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Review:
"EAT THAT FROG! 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done
in Less Time"by Brian Tracy List Price $11.16 (Used copies available through Amazon.com from $7.254) Paperback: 144 pages ; Dimensions (in inches): 0.41 x 8.48 x 5.48 Publisher: Berrett-Koehler Publishers; (October 1, 2002) ISBN: 1576751988 Also available in audio cassettes and CD. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Reviewed by Elizabeth H. Cottrell ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ When I saw a book title with the name Eat That Frog!, I decided that it had to be good or risk a dusty life on the shelf. I predict that this short, insightful, easy-to-read book will be widely read and will help a lot of people feel that they finally have a system—tools, if you will—for wasting less time and becoming more productive. The name comes from the unfortunate (but vivid) concept that "if the first thing you do each morning is to eat a live frog, you can go through the day with the satisfaction of knowing that that is probably the worst thing that is going to happen to you all day long." This epitomizes the theme of the book, which is a series of mental and psychological tips and techniques for helping you identify those things each day that will contribute the most to your personal and business success or sense of fulfillment and then getting them done FIRST, before the less important things impose themselves on your time. The reason I was willing to risk the chance that this might be just another boring, trite self-help book was my familiarity with the author, Brian Tracy. A truly paradigm-shifting piece of work that I encountered early in my business life—when I first began to understand the importance of ongoing personal development—was a series of audiotapes by Brian Tracy called "The Psychology of Achievement." Like that ground-breaking work, Eat That Frog! is based on the very best international research on the psychology of success and accomplishment and is a synthesis of Tracy's relentless and lifetime search for the most proven characteristics and techniques of successful people. Each of the 21 concepts presented in this book comprises a single chapter, so it's easy to pick up the book and read just a short section at a time without feeling that you have to read it all through at once. While Tracy's writing style is somewhat utilitarian; each chapter offers a consistently clear presentation of a single concept accompanied by examples from real life and ends with a "what to do next" exercise for implementing that particular concept in your own life. The power of this book, I believe, lies in a quote attributed to Galileo: You cannot teach a person something he does not already know; you can only bring what he does know to his awareness. You are unlikely to find any of the 21 concepts to be brand new, but Tracy's gift lies in synthesizing each to its most basic common denominator and providing doable steps for incorporating it into your life. I finished the book feeling not only that I had in my hand the cream-of-the-crop ideas for becoming more productive but also an "I can do this" energy that sent me straight to my legal pad to start creating my own personal plan. My main complaint is Tracy's tendency to use hyperbole with virtually every one of the 21 concepts. He tends to use the phrase "most important" or "most powerful" with so many things throughout the book that you begin to tire of it. The nature of the topic, too, is so widely written about that some of the concepts have been discussed so much by so many authors, they may seem trite, obvious, or unoriginal. For me, this was worth putting up with for the handful of ideas—new ways of looking at things I'd looked at before—that got me excited and motivated. When I had finished Eat That Frog!, I realized it is basically a summary of Tracy's longer work (available as an audiotape series from Nightingale-Conant) called "The Power of Clarity." If you have already listened to that tape series, you will not need to buy this book unless you just want a quick review (and for me, this was a terrific way to refresh my knowledge). If you LIKE this book and want a more expansive treatment of the concepts, that tape series will be worthwhile for you. In the spirit of feeding your mind and your personal development, Brian Tracy's EAT THAT FROG! 21 Great Ways to Stop Procrastinating and Get More Done in Less Time, is like a nourishing dish that most people looking for ways to become more productive will find valuable and worthwhile. It is reasonably priced, available in a choice of formats (book or audio), easy and quick to read (I finished it in two, 30-minute sessions on the treadmill), and practical. If you think you're a very efficient, effective person already, this book may not do much for you. If you feel as though you've already read everything there is to know about procrastination to no avail, give this one a try - many of the reviewers on Amazon.com shared the opinion of an Oregon reader: I must have read 50 time-management books, but this is the one that did it for me—my productivity has increased tenfold after reading this book. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ © 2004 by Elizabeth H. Cottrell. All rights reserved worldwide. ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ Elizabeth H. Cottrell is a home-based entrepreneur, freelance technical writer, and owner of Riverwood Technologies, a desktop publishing company in Maurertown, Virginia. She is currently a staff writer and editor for IAHBE.
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