I just finished reading “Switching Time” by Dr. Richard Baer. It Blew. My. Mind. Do not read this if you are afraid of course language. I don’t mean to be graphic, but in retelling this true story there is no way to convey the story any other way.

People who suffer from Multiple Personality Disorder or MPD, have normally suffered something tragic in their lives that cause them to split mentally in order to protect themselves. Don’t we all do that when we are in stressful situations? We become someone who we aren’t, sometimes only momentarily, but for a brief moment we don’t even recognize ourselves. The difference is we are aware of this behavior when it happens, but what if we were suddenly forced into extreme situations repeatedly – how would we handle it?

In the book “Switching Time” Karen, the patient with 17 multiples inside her has suffered in ways that I am not sure any human can bear:

1. Gang Rape by people in her neighborhood and the priest at her church
2. Satanic rituals which involved extreme physical torture
3. Pins stuck into her body from the time she was 1 year old
4. Forced to eat excrement
5. Molested by her father and grandfather
6. Prostituted out for money
7. Forced to watch pornography
8. Fish Hooks stuck in her chest
9. Face burned with curling iron
10. Forced into ice-cold water with blood in it and then stuck in a coffin for hours
11. Multiple items inserted into her body cavities including hammers, hangers and waterhoses
12. Religious torture and brainwashing
13. Electrical shocks
14. Tied to the bed naked and beaten
15. Forced to steal and then punished for stealing

I read this book in 3 days and could not put it down. I’m amazed at the mind’s ability to protect itself. Each of Karen’s distinct personalities had traits of their own. Some were crippled, some had allergies and vision problems and when she’d take medication it was effective on some of the personalities but not on all of them. One of the personalities claimed to be able to make Karen’s body temperature rise at will and for rashes to appear.

Each personality had a function that helped Karen to cope with her life. One personality handled school work and one could draw while others would cook, clean or drive. The personalities were not limited to female either. Karen had 4 male personalities along with her 13 female personalities.

When we were growing up my family was very spiritual. We were Christians who believed in demons and demon possession and we were taught that MPD was a form of demon possession. After reading this book I’m not so sure this is true. I’m sure that in all of our lives there are things of a spiritual nature happening that we do not understand, but are all multiple personality disorders demon possession?

In Karen’s case she did not turn against God despite this ordeal. She was told repeatedly that she was evil and her tormentors played Choir hymns while they tortured her. At her communion her father took her into the back room in her white dress and stuck a cross into her vagina. A priest molested her and forced her to make child pornography films.

What is astounding throughout this story is that Karen was able to fool people into believing that she was okay. She protected her attackers and one of her personalities was always happy and played dumb when she was asked about her injuries. Even with a child denying how she was injured, you would think that her teachers would have suspected foul play and done something to intervene and help Karen.

At the end of the story, Karen writes a brief message to the reader telling us to watch out for children that have a glazed look in their eyes and seem to be disconnected from society. When a child feels that they can’t talk to someone about their problems they have no where else to turn but inward.

Dr. Baer’s story is a compelling and despite the dark topic you are carried on this emotional wave of hope. Despite Karen’s constant desire to kill herself, which is something I think many people would have done in her case, she presses on and after 18 years of therapy finally becomes a whole person.

I’m impressed by Dr. Baer’s patience and as someone who wants to enter into counseling, I found this book very educational. Sitting all day and listening to problems can be emotionally draining and physically exhausting. Dr. Baer gets a divorce during the time that he is treating Karen and despite the fact that he rarely mentions the toll his therapy with Karen is taking, it is evident that is must be destructive on multiple levels to his own emotional health.

I recommend Switching Time to anyone who wants to further understand the power of the human psyche and the impact we can have on people when we are willing to work with them and be patient. As Americans I don’t know many people who could suffer through 18 weeks of intense listening and understanding let alone 18 years. I have a new respect for all counselors after reading this book and I can’t help but applaud both Dr. Baer and Karen for this remarkable recovery.

