Despite the cheesy name, I decided to check it out since it is now a free download (it was originally published by a major publisher over 30 years ago).

If you’re doing exactly what you want for a living and have no regrets or unfulfilled dreams, then this book is NOT for you. If you have dreams, but don’t know how to make them come true, this book IS for you. If you don’t know what your dreams are, this book IS for you.

Unlike most books of this type, this book is based on the premise that we are flawed individuals and that we don’t need to turn into perfect superbeings in order to live the life that we want (good thing too, because that’s never going to happen with me). This book is for the procrastinator, the person who starts a diet on Monday and has fallen off the wagon by Wednesday (if he or she even lasts that long).

The first part of the book is focused on discovering what your dreams are. The premise is that we are told too soon as children to be practical–stop dreaming, stop being silly, stop thinking grand thoughts. Even if we are allowed to keep dreaming, most of us are not taught how to explore our interests. That’s part two of the book: how to get from dream to reality.

Everyone should check out this book and since it’s free there’s no excuse not to.

Surprisingly useful ideas, but the high list price of the book is a turn off.

What drew me to the book

Being somewhat bored with my book blog, I’ve been looking for ideas to revitalize Booklorn in this sparkly new year. I came across this book cruising the digital shelves of my public library and decided to see if it could get me out of my slump.

My thoughts on the book

When I first looked through this book (while eating New York Fries with mayonnaise in the food court, but I’ve been informed that none of you care), I was disappointed. The ideas seemed fairly obvious and geared toward the general personal blog. I finished the book in less than an hour.

Once I gave my brain time to digest the suggestions in the book, I was a little more positive. I started to see possible blog posts for niche blogs. I started being more creative and thinking outside of the box. I flipped to the back of the book to see if I might want a copy for my bookshelf: $25 CDN/$20 USD for 128 pages including index. I decided that I wasn’t quite as inspired as that.

This is a slim book, divided into five chapters based mostly on how much time you have to write your blog post:

1. Fifteen Minutes to Fame
2. Thirty Minutes Away from the TV
3. An Hour at the Screen
4. Take Your Time
5. Think Like a Writer

Each chapter has 20 ideas, with one idea per page. The main idea is the title of the page, which is accompanied by an explanatory paragraph that often includes an example of the idea in action from a real blog (but not the actual blog post). The ideas are varied enough that you are likely to pick up at least a few new ideas that you can rework for your blog no matter how narrow your topic.

If I could pick up a copy for $10, I would do it without hesitation. At $25 CDN ($20 USD), I’ll just take it out of the library the next time I need inspiration.

About the book author

Margaret Mason can be found online at her sites MightyGirl.com and MightyGoods.com, as well as at The Morning News.

Buy this book online (links go directly to book page)

US: Amazon

Canada: Amazon Canada

Europe: Amazon UK

Book details

Paperback: 128 pages (NOT 144 pages as you see mentioned elsewhere)
Publisher: Peachpit Press (2007)
ISBN-10: 032144972X
ISBN-13: 978-0321449726

Disclosure

I took this book out of my local public library. I get a few pennies if you buy through one of the links above based on my review.

I don’t usually find diet books of particular interest. After all, there are only so many different ways to say lose weight by burning more calories than you take in. The problem is convincing yourself to eat less and exercise more.

The Writing Diet: Write Yourself Right-Size by Julia Cameron is a diet book that approaches emotional eating from the perspective of using writing to uncover subconscious motivations for what we do. If you can separate the ideas from the author’s negative attitude towards food, it may be what you need to get you thinking about weight loss in a different way.

The Writing Diet proposes a program that uses writing to uncover the reasons for overeating and/or underexercising. The book is separated into two parts. The first part proposes seven tools for weight loss, some mediated by writing and some not. The second section looks at various situations/issues that arise when trying to lose weight and addresses them specifically.

The thought of writing can be intimidating for some people. Fortunately, the writing proposed in this book doesn’t require a good command of grammar, spelling, or even proper sentence structure. The proposed writing habits are in the form of journalling and inksheds (a type of stream of consciousness writing). The goal is to use inksheds in the morning and journalling whenever you eat anything to raise your own consciousness about why you are overeating or underexercising. If that sounds like a lot of writing to do, it is; but if you can develop the habit it can lead to insights into your own behaviour.

