luck Factor is a revelation and one of the best self help books of recent years. You will never see the world in the same way again. If one day you start rolling dice to determine which new sport to take up, or begin chatting to complete strangers in the supermarket, just say the good Dr. Wiseman told you to do it… Time to luck out!

Categories: British Self Help authors, Practical Self Help Tools, Richard Wiseman, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #3 – A Millionaire Speaks

Posted on July 1, 2010 by James

Self help books come in two categories – the demure and the bold. This book’s brash title almost stopped me from buying the book.  The words blare at you like a foghorn: “Secrets of the Millionaire Mind: Think Rich to Get Rich”. A ticker tape of dollar, pound and yen symbols duly parades in gold across the front cover in imperial purple.

Being suspicious of over-inflated promises and get-rich-quick fables, I had to overcome my natural cynicism to make the purchase. I’m glad that I did. Inside, I discovered a lucid, intelligent and thought-provoking exploration of the psychology of wealth.

The rich are different from you and me. Hemingway’s famous riposte – “Yes, they have more money!” is only half the story. Eker explains the true mental blueprint that marks out successful people like a hidden ultraviolet stamp. This book is the spiritual cousin of Robert Kiyosaki’s “Rich Dad Poor Dad” series – books that do not offer specific income strategies but instead explore that mysterious question – “What makes the rich tick? How do they think?”

This is one of the best self help books I have read in recent years. Eker doesn’t have the literary flair of Kiyosaki’s finely drawn father figures, but what it lacks in finesse it makes up for in bite. Eker pulls no punches: “Let me put it bluntly: anyone who says money isn’t important doesn’t have any!” Money, he rationalises, is very important in the areas where it works, and extremely unimportant in the areas where it doesn’t (health, spirituality, family etc). But he echoes the ideas of Conway’s nineteenth century classic “Acres of Diamonds”: What built your churches, sent your missionaries, fed the poor? The answer, however embarrassing it may appear to some, is cold hard cash.

Eker distils his principles into a simple set of “wealth principles”. Some border on the obvious, but others are profound and even subversive: “Money will only make you more of what you already are”.  Some are just great quotes: “Rich people collect land. Poor people collect bills”. He encourages us to mix and associate with the wealthy, and to build up a peer group of successful people. Recent scientific research shows that positive and negative emotions are socially contagious, so this could be a remarkably effective strategy.

Eker also revives the metaphor of the “wealth thermostat” – the idea that people automatically set an acceptable, middling level of success and will always settle for this.  If they sink below their self-perceived level, they will take radical action to restore their standard of living. However they will rarely stretch themselves beyond this comfort zone. And being comfortable, he argues, is highly over-rated.

One of Eker’s most compelling strategies is the idea of blessing that which you desire. He recounts his own experiences driving a beat-up clunker through a rough neighbourhood of SanDiego. Everyone ignored him. Then he pitched up one year in a brand new Jaguar and before long, youths were throwing beer cans at his car. Wealth excites irrational envy, and Eker advises us to feel the opposite and adopt the Huna philosophy of “bless that which you want”. This may have a “law of attraction” ring to it, but it’s more likely just an exercise in adjusting ourpsychological comfort zone to embrace a more abundant lifestyle.

Here are three of Eker’s snappiest and most profound sound-bites. These aren’t happy-clappy, fuzzy mantras but accurate statements of what works in a market economy. And Eker, who managed a group of retail fitness scores, is soundly grounded in the commercial world. Here they are:

  1. If you are willing to do only what’s easy, life will be hard. If you are willing to do what’s hard, life will be easy.
  2. No thought lives in our heads rent-free (Robert Allen)
  3. The Law of Income: You will be paid in direct proportion to the value you deliver in the marketplace

These aren’t magic bullets, but are signposts for the journey. “Secrets of the Millionaire Mind” is a first class map for the wealth creation road. So look beyond the cheesy title, suspend your disbelief, and turn on to the yellow brick road.

Categories: American Self Help Authors, Motivational Speakers, Practical Self Help Tools, Self Help Books, Uncategorized | Tags: , , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #2 – Awaken The Giant Within by Anthony Robbins

Posted on July 1, 2010 by James

Anthony Robbins - he’s a motivational speaker who is larger than life and packed with sunny Californian optimism. Across the world, few can have missed his infomercials, seminars and firewalks.

Awaken the Giant Within is his definitive work and a must-buy for anyone who enjoys the sometimes hyperbolic self-help genre. It offers a tantalising glimpse of the idea that total life transformation is possible – epitomised in the opening story of multimillionaire Robbins, who is flying in his private helicopter to lead a sell-out seminar at a football stadium. As he swoops over Glendale in California, he spots a vaguely familiar building from the air. It’s where he used to work, on the breadline, as a humble janitor.

I enjoyed this book for its optimistic spirit and its simple but eye-opening insights, such as “It is in your moments of decision that your destiny is shaped”. The opening chapters are exciting, fast-paced and compulsive reading – Robbins really grips your attention by promising dramatic personal change. He demonstrates the vital power of focus, decisions and empowering beliefs, all the time using his trademark conversational style.

