Okay book

There are a couple of books out there that fall into the category of THE SECRET. Many years ago I read THE POWER OF POSITIVE THINKING and LAWS OF ATTRACTION. Both are great, and so is thie Rhonda Byrne book. <br /><br />The basic premise of THE SECRET is somewhat like that of positive thinking, the main message being that we all have the ability WITHIN OURSELVES to make changes and drive our lives. This book will not fix everyone's problems but it's a nice place to start.<br /><br />Would also recommend YOU CAN HEAL YOUR LIFE by Louise Hay. It's a great book combining the aspects of mental thinking and physical illnesses.

I finally got it!!

In his book The Key, Joe Vitale did 2 major things for me. <br /><br />Firstly - He explained why all the self-help stuff I have read, (and tried to put into practice) doesn't work a lot of the time. He then gives techniques for clearing the rubbish in our subconscious minds. <br /><br />Secondly, and most amazingly, the Ho'oponopono technique (from ancient Hawaiian spirituallity)works instantly with any and all problems you care to name. It does mean that you have to accept 100% responsibility for absolutely everything that happens to you. This might be hard for some. Once you can do that, this technique (1 of 10 in the book) is I believe, the single most effective, speedy and simple one for clearing the rubbish that prevents us from having life filled with love and good things. No affirming or visualising until you are blue in the face!!!<br /><br />This is a fast track route to increased health, wealth & happiness but more importantly - spirituality. <br /><br />I have ordered Joe's book Zero Limits, which goes into more detail with this technique (which was used by a Dr. to cure a ward of criminally insane patients).<br /><br />Thanks Joe. I love you!!<br />

Gave me that 'warm' feeling

I must have been going through a period of change when I read this book, because when I finished, I remember having that"it all makes sense now" type of feeling. I enjoyed the book - very simple to read - sweet enough - I felt better for taking an hour out of my day to read it.

A Truly Shocking Read

I bought this book after it was reviewed in a periodical and after reading the snippets I was hooked.<br /><br />I was astonished at the ways in which the news we are encouraged to treat as the gospel truth is manipulated, mass produced and generally tainted by various parties.<br /><br />This is a book that everyone should read - particularly if you ever read a newspaper, listen to the radio or watch television.

Big and cumbersome

Although this is the official book, it is not the best buy. It is A4 size and therefore too big to pop into you bag so that you can read it on the bus or train. You only need to study chapters 2,3,4,5 and 6, but the book contains 9 chapters, 4 of which are not required to be read for the test. The book also contains no questions and answers. You would be far better off buying one of the smaller books. They contain the required study material and one of them even has a CD that contains Question and answer tests with hundreds of questions that you can practice to make sure that you are completely ready for the test.

Lead better

Great stuff from Jo Owen. I've always tried to play the straight man with my guys. If they're bad, I will quite literally lead them round the office by their nose, over desks and chairs, for five minutes or so to show them what happens to muppets. However if they come up with the goods, they get tossed a sweetener - Burtons voucher, golf brolley etc. Jo Owen gives me something to add to my arsenal. We've now started on a more 'human relations' route in the team, with feedback sessions on 'how does that make you feel' and 'how to value yourself and your colleagues'. I might think it's a lot of old cobblers myself, but if it keeps the troops happy, I'm happy.

Fantastic book for NLP Students!

Are you a NLP student or just simply someone who finds it fasinating! This is an exceptionally good book. The writer is very clear in what he means. I am doing and NLP course and I have found this book has helped my understand the subject more clearly. Personally I find NLP fasinating. This book is ideal for anyone but particulary good for NLP students and NLP beginners.

NLP is the study of human excellence

The Work At Home Freelancer's Must Have

Every year I grumble at the thought of shelling out for the latest copy of this, but every year, realising it's a must-have for my freelance writer's toolkit, I buy it.<br /><br />I might start buying it every second year though, as I don't have time to read the pro articles and if I wanted to read these, there are plenty in the Sunday press and literary mags.<br /><br />The 'writing short stories for radio' piece was useful though - however, less pleasing was the fact that these submissions take up to a year to even get read.<br /><br />For a beginning writer determined to make a business or career out of writing, this book can be used as a textbook or course to study! Hard work though!

Great insights - a real kick in the nads for the macho heroic leader!