I’ve done the equivalent of Morning Pages (stream-of-consciousness writing done upon waking) in writing workshops and I agree that they can have tremendous value in unearthing what is lurking in the subsconscious. The idea of writing every time I eat or any time I think of eating as proposed by Cameron is too onerous and time consuming for me to adopt on a regular basis. While some may find it useful, it feels like a time suck to me — the same reason I’ve never managed to keep track of calories for long (to be clear, Cameron doesn’t advocate calorie counting but I find it at the same level of time suck as writing every time I eat).

Cameron has some suggestions for sticking with weight loss that don’t involve writing directly. For example she recommends walking (starting with 5 minutes because who doesn’t have 5 minutes). Cameron also proposes planning a culinary date once a week to explore new cuisine or try a new restaurant. While the culinary date sounds interesting, I found some of her other suggestions less appealing.

Cameron borrows from 12-step programs by introducing the concept of a sponsor (called a Body Buddy) to help you stick to new eating habits (and show your food log to). In keeping with the 12-step ethos, Cameron suggests unhealthy eating is on par with alcoholism which explains why throughout the book unhealthy eating is treated as if it were a disease. It is unfortunate that the book is infused with a negativity towards food because it taints the many useful ideas presented for those struggling to lose weight.

In addition to discussing unhealthy eating as a disease, Cameron also talks about snack attacks, food being an enemy, fighting wars and battles with food, and eating legally. She talks about clean eating, downfalls when you don’t eat clean and other language that makes unhealthy eating sound not only like a disease but a sin. There is talk of spirituality, outside power, and religion at various points in the book as well which seems unnecessary and narrows the audience for the book. Long time readers of the blog will know that I do not like religion in my secular topics unless the book is clearly marked and marketed as such (which this book isn’t, although IF I had been aware of Julia Cameron’s other titles I might have expected the spirituality aspect of the book).

Though I found myself picking and choosing parts of the book to use, it has some interesting ideas in spite of the issues I’ve mentioned. If your view of food already coincides with Cameron’s then the negative language may not bother you. Likewise for the talk of spirituality and religion.

If you eat for emotional reasons and think you can develop a daily journalling habit (among other things), then this book might help you gain traction in developing a healthier lifestyle. For myself, I’ve never managed to keep a journal for longer than a week so I haven’t managed to apply this book for very long yet. If I ever do manage to get anywhere with this book, I’ll discuss it in my Read It, Live It, Blog It Reading Challenge posts.

You can find The Writing Diet and other Julia Cameron books at amazon.com, amazon.ca, and amazon.co.ukas well as other online and bricks and mortar booksellers.

The Power of Who: You Already Know Everyone You Need to Know by Bob Beaudine proposes that the traditional view of networking that many of us are familiar with simply does not work and that, as the subtitle says, we already know everyone that we need to know. Beaudine is an executive recruiter and I’ve learned to pay attention to people in his line of work when they give advice on landing the job you want since recruiters/headhunters essentially study the “getting a job” process for a living. I also hate networking so I’m open to the idea of not sucking up to complete strangers in the hopes that they may one day may be useful to me.

Beaudine’s thesis is two-fold: One is that most of us live unintentional lives, never examining what we truly want and so never getting it. The second is that instead of asking people that we know and who know us to help us get what we want, we instead go out and ask relative strangers because we don’t want to admit weakness to our friends or don’t believe that they are powerful enough to help us get where we want to go.

There is a lot of information and advice in this small book although little of it is new. Many of us need to hear something said in a certain way in order to finally hear it so this book may do it for you even if you’ve heard the information before. I’ll grant the thesis that too many of us never get what we want because we don’t know what it is, but the idea that we’re only six degrees of separation away from our dream job through our existing network of friends and relations is a bit harder to swallow (depending, of course, on what your existing network looks like).

