Book Review

Quadruple Book Regurgitation

Garth Beyer

Following my breakup with girlfriend, I have decided to streamline my goals to accomplishments. At the beginning of 2012 I had decided that I wanted to read 25 books before the end of the year and last night, or this morning – I don’t recall what time it was – I completed that goal.

In the last week I have read four books that I would now like to regurgitate for you. However, unlike past book regurgitations, these will be more similar to reviews, as I did not highlight or pull out too many examples to share.

Ironically, during pre- and post- breakup I was reading The Mastery of Love by Don Miguel Ruiz.

I firmly believe that this book should be read by every adolescent of love. I would define an adolescent of love as anyone who has not read the book. This makes it very black and white as to who I think needs to pick it up. Did this book help me save the relationship? Obviously not. Could it have if I read it earlier, yes, but everything happens for a reason. (And that reason is usually based on the fall of three aspects, which you can read more about in my Twelve Pillars regurgitation toward the end of this post).

While you may solely believe that the book is supposed to help you master love, develop an honest and stable relationship and build a stronger chemical bond between you and your partner, you have correctly assumed only half of it. Reading this book during the break-up assisted me in making realizations and accepting them. The key to it though is not necessarily the eye-openers or realizations, they come naturally if you remain objective. However, if I had to simplify it for you, love is about acceptance.

In short, no matter when, where, or why you would pick this book up, you are going to feel that it was written for you, just you, at just the perfect time. Love is all there is, better to learn how to master (accept) now than later.

1-5 with 5 being read it right now, I will give it a 4.5

—

The War of Art: Break Through the Blocks and Win Your Inner Creative Battles by Steven Pressfield

This book was on my 50+ book list to read and to be straightforward (when am I ever not?), I got exhausted from reading all of the references to this book, all of the reviews and people suggesting others like me, to read it. As a writer, the more I know about the Resistance the better and who better to learn from than the one who put a title (the Resistance) to what prevents us from being creative.

After reading it in nearly one sitting, I was disappointed. Not in the sense of how it was written, or the advice in it, actually, the book is perfect but…

It’s perfect for someone who doesn’t know about the Resistance yet. For me, I’ve been aware of it, dancing with it and fighting with it for a fear few years now. As I set the book down, I really do believe that it should only be read by anyone who either has no clue about the Resistance or who is just starting to learn what being creative really entails.

If a blank mind opens the book, it will be taking in the knowledge Pressfield presents quicker than the desert floor absorbs a bit of rain, and craving more all the same.

While most of what Pressfield shares is only a reminder to me, there are certainly a few actions I will take as a result of reading it. One specifically is in response to reading the chapter “The Definition of a Hack”.

“I learned this from Robert McKee. A hack, he says, is a writer who second-guesses his audience. When the hack sits down to work, he doesn’t ask himself what’s in his own heart. He asks what the market is looking for.” (pg 152)

For quite some time I have been eliminating multiple sentences and sometimes entire paragraphs, rewriting portions that I think are too personal or that the reader wont give a damn about, excluding swear words and even holding back a bit of my real potential. Possibly more times than not, I’ve been a hack.

Rest assured, that phase is over thanks to reading The War of Art.

1-5 with 5 being read it right now, I will give it a 5 if you don’t know what the Resistance is, a 1.5 if you do

—

These next two books are ones that came with the Success book package I purchased last November to jump-start my pursuit for just that, success.

An aside about reading Success books: You don’t need 20 of them. You probably don’t even need 10. A strong handful will do since they regularly repeat themselves in different forms. Also, you can purchase huge packages of 20-30 books on Success but what I have learned is that when you make and devote time to reading on personal growth, you have less and less time to continue doing so. Why? Because you are putting thoughts into action, advice into results and lessons into experience. By the time you begin going through your whole list of personal growth/ success books, you will have already changed your life so much that you are living the life you read about.

My immediate reaction upon reading and resting The Seasons of Life by Jim Rohn on my side table was that it’s a book that should be read in the Winter. It is a highly motivating take on the cycle of personal growth and from experience, most people are already feeling the height of their life during Spring/Summer. The Seasons of Life is not set to make where you are standing now even better, it is to give you a deep understanding of why you are standing where you are at this moment and advice on how to control where you will be standing one season, two seasons or three seasons from now.