Counseling · Life · True Story

Heather Flails her arms about wildly, but looks beautiful and pregnant nonethless

Last night I drove down to Austin to meet Heather B. Armstrong a.k.a Dooce.  It was a treat…

When I first started working at Texas Instruments I HATED my job. I sat in one of those cubicle that only goes about 3 feet how and makes you feel exposed like you are a kid urinating at a trough with your pants around your ankles and everyone can see your buttocks – except now you are an adult and this is totally unacceptable.

Texas Instruments was a thirsty tick that was sucking the lifeblood out of me and I couldn’t help but surf the net for a little bit of an escape from my suicidal reality – and that is how I stumbled upon Dooce.

Immediately I was taken aback by this woman who was writing some of the most hilarious and sometimes bawdy tales of her life. See this excerpt here that was written before her daughter was born and after I had already been reading religiously for a while:

I’m a Slave 4 U(nemployment)

I’ve cleaned every surface in this apartment: every tile, every crevice, every hidden corner littered with dust bunnies the size and attitude of Texas. Alas, I’ve nothing left to clean.

I always said that I’d strip this place bare once I had the free time to do so, much like I’d strip the sleeves from Britney’s trembling shoulders if ever given the chance to hit her, baby, one more time. Two weeks into unemployment and that mission is accomplished (the cleaning mission, not the Britney mission, you pervert). Now what the hell do I do?

As you can see the language is often “colorful”, but the writing is downright creative and sometimes so hilarious that I would sputter and snort in my cubicle. I was supposed to be helping someone figure out how to double-click but instead I was finding a way to cope with that fact that my life sucked  – Heather/Dooce helped me realize that I wasn’t the only one with some serious issues and that sometimes you need to get help with those issues.

As the years went by I got to watch as Heather went through depression and pregnancy and how Mormonism has affected her life. I have read about her political views and ideas on same-sex marriage and although often times I find myself disagreeing with her it has never changed the fact that I have loved her like a sister – a far away online only sister, but a sister nonetheless.

Heather got up and read an excerpt from her new book – it was a story that we had read on her website about how it took seven months after giving birth vaginally with her first child before she was able to have sex again or what she called “Reconvening the Procedure”.

I suppose I could look for a job; that’s what any ambitious worker-bee would do. If I were any ambitious worker-bee I would put my shoulder to the wheel, as the Mormons might say, and find me some fucking gainful employment. After all, I’m a healthy blonde college graduate with seriously long legs. Finding a job shouldn’t be that hard.

What I love most about Heather is not the hilarious side, but the softer side. I love her monthly newsletters to her daugher Leta and the times when she stops and takes a moment to express her love for her husband Jon, like she did in this paragraph:

So it feels really good to have all these emotions toward Jon that I don’t normally experience because of our proximity. I miss everything about him, even the incessant talking and bear feet. It’s a longing that is somehow invigorating, and once where I would have been annoyed that we’d talked six times already on the phone I find myself getting a text message and hoping it’s from him. I ache to get back to the hotel room from whatever I’m doing so that I can call and hear his voice. Which I am about to do right this second, call and see if he slept well, ask if I can interrupt SpongeBob to say hello to Leta, and then stop and savor this feeling of missing the weight of his body on the bed next to me.

The way she expresses her love for her family  is so genuine and intimate that it makes me, as a single dude, hope and pray to God that someday I will find a love like that.

I plan to insert a picture here later that I got with Jon and Heather. I was elated to get a picture with both of them and I hope Jon doesn’t mind me using his photo at the top of this post. I was standing right behind him when he took it and so this was the angle that I had during the hour that she spoke.

Austin TX · Book Signing · Dooce · Heather B. Armstrong · It Sucked and then I Cried

Authors Note: Profanity is used in this review, but only when quoting word for word from this book. I would have used niceties like “The F word or the S word, but I think we are all adults here and I wanted to give you the facts instead of putting perfume on a turd.

