You Are Awesome (Book Review)

 Non-Spoiler Review

You Are Awesome by Neil Pasricha is a self-help book that details nine secrets to aid you on your journey to become awesome. In the spoiler review, I'll be going into each secret and giving my take on how effective I project them to be. I say "project" instead of "determine" because I haven't taken all the advice, so I can't definitively say how effective they are. But I can make an estimate.

I usually don't like self-help books. Our world is already so full of systems and rules, it seems really unappealing to further formalize it. But Lee-Anne likes them, and just because I don't find the genre appealing, doesn't mean it's without value.

Based on the title of the book, I thought it would be about uncovering the aspects of ourselves that are already awesome. Turns out, it's more about how to build yourself into a person that is awesome. So it's more action-oriented than self-discovery.

To highlight this point, the first secret opens with the story of his mother, who grew up in an impoverished family in Kenya, facing discrimination based on her race and gender. The majority of her education was self-taught. However, she managed to be so self-reliant and talented that she received the highest mark in her country on a standardized test and subsequently was given a scholarship to attend a school usually reserved for the dominant class.

So... someone who is much more awesome than you.

I like the fact that the author has his roots in blogging. Mostly because I clearly have a similar background. 

All in all, I thought the book was worth reading. I liked some of the secrets more than others, but there are definitely some studies and perspectives that Pasricha shares that I reflect on, and a couple of tools for working through your life that I liked. The book starts stronger than it ends though, in my opinion.

Spoiler Review

Add a Dot-Dot-Dot

This secret is to not view life as predetermined. He gives the example of his mother, who was born a girl in Kenya with expectations that she would get married out of her family and provide for a husband without any potential for personal ambitions. If she were to accept this fate, she would have been putting a period at the end of her life's story, which is a stopping point. Instead, she studied on her own, received the highest score on a standardized test and was admitted to a school usually attended only by people of a race and gender different from hers. By accepting the potential of a future different to what seemed her only option, she was allowing for an ellipsis, otherwise known as a dot-dot-dot, to be put on her future. The ellipsis gives room for pause and contemplation, to think about not just what is inevitable, but of what could be.

The next step is to add the word "Yet" after the ellipsis. He gives the example of when, after receiving her education, her father became ill and arranged for her to marry a man from Canada. She had to move, adapt to eating meat after living most of her life a vegetarian, and learn to waltz. Adding "yet" creates a potential for accomplishment, when one might otherwise assume an end, "I don't waltz...yet"

I find the second stage of this, adding the "yet" more impactful than adding the dot-dot-dot. The elipsis creates I guess, room for thought, while the "yet" opens potential for the future. I occasionally will say "I don't (do something)... yet" in reference to this chapter, when I want to be optimistic about something I'm inexperienced in. I never reference the "add a dot-dot-dot" part.

Shift the Spotlight

He speaks on something called the "Spotlight effect" which is the idea that we perceive ourselves as being noticed, watched, observed and judged more than we actually are. So shift the spotlight, and realize it's not all about you.

I don't know how I feel about this. My mom used to tell me something similar when I was feeling self-conscious. She used to tell me that people were too preoccupied with themselves to worry about me, and would challenge me to ask myself if I cared about how other people were behaving. If I didn't, why would I think they were going to judge me?

Issue here is, when I ask myself if I pay attention to the people around me... I think I'd have to say yes. I'm always picking up on background conversations, thinking about them, analyzing them, judging them. I put the spotlight on other people all the time, so by this metric, my fear that other people are watching and judging me is justified.

He puts forward a pretty thought-evoking study in this section. Apparently, people who achieve success early in life tend to blame themselves when they fall short, whereas those who do not achieve it blame external circumstance.

I've thought about this study a lot. I'm sure that successful people would use it as a justification for their own success, saying that they took initiative instead of sitting around and whining. But there's a good chance that people who blame circumstances for their life position are unsuccessful because their circumstances have legitimately stood in their way more.