Something I really enjoyed about the book was that it did not overdo it with the seasonal/nature analogy. There was a depth of optimistic realism – yes, that may be an oxymoron – that enables you to relate your life to that of trees, flowers, leaves, or the seasons themselves.

We all know that in the Spring we are often times ecstatic, in the Summer we are happy and content, in the Fall we are at peace but at Winter we are depressed. Reading The Seasons of Life does not present to you a way for balance or consistent happiness, but a mind-set and strategy to make the absolute most of every season.

1-5 with 5 being read it right now, I will give it a 2.5 and suggest again to read it during Winter

—

The next book in my “success series” we can call it, was Twelve Pillars by Jim Rohn and co-author Chris Widener

They took a fictional approach on telling the Twelve Pillars of success. It felt real in the sense that we all wish it would happen to us, so there is an instant connection between reader and protagonist. Speaking of it being fiction,  it was slightly predictable, at least the plot twists were but nevertheless the foresight did not degrade the story in any way.

There is truly a plethora of incredible quotes. For example,

“‘That’s great,’ Charlie said. ‘I am so glad for you. You will have to keep me posted as it progresses. Just remember that once a flower blooms, it still needs water and sun to keep it from wilting. The work isn’t over when the color comes out.”

The Twelve Pillars:

  • A Chance Encounter (Personal Development)
  • Live a Life of Health
  • The Gift of Relationships
  • Achieve Your Goals
  • The Proper Use of Time
  • Surround Yourself with the Best People
  • Be a Lifelong Learner
  • All of Life Is Sales
  • Income Seldom Exceeds Personal Development
  • All Communication Brings the Common Ground of Understanding
  • The World Can Always Use One More Great Leader
  • Leave a Legacy

Overall, Twelve Pillars was an entertaining read that allows you to put each pillar into action in your own life at the end of each chapter.

1-5 with 5 being read it right now, I will give it a 3.5

– As stated with the first book regurgitation on The Mastery of Love, I will now go into a quick insight about love/relationships from a combination of these two books, plus experience. Building a relationship is based on three factors: time, effort and imagination. HT to Jim Rohn, but I think I’ve taken it a step further than that.

Time can be based on quantity or quality, but in the real world, “time” is more “timing” than anything. It’s about spontaneity and creating the perfect moment.

Effort can be dwindled down completely to compliments. Women do not receive enough of them and once you begin to put in the effort, you will realize just how many they deserve.

Imagination is doing something fun, weird, and different together. It’s about getting her to think about the crazy things she has always wanted to do but never has and doing them! Dates, dinners and distractions have their place in a relationship but nothing will make a girl more happy than to do the oddball things she has always questioned about life.

Let me know any of your responses to my thoughts or your thoughts on the books in the comments section and keep coming back for more book regurgitations. After all, I have more time to read now. Is that an up side?

Stay Positive & Genuine

Garth E. Beyer

Think On These Things

Garth Beyer

Don’t you hate when questions are answered with questions? They are often confusing and even more aggravating unless it’s Krishnamurti asking the questions.

This was my second time picking up “Think On These Things” and reading it all the way through. I mentioned that I read it all the way through because it’s actually a hard book to read start to finish because you are constantly asked to do exactly what the title says, to think on the things that are talked about. I’m not sure about you, but thinking can get exhausting especially when what you are thinking about is breaking boundaries, challenges status-quo and punching tradition in the face.

The reason I tried reading it a second time is because the last time I read it, I was 16 years old and I wanted to see if 1. It is really worth reading a book twice and 2. If I had a different outlook on the philosophies that Krishnamurti spoke about 3.5 years later.

Before I write a short book regurgitation, let me riff on reading books over again. This isn’t my first time trying it, and I’m going to give it one more shot with another book that I am going to read again soon. During New Years I was reading dozens of posts about the best books to read and the fact that this year is supposed to be about reading the best books over again and applying the lessons to your life.

What I have come to learn is the little things which you would catch in reading a book over again, are rain dropped throughout a similar book by a different author. The books are similar, so these small repetitive lessons are also similar. You have already taken the most important pieces of the first book; there is no point in reading it again to catch the small points when you can just read another book with new big important pieces and the same small points.