The writing is straightforward and conversational with plenty of anecdotes/case studies and quotes. I found some of the explanations of the diagrams of influence and the 100/40 list unclear, which is unfortunate since understanding that 100/40 list is a big part of applying Beaudine’s idea of networking (I did eventually figure it out from the context of the rest of the book, but it’s still fuzzier than it should be because I had to piece it together myself).

I do find it unfortunate that Beaudine uses a number of references to the bible. Since the book is not marketed from a Christian angle, I wasn’t expecting religious references and found them jarring. I am finding this more and more in books from mainstream American publishers, and it’s unfortunate because it makes assumptions about the audience that are neither necessary nor valid.

Putting aside my dislike for religion in my secular topics, I can see this book being of tremendous use for some, particularly those who may be panicking about their current job situation. It’s a short enough book not to be daunting, but long enough to make you take a deep breath, pause, and think about what you are going to do next.

I am adding The Power of Who to my Health & Fitness Read It, Live It, Blog It challenge which means that I am going to sit down and try to apply the advice in the book to my life and then blog about the effects/results (I’ll just shoehorn the book into the mental fitness category, in case you’re wondering how it fits). Those posts go up on Fridays and cover various books depending on what I am working on any given week (I won’t be blogging Beaudine’s book this Friday as I still have to sit down and do the work).

You can find Bob Beaudine’s book at amazon.com, amazon.ca, and amazon.co.uk.

So Why Have You Never Been Married: 10 Insights Into Why He Hasn’t Wed by Carl Weisman is one man’s investigation of why he is over 40 and not yet married. Since Weismann did not know his own reasons, he set out to ask other men their reasons in hopes of finding his reasons echoed back to him. In the course of his search, he surveyed 1500 men over 40 and interviewed 33. In the end he found that there are many reasons not to marry, but they are not the stereotypical ones society has led us to believe — at least not solely or even primarily.

If you’re over a certain age (which age depends on your gender and culture), you find yourself asked often “Why aren’t you married yet?” or “Why have you never been married?” Only if your family and friends are particularly well-behaved, are you spared this question. People who don’t know me very well sometimes ask, those who know me know better. Curiousity is allowed, but rudeness is discouraged.

So Why Have You Never Been Married focuses on men over 40, but the reasons these men reveal for never being married could just as easily apply to women. This book is part journey of self-discovery and part research. I found it very well done and respectful of the topic.

This is a book for both men over 40 who aren’t sure why they haven’t married and for anyone who is curious about why someone would not have married by 40 but has the good graces not to go around asking rude questions about personal choices. This is also a good book for single women who are nervous that there is something wrong a potential mate who’s unmarried at 40.

Dating the Older Man: Consider Your Differences and Decide if He’s Right for You by Belisa Vranich and Laura Grashow is a guide for women either considering dating or already dating an older man. At least that’s the marketing. In fact the subtitle more accurately reflects the book: Consider your differences and decide if he’s right for you. Period.

Before you read further, let’s clear something up: This book is not about how to GET an older man. It is about what to DO when you find yourself considering or actually dating an older man and you’re not sure how that happened or whether you want to pursue the relationship. It’s about looking at the issues (which you may or may not have considered) and deciding whether this is a good match for you. And it’s about doing this thinking earlier rather than later so you don’t waste time with someone who isn’t going to be a good partner for you.

This book is much more widely applicable than the title would suggest. It is foremost about developing a mature and lasting relationship with a romantic partner (age difference is the angle, but the advice is pretty universally applicable). I have a couple friends who would benefit from reading this book, and they date people their own age.

I, on the other hand, have been there, done that, and was too lazy to have a T-shirt made up. My partner and I have been together for almost a decade (which is less than the age difference between us)–think Catherine Zeta-Jones and Michael Douglas and you’ve got the right age difference (although neither one of us is as pretty, but we’re okay with that). When I saw this book, I could not imagine how one would talk for an entire book on the topic. After all, a Y-chromosome is a Y-chromosome no matter what his age.

I was pleased to see that Dating the Older Man is aimed at women who want a real relationship, not those who want the Sugar Daddy or the Father Figure or whatever other stereotypes there are floating around about the older man. The tone is conversational with occasional humour, but it is intent on providing information and insight. Much of the book applies to any woman dating any man and looking for a lasting relationship: make sure he respects you, make sure you are forging an equal partnership, make sure you disagree productively, don’t sabotage yourself, etc.