The central section of the book focuses on his theory of “Neuro-Associative Conditioning”; and this is where my attention wanders. I am not a devotee of NLP (Neuro Linguistic Programming) approaches, so skipped a lot of the content here. Robbins concludes with a detailed seven-day program to change your life. The closing chapters systematically apply all the concepts in the book to jump-start your emotional happiness, health and fitness, relationships, finances and time management. The tag-line of this book says it all – the aim is to “wake up and take control of your life”.

Here are seven of the insights and soundbites from “Awaken the Giant Within” that have really helped me over the years:

  1. Make a decision to never settle for less than you can be
  2. Concentration is power – a concentrated effort is like a laser beam
  3. Raise your standards and change your limiting beliefs
  4. Lots of people know what they do. Few people do what they know
  5. Ask yourself: Ten years from now, who will you be?
  6. It is in your moments of decision that your destiny is shaped
  7. Questions are the answer. Throw enough constructive questions at a problem and you’ll get a solution.

Instead of allowing uncomfortable feelings such as fear, disappointment and frustration to weigh down on us, Robbins suggests treating these as a call to action. In his words, “Determination is the wake-up call to the human will”. Much of his work focuses on controlling our mental attitude and staying resilient in the face of hardship. The most challenging portion is his “Ten Day Mental Challenge”, where he adapts Emmet Fox’s crazy but profound idea in the 1930s that we should go for over a week with a cheerful attitude and a systematic attempt to squash every negative thought and disempowering emotion! Every time you slip up, you have to start again. I’ve confess I’ve tried this and it is much more difficult than imagined!

I picked up my copy waiting for a flight at Miami airport way back in the summer of 1999 – it cost $12.00 and this investment has repaid itself many times over. I recommend it unreservedly. In summary, this book is an absorbing and enjoyable read with no preaching. It can restore your faith that purposeful action can turn any situation around.

There is a surfeit of recessionary gloom and negativity around these days. “Awaken the Giant Within” is a tremendously powerful antidote.

Categories: American Self Help Authors, Anthony Robbins, Motivational Speakers, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , , , | Leave a comment

Self Help Book #1 – A SEAL’s Story

Posted on July 1, 2010 by James

Anyone can rustle up a sales pitch, spout a few motivational platitudes and talk of winning battles in the boardroom or on a golf course. And we pay them well for their mantras and their war stories. For them teambuilding is a daring afternoon building Lego models, or for the more testosterone-inclined, a bout of paintballing at the local activity centre.

Mack is different. The “teams” he worked in were elite U.S. Navy SEAL units, engaged in life-or-death missions of amphibious, alpine and special operations warfare.  In the “teams”, ordinary people achieved greatness – achieving endurance, heroism and self-sacrifice even as their counterparts wallowed in ordinary, suburban lives.

Look past the cheesy title, “Unleash the Warrior Within”, which sounds like the literary hybrid progeny of Conan the Barbarian and Anthony Robbins. You’ll be more impressed by the immensely lucid and powerful insights that Richard Machowicz draws on from his military career. It is no exaggeration to say that this single book is devastatingly powerful in its insights and has genuine potential to revolutionize the shape of the reader’s thinking. In fact, it has provided me with more practical tools for personal achievement than a dozen other more famous books in the genre.

Mack’s genius is to focus on the psychology that elite special forces teams deploy. The “Warrior” he speaks of in the title is nothing to do with fighting others, but rather the path of self-mastery, of personal achievement.  The book opens explosively. Mack pitches us straight into Hell Week, the infamous and arduous endurance test that all new recruits to the SEALS must pass.  As he is kept awake for days, dragged through rocks and surf and ripped by stones, carrying canoes so heavy they can break necks, he survives by repeating a simple mantra – “I can only be defeated if I give up or die”. He distills this into his core philosophy – “Not Dead, Can’t Quit” (TM).

Mack’s book is as exciting and gripping as a novel. The action never fails – from his sniper training to his HALO (high altitude low opening) jumps, from his beach landings to his days as a Hollywood celebrity bodyguard. It’s no self-indulgent memoir though. The book is jam-packed not just with wise words but actual, practical techniques such as the CARVER matrix to assess priorities, and the phase diagrams to plan goals.  The section on responding to physical threats – hint, always look at the mugger’s hands to see if they have a weapon – is worth its weight in gold.

As one of the world’s elite military forces, the Navy SEALs have no time for soundbites, or ideas that just sound good but don’t deliver.  Richard Machowicz, who is now a noted TV personality in America in his own right, delivers some fascinating and highly practical ideas. He has further developed this into “Bukido”, a holistic martial arts and improvement philosophy.

Of course, you could dismiss all this as a “Full Metal Jacket”-style fantasy and instead take your self-development ideas from perma-tanned “road warriors” whose idea of struggle is a traffic jam on the M1 and an awkward sales meeting. Take that approach if you will. But you might just be missing out on one of the most compelling, exceptional and inspirational personal development books in print today.

 

 

Categories: American Self Help Authors, Practical Self Help Tools, Richard Machowicz, Self Help Books | Tags: , , , , , | Leave a comment