See It as a Step

For this Secret, he suggests that when life doesn't go your way, instead of seeing it as an end, to see it as a step to the next stage of your life. He gives the example of his initial failed marriage. They met because of shared interests and he proposed to her before going to University, so they spent some time as a long-distance relationship. When they came back together, they realized that they hadn't spent enough time getting to know each other and that they really weren't compatible. When it was suggested they divorce, Neil felt it was a huge blow to his character. But he came to see it as a step. It made him stronger and better equipped to move into his future. He asks you to look into your past and see all the big, hard steps that brought you to where you are, and to understand that your steps forward will be just as challenging and transformative.

He brings up a study where people were asked to look ten years into their past and estimate what ten years into their future will look like. The results were that people were able to acknowledge how much their life had changed in the past, but they predicted that their future would have much less variance. The point? We don't appreciate our capacity for change moving into the future.

This holds true, I think. Ten years ago I was in Mali for the Canada World Youth Program. Since then, I enrolled in college, did the Human Services Foundation and Social Service Worker programs, I moved out of my family's place in Guelph, lived a year in student residence and then two years in student housing. I found work as a Summer Program Leader, Direct Support Worker, and Independent Facilitator. I moved out of student housing and sublet for five months, then moved to a townhouse that I lived in for five years. I worked in a grouphome, and finally found work as an In-House Facilitator at the place I did my student placement. I met Lee-Anne, asked her out, started dating, and then we found a place to live together. A worldwide pandemic occurred, and I adopted two cats.

That's a lot of stuff, and if you asked me what the next ten years of my life would look like, it would not approach the number of events that occurred in the last ten.

This section is also where he starts his first blog, called "1000 Awesome Things" to cope with his depression. I resonate with this step specifically, because when I originally started my current main blog (The Gryphon's Perch, not this one, and technically my second blog), it was a coping method for depression. I wanted to motivate myself to do at least one thing worth talking about per day. I've slowed down considerably since then, but it's kind of because my days are full enough that I don't have as much time to blog, which is a good thing.

Tell Yourself a Different Story

In this Secret, he talks about his experience of growing up with one testicle due to an emergency surgery he had as an infant, which he never learning about growing up. He only learned that his body wasn't normal when his gym teacher told a story about how he popped a friend's testicle while they were wrestling, and afterwards they all called him half a man. This led Neil to believe that he would never have a girlfriend or kids, and that he was no good. 

This is a really screwed up story. If I popped a friend's testicle, it would be a shame of mine, not his. If I made fun of him for the results of my actions, I think I wouldn't be able to call him a friend anymore. Even in my machismo-influenced upbringing, I was taught that attacking the testicles was shameful, so I don't know why this guy would brag about it.

Anyway, Pasricha calls our shame the Swamplands of the Soul and asks us to tell ourselves a different story about the things we are ashamed of. He gives examples like: if you hate that you've slept around, maybe it helped you learn what you need in a partner. If you hate your stretch marks, think of them as commemorative of how you brought a child into the world. If you have an extra 10 pounds you can't get rid of, be grateful for the pizza and wings night you have every week with your friends. He says to rewrite our shame stories and treat ourselves kinder.

He tells us to ask ourselves three questions to determine the severity of our circumstances. The first is to ask "Will this matter on my deathbed?", the second is "Can I do something about this?" If there is, you should do it. If not, you're off the hook. The third is "Is there a story I'm telling myself?" It kind of goes with the shame thing. Peel back the layers, see what your situation is and what you're attaching to it.

The questions aren't bad, and if I ever put up the corkboard in my office, I might post them on it as a reflection tool. Some caveats to the questions though, is that when I ask them to myself, sometimes I'll find workarounds. For example, for "Will this matter on my deathbed?" I sometimes think that the current situation won't but it could escalate into something that will. For "Can I do something about this?" I sometimes feel like there is something I can do, but only with great difficulty and with unknown level of influence, which makes the answer less clear-cut. I still think they're generally good questions.

Lose More to Win More

In this one he addresses the scenario when people ask him how they can achieve the success that he has, and his answer is "Do it for free for ten years". He says we're surrounded by people trying to offer shortcuts to success, but sometimes it just takes experience and a lot of time. He says, instead of asking yourself how you can succeed, you should ask yourself "Am I gaining experience?", "Will these experiences help?" and "Can I stay on this path for awhile?"