There are some issues that are particular to relationships with older men such as ex-wives, children (possibly grown), disapproval of friends and family, different priorities. Basically, the older your dating partner is (and the older you are, I would add), the more “stuff” (psychological or physical) you bring into the relationship. Although the advice uses the younger woman-older man scenario as examples, it can be adapted to other differences that cause friends and family to frown.

Dating the Older Man is something that I would have found useful if it had been available back then, and I recommend it to anyone who is trying to establish a long term relationship with an older man (or any man). It is a respectful and considered book on a topic that is often sensationalized and stereotyped.

Dating Makes You Want to Die (But You Have To Do It Anyway) is a fun read. It is sarcastic and yet there is truth in the sarcasm. There are fun little quizzes, silly scenarios, and she says/he says banter. I like that the chapters progress through the various stages of a relationship (and send you back to the previous chapter if you didn’t graduate).

Although I’m not dating, my partner and I had a laugh as I read some of the book aloud and we reminisced about our first date (The Kinda Date). You know the Kinda Date, the one where you’re not sure that you’re actually on a date because the other person is hedging their bets and not declaring it a date? Yeah, those are fun.

I did find that the brash humour got a bit much in large doses, but that won’t bother everyone. Here’s a passage about breaking up so you can get a feel for the type of humour:

The good thing about being cathartically vengeful is that it gets tiresome. After week three of screaming into his voice mail, you’ll get tired. You just need to exorcise the hurt of being dumped. Once that clears through the pure force of your abject bitchiness, you can go back to being antagonistic to your Chinese deliveryman for not including your egg roll order again. (p. 165, ARC)

This book is very American in its humour and popular culture references, which is worth noting if you are buying it outside of the US. I don’t have cable so I don’t get a lot of American TV and some references escaped me completely, while others were well-known enough that I could supply the Canadian equivalents myself (I mention this because I got this book through a Canadian publisher–if I had received it from an American publisher I would make allowances for that).

This is not your typical self-help book which is both its strength and its weakness. After reading a lot of self-help books on many different topics, this humorous and irreverent approach is certainly refreshing. I did find that there was a certain superficiality to the information, which is almost a requirement with the humour approach.

If you are just starting to explore why you aren’t having success in dating, then this book is a gentle and easy introduction to the issues. If you already know you have issues with dating, then this book addresses the issue on too superficial a level to be helpful. However, if you know someone who complains about their lack of success at dating, but they don’t seem to know where to begin to fix the issue then this may be the right book. It is definitely a good book to give someone who is in denial about their dating prowess (you can pass it off as a gag gift if they get offended).

Perfect Daughters by Robert J. Ackerman is a non-fiction book that reports the results of a survey of more than a thousand adult daughters of alcoholics. There are two editions (2002 and 1998) and this review is of the first edition (I am tracking down a new copy to see if there are significant differences).

Perfect Daughters is a compact book at 200 pages, but it is full of insight for adult daughters of alcoholics (I have not been able to track down a similar book for adult sons of alcoholics, unfortunately—parts of this book may provide insight for sons, but the bulk of the book is specific to daughters). A few reviews that I have read complained about the introduction to the book, a story about a little princess in a kingdom ruled by a king and queen who don’t make sense (the alcoholic parents). This introduction didn’t resonate with me either, but it is a very small part of the book and worth reading past. The rest of the book is more concrete with the occasional short snippet from an interview to illustrate a point.

What makes this book valuable is the description of types of adult daughters and the explanation of why these differences develop. This allows adult daughters to figure out why they are one way and not another. The book looks at adult daughters in a number of different ways. The first part of the book focuses on differences in the alcoholic households that affect child development; the second part of the book focuses on the characteristics in adult daughters that can cause problems for themselves and those around them.

In looking at childhood, the book shows that the effect of the alcoholic parent on the daughter differs according to what point in the daughter’s childhood the parent started drinking (the most profound effect is on daughters who were born into an alcoholic home) because it affects which part of development was interrupted (this would also be of interest to adult sons).

