Friday Book Summary and Review
As a continued effort to add true value to your life, I have decided to dedicate each Friday on the site to summarizing and reviewing a book that I have read throughout my life. I will focus on books that have had the greatest impact on me as an entrepreneur and attempt to convince you why you should also read it! 😉
My Passion for Reading
As a quick preface, I have been obsessed with reading and learning since I can remember. I grew up in a family where my mother was reading a new book every week and was always encouraging my sister and I to read, read, read. Every summer, we would go on vacation to Cape Cod or somewhere on the east coast and it would be filled with hours upon hours of reading new books that had just come out. Before I found my love for business , non-fiction, ans spiritual books, I was very much a fiction reader obsessed with the likes of Harry Potter, James Patterson, and Dan Brown.
Today, I have a never ending list of books that have been recommended to me by friends, family, and professional connections that I slowly make my way through. I usually aim to read one new book every month and sometimes have to extend it to two months if the book is longer or life becomes too crazy.
I am at a point in my life where reading is a continuous opportunity to further my knowledge as an entrepreneur and educate myself as if I were in a university. I stick to biographies of business leaders, business focused books, and spiritual books focused on growth as an individual. As I read each book, I take notes, reflect, and find ways to apply the best practices to my own life so that I am always growing.
It is my hope that my recommendations will do the same for you!
The Passion Test: The Effortless Path to Discovering Your Life Purpose
written by Janet Bray Atwood and Chris Atwood
This book was surprisingly one of my required readings for a management course while I studied at Quinnipiac University. I decided to take the course because the professor had great ratings online and a number of upperclassmen highly recommended I take his class. I believe that it was operations management.
It turned out to be nothing that I had expected taking me down a 4 month series of activities to grow as an individual and leader. The assigned reading and in class assignments were nothing like the other business courses that I was taking and we continued to have discussions centered around passion. He had us watch The Secret and we had a weekend class where we learned to meditate for a prolonged period of time.
I can’t say that I knew what I was signing up for, but I ended up loving it and taking numerous lessons away.
The Passion Test was assigned as reading throughout the entirety of the course. It worked out nicely because therr are particular activities to complete throughout all of the chapters. Although it’s been almost 4 years since I last read the book, I still remember the sound methods that they presented and continue to use them today.
Create a Vision of Who You Want to Become
One of the most memorable activities came towards the end of the book when I was challenged to create a vision board.
A vision board is a board that has the top 5 achievements that you want yo reach throughout your life. If you want to travel, you put pictures of different places you want to visit. If you want to be a scientist, you put a photo of one. If you want to have a family, you put what you imagine it looking like.
In the book, the authors make the argument that the more you train your mind to understand who you want to become, the more your actions are a reflection of that future.
I’ve read many books that share a similar message and I am a strong believer in keeping your goals in sight. That’s why my short term and long term goals are always hanging on the board above my workspace.
Read The Passion Test if…
You want to live a life centered around what makes you happiest.
You are eager to create a vision of your life, but struggle to understand how to so it.
You want to re-evaluate where you are in your life and realign your actions with your vision.
You want to grow spiritually as an individual to better understand who you are.