I listen to 106.1 Kiss FM in the morning and I heard Big Al Mac, one of the morning personalities, confess, “Yes, I am currently reading Skinny Bitch.”

I sort of chuckled and put it out of my mind. Then last night I went to Borders and saw the book prominently displayed on one of their stands. I scooped it up and made my way to their coffee bar, purchased a caramel latte and proceeded to read.

From the first chapter the authors of Skinny Bitch are telling you that you to “Give it Up”. You need to give up beer, cigarettes, caffeine, coffee and sugar. The Skinny Bitches go on a diatribe of not only why you should stop these bad habits: bad breath, extra pounds, makes you ugly, they also give you the reasons why they make you fat and ugly and immediately start dropping chemical names like butylated hydroxyamisole and butylated hydroxytoluene. Then they say things like “Coffee is for pussies” and “you need to exercise, you lazy sh~t”.

Wow Rory and Kim, I know you used to be models but are the vulgarities necessary to sell your books?  Maybe so.

The two women continue to discuss everything from animal cruelty to pooping in the remaining chapters: Carbs: The Truth, Sugar is the Devil, The Dead, Rotting, Decomposing Flesh Diet (Atkins), The Dairy Disaster, You Are What you Eat, The Myths and Lies About Protein, Pooping, Have No Faith: Governmental Agencies Don’t Give A Shit About Your Health, Don’t Be A Pussy, Let’s Eat, and the final chapter is called Use Your Head.

This book is actually only about 140 pages of actual reading, the rest is recipes, food, a month’s worth of menus, websites and other helpful information to start your vegan lifestyle.

Here are the things you need to give up to be a Skinny Bitch:

• All Meat Products
• All Dairy – no cheese, eggs, milk, yogurt, nada, zero, zilche
• Caffeine
• Processed Foods like white flour, sugar, high fructose corn syrup, white rice, white bread, etc.

What can you eat?

Vegetables, preferably organic because if they aren’t certified organic then they are probably genetically modified or full of pesticides.

• Tofu
• Soy
• Whole Grains
• Nuts
• Organic Fruit
• Fresh Squeezed Juices
• Water
• Beans

After reading the book I am actually surprised that I am on board with some of their suggestions. They mentioned chicken pens full of cockroaches and chickens that have their beaks seared off and their feet that have grown around their wire mesh cages. If that wasn’t enough to keep me from wanting to eat chicken and eggs, they talked about hormones pumped into these poor birds as well as the inhumane butchering processes – and that was just the chicken!

Pigs are butchered by boiling them after their throats have been slit, but sometimes they are still alive when they are dropped into hot water to remove their hair. They are then drowned by a revolving arm. Not to mention that pigs are pretty much fed whatever is rotten. Even Ben and Jerry’s, the ice cream vendor, feeds some of its waste to pigs because it is too toxic to put into the dump. Then these pigs are butchered and fed to us. I’m not ignorant when I’m eating my bacon, but after hearing about some of the cruelty that goes on at these slaughtering houses I must say that I will pause before getting bacon and eggs at IHOP.

The Skinny Bitches continue to list the horrors that happen to our food on every level. Cows get milked by machines and sores and puss develop on their udders and of course that puss goes into the milk along with all the hormones they injected into the cows so that it will produce 100 pounds of milk per day. The milk is pasteurized to rid it of all these impurities, but it still contains lots of chemicals that the FDA deems perfectly fit for human consumption.

The authors of this book did their homework. The data, even if you only believed 25% of what they say is compelling. I have a gallon of milk in the fridge and I couldn’t bring myself to eat my Fiber One with it this morning. Instead I had oatmeal with a banana and cinnamon sweetened with honey.