The gender of the parent who is drinking (80% of alcoholic parents are fathers) also affects the child (as does the gender of the child, which is why much of this book will probably not be of use to adult sons). The differences are explained so that it is easier to understand the characteristics that an adult daughter has or has not developed (this also explains why all characteristics on the laundry list of ACoA characteristics do not apply to all ACoAs equally).

The book then moves on to the different types of adult daughters, which is much like an astrological sign description in that it describes eight different personality types. There is a description of various characteristics and a short survey to help readers figure out which traits are most prominent in their behaviour.

For those who are interested in the numbers, much of the survey data is reproduced in tables at the back of the book for reference. Tables and graphs don’t appear in the main text because Ackerman felt that it would be distracting to the reader. I think this was a wise choice as the text gives you the information you need in a much more compact form that the numbers would.

Perfect Daughters shows how a parent’s drinking affects an adult daughter by explaining exactly why certain characteristics develop and why this is perfectly normal. This book also avoids the victim approach by approaching adult daughters as survivors who have developed a lot of useful skills because of their upbringing, rather than victims who have developed faulty characteristics.

Perfect Daughters should be required reading for all adult daughters of alcoholics to gain a better understanding of themselves.

If you shop at Amazon or BookCloseouts online, please buy through the links on this site (money goes to hosting and books):

This book is written by two family therapists. Stoop is founder and co-director of his Center for Family Therapy. Masteller is co-director of the Center and a family therapist there. Stoops personal background includes growing up in a dysfunctional family.

The focus of the book is forgiveness. The authors are careful to distinguish forgiveness from forgetting. Forgetting is not a requirement, but forgiveness sets the adult child free. Interestingly, they point out that forgiveness is something that the adult child can do on their own and for themselves, but reconciliation involves the family and may or may not be possible. Many people confuse forgiveness, forgetting, and reconciling.

The authors use case studies to present their ideas. First, the different types of dysfunctional families and how they affect children are presented. Then the authors discuss skills that ACOAs and ACODs may not have learned as children because of their home situation. After that, they go through the steps to facilitate forgiveness. At the end they present several case studies on reconciliation although this last is a small part of the book.

At the back of the book, the authors have included a study guide with questions and exercises so that the reader can apply the book to their own issues.

pg. 107

Unwritten Rules

Children who grow up in dysfunctional families quickly learn the unwritten, unspoken rules of the household. Here are some that are especially common:

1. We don’t feel. We keep our emotions guarded, especially anger (though often there is one person who is allowed to express feelings openly, especially anger.
2. We are always in control We don’t show weakness. We don’t ask for help, which is a sign of weakness.
3. We deny what’s going on. We don’t believe our senses or perceptions. We lie to ourselves and to others.
4. We don’t trust. Not ourselves, not others. No one can be relied upon, no one confided in.
5. We keep the family’s secrets. Even if we told, no one would believe us—or so we think.
6. We are ashamed.We are to blame for everything bad that happens—and we deserve it.

pg. 179

The Six Steps of Forgiveness

1. Recognize the injury.
2. Identify the emotions involved.
3. Express your hurt and anger.
4. Set boundaries to protect yourself.
5. Cancel the debt.
6. Consider the possibility of reconciliation.

Despite the fact that this book was put out by a Christian publisher (usually a huge turn-off for me), there was very little religion in this book. There are case studies of biblical characters from time to time, but these are not that difficult to overlook. There are sections of the book where the authors go on a bit about the Christian ideal of a family, but these sections are short. The actual process described to achieve forgiveness does not rely on religion so this book is useful to all beliefs or lack of thereof.

This book is a good introduction to dysfunctional families and the healing process for adult children. I found the book very informative. I particularly appreciate the inclusion of the study guide at the end of the book. Reading about healing is one thing, doing the hard work of it is quite another. This book provides a guide and framework for doing the work.

I will be spending quite some time with this book. Now that I’ve read it, I have to go back and do the work (I did not find the study questions until I had finished the book since they are at the end of the book, even though they are grouped by chapter).