Jim Collins and a team of researchers have spent 5 years trying to identify the essential characteristics found in great companies but absent in merely good companies. <br /><br />Heard it all before? Well I thought I had, but in contrast to the usual highly predictable drivel that purports to explain the success of companies, Collins uncovers some really unexpected insights. Charismatic, dominant, headline-grabbing leaders turn out to be bad. The meek (but not weak!) shall inherit the Earth. And there's a good explanation too. <br /><br />Without revealing the rest of the findings, the book sweeps aside the dogma we have been fed about successful companies, their leaders, culture, practices, turn around processes, the role of technology, growth through acquisition etc. <br /><br />Collins leaves the reader with a distilled set of principles that have turned unremarkable companies into great companies which achieved sustained superior performance, even in unattractive industries. This insight is derived from many hours of interviews with executives from great companies and similar comparator companies. Collins manages to organise and verbalise the intuitive, unformatted, instinctive drivers of actions and decision making that has served these companies faithfully, and which remained constant during and in the build up prior to their most successful periods. Those companies that stray from the rules revert to mediocrity or worse, which is reasonable evidence in support of the theory.<br /><br />There is a lot to be said for this book, but don't show it to your competitors!

Best Book on Project Management I've Read

Great book that's very easy to read and full of useful advice. Style of the book makes it an ideal travel companion. I wish I'd had the benefit of working with such professional project managers on my past assignments.

Time management that makes sense

I have to be honest only been using it a little while, however it works. It's a simple process to follow and without trying achieved tons of things that have been lying around for ages. I've cleared the decks, tidied the desk at work and made by home office spotless. Everything is where is should be and I know what there is to do and when it needs to be done.

Simple yet poweful!

This book takes key concepts in building your own wealth and communicates them in the story of Robert's two fathers. The poor, highly educated one and the wealthy one who did little school education. By revealing his formative years being taught by rich dad how to build independent wealth- you learn the simple but very important ways the rich build wealth.<br /><br />Despite its simplicity, the message works on many levels, it's a fascinating story, it shows you how the rich build their wealth and it shows you how to avoid the pitfalls of staying poor from bad habits.<br /><br />An easy read chock full of financial wisdom.

Psychology is taking a positive turn

= POSITIVE PSYCHOLOGY =
Until recently psychology has mainly been working within a disease model: a strong emphasis has been placed on discovering deficits in human behavior and finding ways to repair this damage. Psychologist hardly focused on in doing studies acquiring knowledge about healthy functioning and building strengths. In other words: they have focused solely on taking away something negative (the disfunctioning) instead of adding something positive (increasing mental and behavioral health). The result: psychologist know little about healthy and happy functioning. This situation has been changing now since the rise of positive psychology a few years ago. What is Positive Psychology? It is a new movement in psychology, originated by Martin Seligman and a few other prominent psychologists among whom Mihali Csikszentmihalyi (author of FLOW). It aims to be a psychological science about the best things in life. Main topics of study are: positive emotions, positive traits and positive institutions. This book, Authentic Happiness, is the first book on positive psychology. Seligman is its main spokesperson.

= HAPPINESS =
This book mainly deals with the phenomenon of happiness. According to Seligman your enduring level op happiness results from three factors: 1) your SET RANGE ( the basic biologically determined range within which your happiness normally will be), 2) the CIRCUMSTANCES OF YOUR LIFE (some conditions - like being married and living in a democratic country- somehow seem to contribute to happiness, and 3) your VOLUNTARY CONTROL ( the things you can do to get your happiness to the upper part of your set range. Ok, then how to get this done? Before answering this question Seligman explains that happiness/positive emotion can refer to three domains: the PAST (satisfaction, contentment, fulfilment, pride and serenity), the PRESENT (joy, ecstasy, calm, zest, ebullience, pleasure and flow) and the FUTURE (optimism, hope faith, trust). Then the author comes up with suggestions to improve your happiness:

= HOW TO INCREASE YOUR HAPPINESS =
1) to be happier about your past, you need to: 1) let go of the false belief that your past negative experiences determine your present and future, 2) increase your gratitude about the good things in your past and 3) learn how to forgive past wrongs.

2) to be happier in your present, you need to distinguish between PLEASURES and GRATIFICATIONS. Pleasures are delights that have clear sensory and strong emotional components that require little if any thinking. Gratifications are flow-experiences. They are activities we very much like doing but that are not necessarily accompanied by any raw feelings at all. The gratifications last longer than the pleasures and they are undergirded by our strengths and virtues. The key to happiness in past and future lies in enhancing gratifications.

