Find Your Strongest Life by Marcus Buckingham

October 5th, 2009 |

Author: admin

FIND YOUR STRONGEST LIFE.cover

Find Your Strongest Life by Marcus Buckingham

From the Back of the Book:

Best-selling author and researcher Marcus Buckingham has walked millions through the process of discovering their strengths, from boardrooms and CEOs to Oprah and her viewers. No one is better at hellping people understand teh keys to living a strong life.

Packed with research, practical advice, examples, and testimonials, Find Your Stronget Life is a step-bystep- guide to realistic change from the expert who knows how to make it happen.

About the Book:

This is a book about how women, specifically, can find their strongest life. He has gathered information and created a test to help every woman find the life she wants to live. Marcus Buckingham did a workshop on Oprah with her audience to help all of them find their strongest life, and then he wrote this book to help other women around the world do the same thing. Once you take his Strongest Life Test, then you can figure out what your lead and supporting “roles” are and figure out how to live your strongest life. There are 9 different “roles” that Marcus Buckingham describes in his book, and each of these roles give you a clue as to how you react to life and how to find your strengths and talents.

You can take the test for yourself with this little widget.

My Opinion:

I was really excited to get this book. I”m rather a “self help” book junkie. Throw in the “Strong Life Test” and I was all over this book. I started reading this book thinking that maybe it could boost my life into the right direction. I”m a small business owner, and I am very happy with my life, but there’s always room for improvement. So when I started reading this book, I was looking forward to growing and learning. What I came away from it with, was disappointment and a little bit of anger.

One of the things that made me the most angry about this book is the complete disregard for mothers or the job of being a mother. Basically he says that you can’t live a strong life if you’re “just a mother”. Partially because women are too hard on themelves and their mothering ability and also because women aren’t honest enough about their children or their worries and successes as mothers. So you can’t have a “Strong Life” if your wanting to be a mother. Mother’s don’t count.

Excuse me?! That’s all I ever wanted to be, was a mother. The jobs that I’ve had and even the business I created has been secondary to my main job, which is being a mother. Whenever I’ve felt the most unhappy with my life, it has been because I couldn’t be a full time mom. The reason I started the business that I have was so that I could work from home and be with my sons full time! So when someone says to me, that you can’t have a strong life because you’re focused on being a mother… well that sorta pisses me off!

Maybe Mr. Buckingham didn’t mean to disparage the most important job in the world, being a Mom, but that’s exactly what he ended up doing. And someone who is writing a book like this, should be more aware of their words and not make a mistake like this. If it was a mistake at all.

The other thing that disappointed me in this book was the Strong Life test. I took the test and what it gave me as my leading role didn’t sound like me at all! I read the full description of the role and I didn’t recognize myself even a little. Not even some of my subconscious traits were there. I’m used to taking these types of test and at least finding something to relate to myself. But this one didn’t. You can take the test for yourself and see what you find.

Anyway, I wouldn’t recommend this to many people at all. If you don’t put mothering as a high priority in your life, then you might be able to read this book without getting upset. If you don’t have children or don’t want children, then you could probably read this book without getting upset. Other than that, I would say this is definitely not a book for any mom!

My rating: 2.5 stars