He points out that ambition exceeds ability, and that this is a good thing. Ambition makes you keep trying, which means you keep failing, which means you keep learning. Ambition keeps life interesting, and it means you have the gift of wanting to be better.

He talks about his six failed blogs (one being on Livejournal, which is a bit nostalgic because that's where I had my first blog), which he did before his seventh 1000 Awesome Things. He calls attention to the fact that he couldn't have succeeded if he hadn't failed all those times before

To ensure that you lose more to win more, he suggests you follow three steps: go to parties where you don't know anyone, to keep you from staying in your comfort zone as success can get in the way of future success. Have a failure budget, some money set aside to account for potential failures on new endeavours. Count your losses, because looking back on them will show you how far you've come.

I like everything in this section. Even the "Go to parties where you don't know anyone" step. I'm not a huge party animal myself, but I think that when you only spend time with people that you agree with and who know how you want to be received, it narrows your perspective. Exposing yourself to environments where people don't know you keeps you humble and more objective.

Reveal to Heal

This Secret is about how we benefit from the act of disclosure. When we share our deepest and darkest thoughts, we are able to expel them from the hidden parts of our mind. Throughout most of history, people often achieved this through confession, which was built into many religious practices. However, with our global population being less and less connected with religion, we have lost this tool of confession that helped us deal with our internalized negativity. Pasricha says that our need to release our inner stressors is just as necessary now as ever, regardless of your religious affinity. For this, he offers a technique called "Contemporary Confession"

He suggests starting each day with three statements, using the prompts: "I will let go of...", "I am grateful for...", and "I will focus on..." Like with the "Tell Yourself a Different Story" secret, I'd kind of like to add these statements to my corkboard.

I've heard a lot about how externalizing negative thoughts takes the power away from them, even if the only person you're disclosing to is yourself. In the past, I've tried many times to maintain a journal. Despite the fact that I haven't been able to consistently keep up with one, the fact that I keep coming back to it indicates that it does help. In fact, I seem to come back to it during times when I need it.

Find Small Ponds

In this one, he talks about how "Different is better than better". It can be tempting to be competitive and strive for prestigious titles, because you want to prove yourself. Sometimes though, it makes more sense to go to the places that need you, because they're failing, or because they don't have anyone like you on their side. He gives the example of taking a job at Walmart, even though it was humble and he didn't have any experience related to the field he was applying, but because he had knowledge about internal leadership while no one else there did, it allowed him to take off and succeed. He says it's important to find a small pond, so you can be the big fish.

Seems weird to glorify Walmart. Doesn't exactly feel like a "small pond" but I get where he's coming from. At my agency we have the phrase "Difference is desirable" and I do believe that going where you're needed is a better approach than going where "people like you" go.

The danger here is that I feel it could make you complacent. I was very limited in my youth, and if I had accepted the small pond that had been offered to me, I don't believe that my life would be better for it. Pasricha's mother didn't settle for her own small pond, and he portrayed that as an admirable quality.

So I agree with the "Go where you're needed" aspect of this secret, but not that you should settle for any small pond. If you're happy in a small pond, then that's awesome, but don't be afraid to leave it. Pasricha in fact does choose to leave his small pond, so even he doesn't follow this secret as a constant.

Go Untouchable

In this one, he suggests thinking of your day as separated into three "buckets", each with an amount of time inside it. One is for sleep, another for work, and another for fun. For Neil, he found that as he gained parental responsibilities and started getting paid more for his creative endeavors, his "Fun bucket" became filled with responsibilities. To mitigate this, he quit his job at Wal Mart (left his small pond) and replaced the job responsibilities in his work bucket with his creative efforts, freeing up more space in his fun bucket. Unfortunately, he found that he still couldn't focus on creativity since life is full of so many distractions.

His solution is Untouchable Days. Days where you keep your phone on airplane mode and cut the Wi-Fi from your laptop. A day spent completely on your own, even away from your loved ones. He says that he's 10x as productive on these days, and that it improves his self-esteem the rest of the week. He warns that you'll get pushback from your loved ones when you propose this idea, but that it's vital. Apparently he schedules two Untouchable Days per week.