3) to be happier about your future, you need to change your explanatory style in order to become more optimistic and hopeful (for an explanation read my review of Seligman's book LEARNED OPTIMISM).

= AUTHENTIC HAPPINESS BY USING YOUR STRENGTHS =
These explanations imply what Seligman means by AUTHENTIC HAPPINESS. He says we should not rely on shortcuts like television watching, chocolate eating, loveless sex, and buying things to feel happy. He explains that positive emotion alienated from the exercise of character leads to emptiness, to inauthenticity, and to depression. So we want to feel like we deserved our positive feelings. That's why Seligman says UTHENTIC HAPPINESS comes from identifying and cultivating your most fundamental strengths (so-called SIGNATURE STRENGTHS) and using them everyday in work, love, play, and parenting. This message reminds of the one in Csikszentmihalyi's FINDING FLOW (see my review).

= CORE VIRTUES AND STRENGTHS =
Psychology has devised a classification system (language) for describing abnormal behavior and mental diseases. But it lacked a language describing human effectiveness and sanity. That is why Seligman and a team of scholars researched sources from all kinds of cultures and times in history and found that there is a strong convergence in what these traditions consider to be virtues and strengths. This led to the formulation of a classification system of virtues and strengths. SIX CORE VIRTUES: 1) Wisdom and knowledge, 2) courage, 3) Love and humanity, 4) Justice, 5) Temperance, 6) Spirituality and transcendence. Further they identified 24 strengths corresponding to these virtues. This book contains definitions of this taxonomy and some questionnaires for the reader to complete (the questionnaires can be found on the web too, by the way).

= CONCLUSION =
Some words about the form and style of the book. It is pleasantly written. Seligman writes in a rather personal and honest style which makes the book lively (for instance he exclaims on page 24:"I am a hideous example of my own theory.") I recommend this book to anyone interested in psychology and in happiness (although it is not a self-help book in the first place, I think). The book ends reflectively dealing with the relationship between positive emotions and win-win situations, and speculating that we may be on the threshold of an era of win-win games and good-felling. I enjoyed reading the book and I like positive psychology. It is in many ways reminiscent of humanistic psychology (which I always liked) but has a more scientific approach. I have a good hope it will be a success.

Coert Visser, www.m-cc.nl

Interesting, easy to read and eye-opening

In this interesting and well written book, Harford explains how basic economics drives the world and why the cup of coffee you buy on your commute in the morning is so expensive. <br /><br />A quick glance at your average daily newspaper will show how a lot of people who ought to know better completely misunderstand economics and how the world works. This book is fun to read as well as easy to understand, but not patronisingly simple.

Irritating In The Extreme

Much like the author, I suspect. Nassim Taleb is, at least by his own reckoning, one of the smartest men alive, and this estimate is present in just about every line of this book. The really irritating aspect is that he is writing about some genuinely interesting and even fascinating concepts and what could have been an mesmerising and perhaps even life changing read is destroyed by his complete inability to write. Perhaps English is not his first language, but I think that his real problem is a prickly narcissism which turns what should be an exhilarating exploration of new and sometimes even shocking ideas into a boring, contemptuous declaration of what is wrong with the media, market traders and economists, and this is a real shame, because when he's not pronouncing, he's actually worth listening to. What he needs is a ghost writer and a bloody good editor.

A Beginner Trader Must!

Having lost a few £'s from a share tip in the Northern Rock share crash i decided it was time to know a little bit more before dabbling with investments. And how happy I am that i started with this book. Not only were all my trading questions answered but I actually thoroughly enjoyed the book from beginning to end due to the light hearted and sometimes comical way the writer puts his messages across. I would recommend as a must read for any beginner investor!

JSP

I enjoyed this book and loved the layout of it. It took the format of a very readable magazine with plenty fun in it!<br />A good laugh and I would think JSP had fun putting it all together!<br />I like her take on life!

Is Blackjack beatable...

....amazing story of how 6 students used their mathematics skills to work the vegas tables. What starts as a low key affair soon escalates to high stakes and unwanted attention - causing some scary moments and adrenalin fuelled moments. As many of the reviews say you really do have this overwhelming feeling to just read another page as the story starts to unravel. Favourite part was the Tyson fight night.......wont spoil it though.