Other tips for becoming skinny:

• Don’t drink any diet drinks or artificial sweeteners (including Splenda/Sucralose)
• Exercise
• Drink water, but don’t over do it or else the water will leech your body of necessary nutrients
• Fast – do a juice fast or raw food fast and then eventually do a no-food fast

There are no new ideas presented in this book for losing weight other than the becoming a vegetarian part. I’ve heard most of this information before, but I’ve never been slapped across the face with it boot camp style. Apparently riddling your book with phrases like, “Yeah, eating onions and garlic makes your breath smell like someone took a sh~t down your throat” will sell diet books because we’ve heard the information presented every which way possible and so yeah, these girls did give us something new in the way of profanity.

Lastly, the book does provide the reader with countless resources for finding Vegan foods.

Some of the website provided:

veggieworld.com

goodbaker.com

eatraw.com

treehuggintreats.com

rosecitychocolates.com

playfood.org

vegandreams.com

goveg.com

veganoutreach.org

Truthfully, I can’t imagine my life filled with organic cereals and soy milk, but I think I can at least limit my intake by 75% of these foods and better my health. I think what is important is making healthy decisions that not only impact your health, but the world we live in. I think this is a message you can convey in a smart and fun way without telling people they are lazy-shi~ts, but hey, it creates a buzz and gets people talking and so I can’t say that I don’t admire Rory Freedman and Kim Barnouin for their achievements.

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I just finished my latest Wilbur Smith novel – River God. 

At the end of the book there is an author’s note that this book was based on a true account of the slave Taita that lived in Egypt during 1780 b.c. No other author has ever moved me to such depths or taught me so much. When I finish reading something by WIlbur Smith I feel like I have learned in a few hours what some people never learn or understand in a lifetime. 

What I learned most in this book is how to be a servant and to find true happiness in the selfless service of others. When we love people we serve them without restraint or regard for self. Our motives are pure when we seek only the happiness of others. 

I hope to be more like the slave Taita who although he was treated so cruelly by his masters never lost his ability to find compassion and love even for his greatest enemies.

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I’m currently enthralled in another Wilbur Smith novel called “Warlock”. An epic tale of Pharoahs and Egypt, I can’t help but think of one of the best children’s stories from the Bible and after doing some research it appears that Smith’s fictional stories are often more fact than fiction.

In the book there is one scene where the Warlock “Taita” turns his staff into a cobra and forces some priests to leave the building. At other times this man prays to the Egyptian god’s Horus, Seth and Lostris. It’s fascinating to think that at one time there were cultures that actually cultivated the supernatural forces around them, often times they were dark forces, but they believed in them and that gave them power nonetheless.

What I’ve found most interesting about Smith’s stories is his constant use of religion, faith, God and gods thoughout his novels. His protagonists are normally strong believers in one form of religion or another and that faith, whatever it may be, is passionate and devout. The prayers are constant, the offering of thanks incessant, the love immeasurable. It fascinates and shames me.

In every decision, big or small, i do not consult God for his advice. I do not seek his blessing and guidance for every path I choose. Instead I trust in myself and only when I think it truly necessary do I call on the Lord for help or assistance and even then it is with only a half-measure of faith that I truly expect him to come to my aid.

What if I was like one of Smith’s characters whose total focus, every thought, deed, or word was first passed through a filter of faith? What if I sought the will of the Lord and sat and prayed for hours until I received an answer?

We are an arrogant culture that quickly dismisses the spiritual and the supernatural. We are full of our own self-confidence and independence and we deny our need for a deity.  Instead we make our own way and when our world falls apart then we turn to God and ask Why? We shake our first and we place blame and we curse because we know what was right and it was God that failed us, not ourselves.

It might be a fools quest to chase a life that is greater than what the world around me is trying to sell me. I hope to achieve something great with my life even if that greatness is only noticed in Heaven.

In the future I’m going to make a concerted effort to seek God’s wisdom and his counsel. I’ve been going on 10 years now dealing with the same issues in my life and trying to handle them on my own. I’m tired and ready to ask for help.

For we wrestle not against flesh and blood, but against principalities, against powers, against the rulers of the darkness of this world, against spiritual wickedness in high places… EPH 6:12

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I hadn’t heard of this book 365 Nights: A Memoir of Intimacy until I bounced over to Edgy Mama’s site to see what she has been up to.  There she talked about some of the hate mail her latest article has received and after reading the well-written article I don’t see what the fuss is about. Who doesn’t want to read a book about a woman who gifted her husband sex every day for a year?

