TOP DRAWER BOOK REVIEW
by
HL Carpenter

 

The Power of Full Engagement
by Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz
245 pages; hardcover; $26.00
Simon & Schuster, New York, 2003

This book was ranked #6 on the Wall Street Journal’s Best Selling Book list the week the review was written..

Workaholics, take note. The Japanese have a word for what can happen to you. Karoshi. It means death from overwork.

Jim Loehr and Tony Schwartz, co-authors of The Power of Full Engagement, attempt to offer an antidote. They believe management of energy, not time, is the key to creating lasting changes in your life. How can you learn to manage your energy? According to the authors, rituals - basically habits tied to values – are the building blocks.

Unfortunately, only a skinny 60-page section (followed by a five page Personal Development Plan that you can fill out yourself) is devoted to an explanation of creating these rituals.

Before you get there, the first part of the book is full of run-of-the-mill health and fitness advice that you can find in any dime-a-dozen magazine (and that you likely heard from your mother or grandmother) - sleep right, eat right, take time for breaks and exercise, drink plenty of fluids, etc.

If you’re looking to improve your life, you’re already familiar with these ‘shoulds’. What you need to know is how to make the ‘shoulds’ part of your everyday routine without abandoning them faster than a New Year’s resolution.

The second part of the book provides tips for doing that, such as taking incremental steps, writing down your goals and tying them to your core values. But unless you’re highly motivated and capable of facing the brutal truth about your behavioral patterns, you’d do better to pay for the hands-on course or hire your own Personal Life Coach.

Then again, simply heeding your grandmother’s advice might be as effective – and less expensive.

 

Review originally published July 2003.