Review: Personal Development for Smart People
Steve Pavlina’s credentials in personal development are impressive: he’s written about productivity, goal setting and more on his blog and in other venues. This month, Pavlina’s book — Personal Development for Smart People — hit shelves.
With a name like Personal Development for Smart People, I have to admit I was expecting something a little more technical than what Pavlina wrote. I was expecting a system, maybe a few worksheets and some definitive steps that Pavlina might recommend to readers. If you’re looking for a how-to guide, however, Personal Development for Smart People isn’t going to meet your needs.
Rather than producing a user’s manual for personal development, Pavlina created something more philosophical, more theoretical. His book provides a basic framework from where all other parts of finding a workable system, be it for productivity or careers or something else entirely. It works as such and can provide a good introduction to underlying principles. I think, at least in part, Pavlina’s approach is a reflection of how he came to the topic of personal development. In the introduction to the book, he relates the moment when he decided he needed to straighten out his life — he was 19 years old and in jail. He decided he needed to start from the ground up, down to the point where he needed a new code of ethics. I doubt Personal Development for Smart People could have been written by any personal development expert who came to the field needing to solve just one problem or answer just one question. On a fundamental level, Personal Development for Smart People really is about building from only starting principles.
Consider the first half of the book’s table of contents:
- Truth
- Love
- Power
- Oneness
- Authority
- Courage
- Intelligence
These are the topics that Pavlina considers fundamental, and after reading his book, I think I agree. Consider the issues we’re always looking to tweak: our careers, relationships and other fairly surface issues. Pavlina set out to find commonality between all these problems we run into, on the grounds that there must be fairly universal approaches that could work across the boundaries between career and relationships. Pavlina’s criteria were simple:
…these principles must be universal. They must be applicable by anyone, anywhere, in any situation. They must work equally well for all areas of life: health, relationships, career, spiritual growth and so on. They must be timeless, meaning that they can still be expected to work 1,000 years from now, and they would have workd 1,000 years ago.
That’s a pretty tall order, but Pavlina managed to find three principles that fit the bill: truth, love and power. The other four (oneness, authority, courage, and intelligence) are secondary principles derived from those three. It isn’t a stretch to consider most of our questions about personal development in those terms: I know a lot of my own productivity pitfalls have amounted to whether I was really being truthful with myself from goals to my own capabilities.
Pavlina didn’t really let me down when it comes to concrete advice on developing parts of my life, despite dedicating the first half of Personal Development for Smart People to a broader over view. The second half is the “Practical Applications” section and I did find plenty more to chew on in the second section. Pavlina really puts the theoretical concepts he discusses in the first section to work when describing his principles’ practical application. Chapter 7 particularly stuck with me: it covers habits, starting with their connection to truth and leading through love and power. With truth, Pavlina suggests a few moments of brutal honesty:
What are your best habits? What are your worst? Do you have any addictions? Do these habits serve you well or hold you back? Do they help you align with truth, or do you feel compelled to lie about them? What habits are you hiding? What habits are you most proud of?
Pavlina is suggesting a very difficult conversation to have with yourself, and his approach to handling your habits doesn’t get any easier. When he looks at habits through the lens of love, he has equally tough ideas — including removing connections to friends that make it harder to break your addiction. Nobody ever said that personal development was easy, however. Beyond connecting his discussion of habits to principles, Pavlina does cover some helpful hints on actually breaking negative habits and creating positive ones, such as 30-day trials and stair-stepping. From there, Pavlina dives back into his principles and covers how habits interact with the secondary principles, such as oneness and authority. He does the same with Career, Money, Health, Relationships and Spirituality.
I don’t know if Personal Development for Smart People is going to be a game-changing book as far as personal development goes. While it is packed with good information, it has a ground-up approach that may not work for everyone. So many people are looking for help with just their careers or just their relationships that it seems not everyone is ready for such a broadly-based book. But for those individuals who are ready to tackle some dramatic changes — especially those interested in starting from scratch — Personal Development for Smart People really could be the right fit. On that note, I recommend adding Personal Development for Smart People to your reading list.
WRITER'S BIOGRAPHY
Thursday Bram
Thursday Bram blogs about a variety of topics, from personal finance to small business. She is the author of an upcoming book on the tools and tricks you need to build a career you can take with you during long-term travel. More information about Thursday and her book, Working Your Way Around the World, is available on her personal site, ThursdayBram.com.
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Comments
FrugalNYC says on October 28th, 2008 at 10:45 pm
Sounds interesting, but are there no other books out there like it? Can the information it provides be found on his blog?