How many women do you know what would make this sacrifice? (If you are out there and single, please post a comment immediately and include your phone number.)

As someone who has worked a myriad of Love, Sex, Marriage conferences I must admit that when it comes to Christians and Sex there are a lot of unanswered questions. Even more, it seems that sex is  quite possibly the one thing that men and women have in common that is often misunderstood – a need for intimacy without the fear of rejection.

I’m not married so I can’t even begin to understand what happens between couples after the rings are placed on fingers and the “I Do’s” are uttered, however, it doesn’t take a Sex Therapist to tell you that when it comes to intimacy our world is f*$*K’d up – literally.

So you married people, this book seems to be a challenge to all of you out there to step it up and as the author of the book says repeatedly, “It’s not a book about sex, it’s a book about marriage.”

As far as “The Gift” is concerned, I am sure that while we’d all like to chuckle and jab, in the end it is obvious that all of us could probably learn a thing or two from Charla and Brad.

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I walked out to the mailbox on a Sunday afternoon at 4 p.m. and found my copy of Gut Check stuffed snugly between my mortgage payment and my car payment. It is now 7:27 p.m. as I write this and I have already finished reading this book. It is 191 pages of some of the most useful information I have ever read. Pretty high billing? Maybe, maybe not. I’m an avid reader but my tastes normally stay in the realm of fiction. I like Koontz, Patterson, Tolkien and C.S. Lewis, but it is rare that I pick up a “Motivational” or “Business Success” book and read it in one sitting.

While reading this book I did not stop to go to the bathroom, did not stop to eat, or check my BlackBerry for new emails – I could not put it down.

Tarek Saab immediately caught my attention by being very transparent about his years in college. He edits the language by say “S___” and “F—” so you get the full truth of the message without the crudeness. He speaks openly about the introduction of pornography into the college world in the 1990′s and the corruption that it has caused.

This book, unlike many books marketed to the masses, is simple black and white. You know where Tarek stands in his beliefs. He believes in God and makes it clear that happiness in the corporate life is not about making money and success, it is about doing what you do, whether you love it or not, to do it with love.

One of my favorite parts of the book is makes a brief outline of the man he wants to be:

The man I want to be is…

• Prays, recognizing that his duty is to God first above all things.
• Is articulate, communicating his thoughts and opinions intelligently and respectfully.
• Respects women, directly, through honorable discourse and chaste living, and indirectly by his thoughts.
• Defends the innocent, especially children and unborn life.
• Is not addicted – whether to alcohol, pornography, or entertainment, and therefore truly free.
• Is healthy, actively maintaining physical fitness and proper diet.
• Holds convictions supported by reason and truth.
• Is courageous, unafraid to defend truth in all circumstances.
• Educates himself, not for the sake of accumulating factual knowledge, but for the advancement of wisdom.
• Works hard, acknowledging that time is a gift to be used wisely.
• Sacrifices his needs for the sake of others.
• Is humble, possessing and honesty that doesn’t tolerate deception, and gratitude without envy.

No matter what your beliefs you can read through that list and see that it is an admirable, albeit somewhat controversial, set of goals.

Throughout the book there are numerous quotes from G.K. Chesterton, Thomas Aquinas, St. Augustine and passages of scripture that are extremely poignant and while written years ago are still relative today.

I saw Tarek speak just shortly after his appearance on The Apprentice. I went to hear him speak with very low expectations because The Apprentice had made Tarek appear cocky and arrogant. What I found was just the opposite. Humble and forthright, I listened to a man who didn’t stand up in front of an audience and talk about himself and his accomplishments, but instead shared real life experiences that were humbling. When I left the auditorium I felt elated and motivated to go out and work hard and to do my best, not to make more money, but because it was the right thing to do.