As someone with ADHD, this seems incredible. The distractions of day to day life drive me crazy. I hate being connected to everyone through my phone all the time, and in fact resisted getting a cell phone until I was in college. Even then, I only had a flip phone for two years before I finally succumbed to the smart phone. On the few occasions that I've managed to limit my distractions, such as in Chisasibi and Karadie, I've excelled. I wouldn't know how to schedule for such a thing, but I'd like to. Two days a week feels unreasonable, though.

Never, Never Stop

He starts off this one by talking about what he admires about his father. His father is from a small village called Tarn Taran, but when people ask him where he's from, he says New Delhi, because no one knows Tarn Taran, but everyone knows New Delhi. His name is Surinder, but when everyone mispronounces his name as "Surrender" he starts going by his middle name, Kumar, but tells everyone they can call him Ken. Why does he make these accommodations? Because it makes it easier for other people. Neil assures us that it isn't "shredding your values, or dishonouring your traditions or snapping open your moral compass".

He says that his father chose to move to Canada because he looked up which countries had the highest quality of life, which were the Scandanavian countries, but they were difficult to immigrate to. From there, Canada and the US were next, so he applied to both and Canada got back to him first. Neil talks about how we are sometimes paralyzed with the amount of choices we have in life, so sometimes it's better to simplify, pretend you don't have a choice, don't think, just decide, and then never, never stop.

He also reflects on his dads sociable nature, his way of getting him to think about business models, how he taught him about stocks, and how he never showed interest in returning to India physically. He says that his dad only knew one direction: forward, and that really there is no other direction but forward on the road to awesome. This is where the book concludes.

I don't know. I think Pasricha loves both his parents, and kind of bookended things with what his mom taught him at the start of the book, and with what his dad taught him at the end. After hearing both lessons, though, I favour his mother quite a bit.

I'm not in love with his dad telling people that he's from a more recognizable location than he is. I can sympathize with not wanting to elaborate to everyone where he's from, and I've known people to do this, but it's always felt like people are overestimating how difficult it is for other people to hear the name of a location they're not familiar with. It sounds a bit like the person claiming to be from somewhere they're not is ashamed of being from a small community.

He changes his name from Surinder, to Kumar, to Ken. I've known many people to change their name to something that is more accessible to the dominant culture they live within, and I accept any name given to me. However, I've always been happy when people have been comfortable enough with me to tell me their preferred name instead of the name they've decided I'm comfortable with. I have some linguistic limitations and my pronunciations are not always perfect, but I will try my best to pronounce peoples' names as best I can, and I'm happy to do it.

Pasricha says that his father changing his name isn't "shredding your values, or dishonouring your traditions or snapping open your moral compass" but he doesn't elaborate on why it isn't these things. He's addressing concerns that people have when deciding whether or not to adjust their names, but he doesn't explain his position.

In fact, when I was in college it was impressed on me the importance of learning how to pronounce peoples' names correctly, and at my current agency we've had sessions where we go over everyone's names to make sure we all know how to pronounce them. So clearly Pasricha's dad's position doesn't resonate with everyone.

His dad's lack of interest in physically returning to his home country, when paired with his dishonesty about his place of birth, and his readiness to give up his name for a Western one, kind of indicate some kind of internalized shame.

The one positive that I take from this secret, is his decision to change country and to commit to it without much thought. It's true that we suffer from "choice paralysis" when we're given too many options, so the ability to make a quick decision and commit to it, accepting all outcomes, is admirable.

Conclusion

I felt like reading this book was worthwhile. I liked his fixation with blogs and his motivation to do them, as they relate with my experience. His mom is super cool, but I didn't feel his dad had as much wisdom to draw from, so finishing with his father's lessons was kind of anticlimactic.

I already mentioned it, but the statements raised in "Tell Yourself a Different Story" and "Reveal to Heal" are worthy of being posted in my home and being reflected on regularly.

"Lose More to Win More" and "Go Untouchable" were maybe my favourite secrets. The overall messages in "Find Small Ponds", and "Never, Never Stop" were a bit problematic though.

All in all, I definitely gained more from reading this than I lost.