FutureMichael says on October 29th, 2008 at 12:07 am
Pathetic review.
This is an excellent book. This books rocks, Trust me, I’ve read many success books and this one has all you to need to go to the next level in your life!!!
Vincent says on October 29th, 2008 at 5:23 am
I have seen many reviews on this book. Most of them have good reviews on it though.
Cheers
Vincent
Personal Development Blogger
DanGTD says on November 9th, 2008 at 5:32 am
@FrugalNYC
No, actually there’s no other book like it. You can flip it through Amazon LookInside and read a dozen of pages or so for free.
John says on November 10th, 2008 at 8:40 am
Shameless advertising post
stephen goldberg says on November 17th, 2008 at 5:17 am
An extensive resource on business and personal development. A lot of thougths, views and articles on the recent happenings and their impact on economy and your lives.
Zmds1108 says on December 1st, 2008 at 9:54 am
Have you had it with your husband’s infidelity and are on the verge of leaving? If you want things to go back to the way they were when you were first married, there are a few hard facts you may have to face. Most men stray for a reason. There are a few who just enjoy the thrill of the chase and for many it is due to facing the reality that they are getting older.
We have all heard the saying, ‘middle aged crazy.’ For many men this is true. They begin to wonder what they have missed. Often they buy motorcycles. They want to go out and party all night like they did when they were younger. However, many men stray. This has been happening for years. So how do women keep their husbands from straying?
Do not ignore the fact.
Some women seem to want to accept this as a fact of life hoping if they ignore what is happening, it will just go away. This is not going to happen. You must face it head on and let him know you are aware of his behavior. If he denies it, which most men do, you have to be steadfast. The worst thing you can do is take his word for it, bury your head in the sand, and think you must have been mistaken.
Do not continue to hold it over his head.
If your husband or boyfriend has cheated, the two of you decide to try and work it out and save your relationship; you cannot bring it up every time you have a disagreement. If it has been decided by both of you to put it in the past and go forward, this is going to be the worst thing you can do. The past belongs in the past and if you cannot leave it there, the future will not happen.
If the middle aged crazy bug bites your husband, a cure can be found.
If all the tell-tale signs are there including wanting to buy a Harley, you need to act a little crazy yourself. This can be a rough time and by doing things out of the ordinary and spicing up the relationship, you can keep him from looking elsewhere. Remember he does love you, he is just doubting himself.
Counseling can work if both of you agree.
If communication is an issue, counseling may be your best option. Everyone is told to
Zmds1108 says on December 1st, 2008 at 10:09 am
Do you think your wife is cheating on you? Have you found the signs of infidelity within your home, on her clothing or in her vehicle? Maybe you are not really sure about the issue of your cheating wife, yet something seems to be missing in your marital relationship. Do you know that the leading cause of a married woman having an affair is directly linked to the way she feels? Does she seem to be unhappy in your relationship? Are you meeting her emotional needs as well as all her other needs within the relationship you share together? If you are wondering if your wife is cheating on you or you have found some type of tale tell sign of infidelity, more than likely your wife is cheating on you. Are you confused about what to do about your marriage?
Well, the news is out. There are female cheating stories that reveal to you 6 ways to stop your wife’s infidelity. Upon revealing some of their secrets other females, cheating wives are offering men an opportunity to learn how, what, where and why they had the affairs of infidelity to their marriage and to their husbands. If you want to stop your wife’s infidelity you may want to pay close attention. In order to stop your wife from cheating on you there are a few things you can do to encourage her to be honest, truthful and faithful to you and your vows of marriage.
1. When you want to stop your wife from cheating on you, you will need to pay her a bit more attention. For instance, you should be more interested in the things she says while talking to you. One example is to turn off anything that may be competing with what she is saying when talking to you. Turn off the radio or the television if that is what you are doing when she tries to gain your attention. She will be surprise; however she will be flattered as well when you do this. You enjoy having someone’s full attention when you converse with them, she will as well when you do it for her.
2. Plan a weekly date night so you two can get out of the house and enjoy yourself. Make sure that you plan for a babysitter if you need one. Take the time you need to plan out your date, just like you did in the beginning of your relationship.
3. Admire her and let her know that you think she is beautiful, entertaining, intelligent and wonderful to behold. Let her know you enjoy her company and want to spend more time with her.
4. Tell her openly how much she really means to you. Do this daily. Tell her how much you appreciate all those little things she does for you, even those which are mundane. If you have children, let her know that you think she is a good mother to your children. Do this every chance you can get. Just let her know that she is special and
Zmds1108 says on December 1st, 2008 at 11:14 am
thanks