I put this book on the Corporate Study Guide list of links (right sidebar) because those books are “must-read” books for being successful not just in the business world, but in this corporate world known as “Life”. You can purchase the book on Amazon.com or at www.buygutcheck.com

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I’m reading True Evil by Greg Iles and his protagonist uses this phrase to describe a lab that is full of primates that he plans to set on fire. I’d never heard of Bosch so I Googled him. His pictures depict images of sin and hell, I’ve never seen anything like them.

I am a fan of Greg Iles because he explores so many subjects in his novels. This particular novel goes into great detail about biological warfare and how America could one day be in a war against China, which is fast becoming a superpower like no other. So many of the scenarios in this book seem more likely than global warming. They are theories and postulations, but they are good ones.

I love a book that teaches me stuff and this is one that I can’t put down!

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When I first read the title of this book I thought it was going to be about people who were discontent with their faith, it isn’t. It is a book about people who were unsettled by what they saw around them and they decided to do something about it. People like Mother Teresa who walked to school every day and passed homeless families on the streets. She couldn’t stand it, so she did something about it.

As I read the book I felt motivated, but this book is like many others in that it is just a book with a lot of great information. We can read books until our eyesight dims and we need glasses, but knowledge without action is about as good as a car without gas.

Personal Vision… what exactly is that? I look around and I don’t see many people with personal vision. Most people don’t even make small short time goals much less have a vision that is outside the scope of their wants and needs. I see people like Oprah, Bill Gates, Mark Cuban, Ross Perot, Steve Jobs – those people have vision, but what about vision that has nothing to do with personal gain and is only focused on helping the people around you for the glory of Christ? 

Give this book a try if you want to have your eyes opened to the way people have changed the world because of a little Holy Discontent.

Hybels book is available at  Amazon.com.

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It is strange reading a Christian book written by someone who was born and raised in India. Why is this weird to me? I don’t know, I guess it is just that most of the non-fiction Christian books I read are written by someone who was born here and knows our culture but very little about other cultures. It’s nice to read Mr. Zazharias’ points of view on Christianity.

What is “The Grand Weaver” about? The subtitle reads: How God Shapes Us Through the Events of Our Lives. However, every chapter of the book is titled with this “Your _______ Matters” – fill in the blank with words like Spirituality, Worship, Morality and even DNA.  The book like many non-fiction books did not immediately grab me, but  as I read I started to see that this book is more about motivating people to do God’s work than it is about the grand cloth that God is weaving out of our lives. Sure that remains the common theme, but the book could have just as easily been calling “What You Do For God Matters” or any number of inspirational titles.

I like this book because it actually does a lot of teaching about other religions. In the chapter titled “Your Morality Matters” Zacharias points out that Buddha and Muhammed built their religion around the basis that morality precedes redemption, then later points out that with Christianity it is the other way around. Christians are redeemed by God, not as a result of works, it is here the Christianity remains “distinct and definitively different”. (p.83)

There are times when I question my faith, we should, we should never stop seeking the truth, but there are some things you have to take on faith. Ravi Zacharias’ book The Grand Weaver is a definite “must read” for any Christian or non-Christian that wants to understand more about God and his plan for your life.

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I don’t know if I mentioned the fact that I get free books to read from Zondervan and one other publisher so that I can review them on my website. I’ve been so busy that I haven’t had time to do much reviewing, however, I can tell you that I am reading Holy Discontent by Bill Hybels, The Case for the Real Jesus by Lee Strobel and Abiding Darkness by John Aubrey Anderson. So far my favorite is The Case for the Real Jesus which is an intellectually riveting read that is filled with fascinating information and insights about the life and historical information written about Jesus Christ.

Did you know that besides 1st and 2nd Peter there is a Gospel of Peter? Who knew! There are so many “Gospels” and literature written about Jesus Christ that people have gone through great lengths to find the truth. Lee Strobel does a brilliant job of showing us how we got to that truth.

