Success! I've finally finished the book "Real Success" from Ken Shelton and the Editors of Success Magazine. The book is a compilation of writings from Success Magazine founder Orison Sweet Marden. Orison is considered to be the founder of the modern success movement in America.
The book is broken down into 3 sections: 1) Character, 2) Action, 3) Influence. Within section 1 - Character, there are writings on faith, self esteem, positive thinking, and affirmation. Within section 2 - Action, there are writings on work, healthy habits, goals, and adversity. Finally, within section 3 - Influence, there are writings on personality, persuasion, relationships, and leadership. As you can see, this book doesn't focus on one area of success (such as a book solely on leadership, etc) it touches on a wide variety of areas and doesn't go into as much detail in each area.
Every success area that is talked about revolves around faith. If you've read other books on success by authors such as Napoleon Hill or Norman Vincent Peale you'll find that this book follows a similar pattern. However, the faith aspect is more about "The Creator" or an "Inner Power" so it's more "general" in faith (not sure if that's the right word). I, personally, don't mind due to my faith background but I know for some people it can be tough to read.
The biggest negative I found was that although the book isn't too long (319 pages - maybe a bit longer than similar development books) it's a long read. It seems to be very repetitive and touch on the same examples over and over again. Typically I read roughly a book a month, but this took me 3 months to read. Now, other things have come up causing me to get off the reading track (typically 30 minutes 4-5 times per week), but I was a little discouraged and felt the need to "just get through the book" at several times.
My biggest passion when it comes to success is within all of section 1 - Character. These were my favorite parts as I believe those four areas: faith, self esteem, positive thinking, and affirmation are really the foundation of success. The other sections have a variety of skills and attributes that can lead you to success.
Something I loved about the book were the examples. There are several examples in each chapter from great leaders and successes such as Abraham Lincoln, John D. Rockefeller, Michael Jordan, and Dale Carnegie (any many, many more).
Overall, although it's a long book, I think it's definitely worth the read if you want to touch on a wide variety of areas of success.
Now, time to enter my underlines and notes into the "Knowledge Bank" and move onto the next book!
No comments:
Post a Comment