The thing about the many books based on the same subject or field of interest is that they are all plagiarized. The author read nearly a hundred books on the subject, used the small points from them and created the larger, new, more important ones and the next author did the same. Because this is the way books are written, it seems ill-fitting to reread a book over again.

Book Regurgitation

“To find out what you love to do demands a great deal of intelligence; because, if you are afraid of not being able to earn a livelihood, or of not fitting into this rotten society, then you will never find out”

The real reason I picked Think On These Things up to read it again was because I wanted to revisit his concepts of the function of education which is the title of the first chapter. Throughout the entire book the way education is taught is challenged and ideas are given to improve it. Being straightforward, everything that is mentioned in the book is supposed to also be mentioned in school, to be thought on, to be philosophized on – something that will also appear in my first 30,000 word eBook that will be released at the beginning of August.

Freedom is the next subject that is focused on as most people are not free; they are dead or near death. “We all want to be famous people – and the moment we want to be something, we are no longer free.” (pg 10) At the same time of freedom, intelligence is thought on. Intelligence is to find out, but to find out is not to make a conclusion. Once a conclusion is made, the mind is bordered and dies much quicker. See, the whole concept of freedom is to free the mind, not in the sense of it being empty but in the sense of it being aware with love and experience.

Love is mentioned very few times throughout the book because love is simple.

“Have you noticed how few of us have deep feeling about anything? Do you ever rebel against your teachers, against your parents, not just because you don’t like something, but because you have a deep, ardent feeling that you don’t want to do certain things? If you feel deeply and ardently about something, you will find that this very feeling in a curious way brings a new order into your life” (pg 61)

Another quick note to make about the book is that aside from the opening of each chapter, the chapter is comprised of answers to questions. One particular question is “However much I may want to be an engineer, if my father is against it and won’t help me, how can I study engineering?”

Krishnamurti’s answer, “If you persist in wanting to be an engineer even though your father turns you out of the house, do you mean to say that you won’t find ways and means to study engineering? You will beg, go to friends. Sir, life is very strange. The moment you are very clear about what you want to do, things happen. Life comes to your aid – a friend, a relation, a teacher, a grandmother, somebody helps you… But you see, we don’t want to invite life, we want to play a safe game; and those who play a safe game die very safely is that not so?” (pg 126)

Other great questions which are issued and responded to:

To revolt, to learn, to love – are these three separate processes, or are they simultaneous?

How can we be free of dependence as long as we are living in society?

What is self-knowledge, and how can we get it?

Why do we want to be famous?

I am full of hate. Will you please teach me how to love?

What is happiness in life?

Why do we find pleasure in our games and not in our studies?

Why do we hate the poor?

Why do we like to be lazy?

How is one to become intelligent?

Why do birds fly away when I come near?

As always, I have to give the one chapter to read to see if you are interested in getting the book. “The energy to life” is the fourth to last chapter in the book and basically answers how to be full of energy all of the time rather than lethargic and lazy each day. All in all, was it worth the read a second time? No. Was it worth a read the first time? Yes.

Free Library

Krishnamurti is the far right one, had to be different and put the pages facing out

Since I moved to Madison, I have noticed something peculiar popping up as I ride my bike on the bike paths. Bird houses. Not just your typical bird house, but a huge bird house, with an actual door instead of a hole. Above the door the words “Little Free Library” are written. Inside this giant bird house are random books that people have put inside. I think it is an absolutely brilliant idea and as you can see, I have deposited my Krishnamurti book in one. At first I was worried that there are only bad, terrible books being tossed into the free library because people don’t want to hold on to them. Then I realized the books inside are probably the best books anyone can read because they are so valuable that people have to share them, have to let someone else experience them and have to feel that inspiring power of knowing that you contributed to someone’s experience in reading a fresh, positive, great book. To the person who will pick this book out, enjoy. To the readers who will check this  book out at a public library or view the recommended chapter at a book store, enjoy.

Stay Positive & You Get The Most Thoughts For Your 4 Bucks With This Book

Garth E. Beyer