In the above paragraph I mentioned “Abiding Darkness” by John Aubrey Anderson. It’s an intersting read but it started out a little bit like a play. There are introductions to the characters and who they are in the book. Do people do this with books? I thought part of the purpose of the book was for you to figure out who the people were and what their roles are while you are reading it? This is the first book in a trilogy and so maybe it will make more sense later.

The book starts out interestingly enough. It sort of reminds me of To Kill a Mockingbird meets Piercing the Darkness. A 1940′s setting filled with kids and demons and angels in a spiritual realm. I was intrigued at first and then there is this chapter where this demon takes possession of a water mocassin and he recruits other demons to also possess other water mocassion’s and they are traveling from all over to kill this little girl. Now I don’t mind dancing outside the realm of reality, but this is a way out there. I mean, the only mention of animals being possessed by demons was when Jesus cast out Legion into the pigs and they ran off the side of the hill.

If animals can be possessed and they act like Cujo or those Lions from the movie The Thief in the Darkness then I wonder why we don’t see more crazy animal possessions?

All I know is that my mind is ever being opened to new dimensions of possibility. For so long I’ve been close-minded about many things and instead of doing real research for myself to find truth, I just took someone else’s word for it.

I challenge you to do the same. If you believe in something, be sure that you know why you believe it. Find out some facts, don’t just do it because that is what your parents taught you to believe. Don’t be a democrat because your parents were Democrats, or a Conservative because your best friend is a Conservative. Go out and decide how you want the world you live in, the world your children will live in, will be shaped.  I love that about America, we have this amazing ability to change the world we live in, even if it is in the small things.

For example: I don’t like people begging for money on street corners, however, I used to feel sorry for them and I would give them money. That only reinforces their behavior and so the problem with panhandlers only becomes worse. However, if everyone stopped giving them money then they wouldn’t stand on the street corner because it would be a waste of time.  We, as a society, are the ones that make the decisions that rule this country, change takes time and patience and hard work, but if you really care about something strongly enough, then you can make a change.

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The Power of Thinking Twice

I don’t do self-help books. I rarely pick up anything to read other than my Bible and fictional books that fall into the psychological thriller – murder mystery genre.  Business, corporate talk, money-making books, finance, get-rich-quick guides normally turn me off faster than my mom used to turn off the TV when she caught us watching The Simpsons.

But this book, this book is… powerful. Yes, that is the word that sums it up because it hits on all the important topics about being successful without bogging you down with unnecessary jargon or personal pontification.

One of my favorite “truths” from this book is a quote from Holly Lisle, “If you don’t accept the responsibility for your own actions then you are forever chained to a position of defense.”  Stop and think about that for a moment and see the simple wisdom in that statement.

If I took the time to recount all the great information in this book then there would be no need for you to go out and buy it because I’d have to put the entire thing on this site. Page after page I found myself gripped by the realization that this book was speaking to me. It was telling me to take action on things that I had put off in the past because I was afraid that I would fail. I wrote a book but never tried to get it published because I was afraid of rejection. I never even sent it to one agent! Now, almost 3 years later, it is collecting digital dust on my hard drive. At least if I had sent it out to an agent I would have gotten back some criticism or insight into what I could do different, but I chose the easier path of procrastination.

In this book Dr. Parrott points out again and again how it only takes 3 seconds to make life changing choices. 3 seconds to take responsibility for your actions, 3 seconds to decide to go the extra mile or to take the easier path, 3 seconds to look past the negative and to focus on the positive.

I already consider myself someone that has a “can do, whatever it takes” attitude. However, sometimes my motives have been less than pure. I did because of what I would get in return, not because it was who I was. I’m trying to changet that.

Another point that this book makes crystal clear is this, sometimes sitting back and taking the the easy way seems like more fun, but in reality, isn’t the real fun sitting in the drivers seat? What is the point of being part of a team if all you ever do is sit on the bench?

Take 3 seconds and make the decision to get this book immediately. It is published by Zondervan and is available at Amazon.com.

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