Tuesday, April 16, 2013

Review of START by Jon Acuff

In 2011 Jon Acuff released his book QUITTER, which was a book all about pursuing your dream. The trick was to not quit your day job, but to utilize your day job to fund the pursuit of your dream job, while also doing excellent work at your day job. Acuff’s new book START goes deeper into the process of actually pursuing your dream. For many people, there are plenty of excuses not to start pursuing their dream. We may be afraid, or we may fear we need a complete map for how things should go before we get started.

But Acuff says we just need to start. We’ll never get anywhere if we don’t start. Acuff says to punch fear in the face, abandon the path to average, and run hard on the path to awesome. So how do we do that? Acuff breaks down the process into five very practical phases:
1. Learning
2. Editing
3. Mastering
4. Harvesting
5. Guiding

The great thing about the process as Acuff outlines it is that it’s a very practical path of continual development. We all start with learning, and by learning we learn what we’re gifted for and what we’re not. By editing out what is clearly not for us, we can focus on mastering the thing that is for us. Then we can enjoy the harvest, even as we continue developing. Finally, we can guide others on their path to awesome.

I love this book for its practical wisdom and the humor with which Acuff communicates throughout. I’m currently “starting” down my own personal path to awesome by pursuing alternative certification to be a teacher. This book is going to be very beneficial as I go down this path. I can’t recommend this book enough if you really want to pursue your dream.

Review copy provided by Thomas Nelson Publishing

Photo Credit: Thomas Nelson

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