If you have read Think and Grow Rich you will know there are numerous mentions of this hidden secret. In fact, Napoleon Hill offers the following teaser in the book’s introduction:

“In every chapter of this book, mention has been made of the money-making secret which has made fortunes for more than five hundred exceedingly wealthy whom I carefully analyzed over a long period of years.”

I was therefore very happy when I recently received a copy of Brian Kim’s e-book The Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich. Would my curiosity finally be satisfied? I hoped so, but I must admit I was also worried that the secret Brian would identify would be a big let-down. I believe my thoughts were: “Please don’t be the Law of Attraction!”

What’s the Book About?

Brian doesn’t waste any time in his book, identifying what the secret is at the very start of Chapter 1. I’m happy to say it is not the Law of Attraction.

As previously noted, the secret is said to appear in every chapter of Think and Grow Rich. Brian is understandably keen to prove the secret he has identified is what Napoleon Hill had in mind. He devotes the second chapter to going through Think and Grow Rich chapter by chapter, pinpointing exactly where the secret is mentioned. Assuming you have read the book, you should find some satisfaction to going “Aha! That’s where it is!” I think you will also be more than convinced that Brian has indeed correctly identified the hidden secret.  The rest of the book goes into detail about how you can use the secret to obtain whatever it is you desire in life.

One thing I noticed is that there is some repetition in the book. However, I think this was a conscious decision on Brian’s part to make sure the reader fully comes to grip with the message of the book. As he says in the book, one common fault of success books is they ‘pump’ you up and that’s where it ends. The Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich is designed to forever change you way you approach a goal or desire.

Why Buy the Book

I highly recommend this e-book to people who have read Think and Grow Rich. If you haven’t read this classic, Brian has included a copy of this book in PDF format free with the purchase of his book.

Now, those of you who have read Think and Grow Rich may be wondering whether or not this book is worth your hard-earned cash. “Can Brian Kim really tell me anything new about success that Napoleon Hill hasn’t?” is what you may be thinking.

Well, the book succeeded in satisfying my curiosity about what Napoleon Hill refers to as the hidden secret, but it also did far more than this. I believe the book’s real value is that it helps everything you have read about self-improvement and personal development come together and click into place.

Think of success as a puzzle. We are all familiar with many of the pieces of this puzzle, principles such as courage, confidence, hard work, persistence, etc….. What is not so clear to many of us is how these pieces fit together to form the puzzle. Brian has done an incredible job in this book of giving the reader both the big picture, as well as a detailed process for making your deepest desires become reality.

The book is a healthy 122 pages, and Brian has also generously included two bonuses: a special report called The Three Biggest Mistakes People Make When Using the Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich and a workbook that accompanies the book bundled up as a special offer for Pick The Brain readers.

Click here to access the special offer for Pick The Brain readers and get The Hidden Secret in Think and Grow Rich by Brian Kim and the bonuses today.

“The Personality Puzzle” is the new e-book from Pick The Brain contributor Hunter Nuttall. Back in August we published Hunter’s first article for this blog: Introverts And Extraverts: Can’t We Just Get Along? If you enjoyed this article (and it seems many of you did – it received 90+ comments and 1119 votes on Digg), this book will be of immense interest to you.

What’s the book about?

“Sometimes I just don’t understand human behavior.”- C-3PO

“The Personality Puzzle” aims to help you understand what “makes people tick” via the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator (MBTI). The MBTI originated from the ideas of revolutionary Swiss psychologist Carl Jung. His work was continued by an American mother and daughter team, Katharine Briggs and Isabel Briggs Myers, and resulted in the MBTI being published in 1962. The MBTI did gain some popularity in the 1980s, but according to Hunter the usefulness of it is grossly underestimated.

What’s so good about the book?

One of the best aspects of Hunter’s e-book is the way he combines psychological research and real-world examples. Here are just a few of things you will discover in “The Personality Puzzle”:

• Why Democrats and Republicans tend to disagree on drilling for oil in Alaska
• Why you may be getting paid less than a colleague for doing the same work
• Why a packet of M&Ms can tell you more about yourself than you ever thought possible

The book also introduces a potentially addictive new hobby: typewatching. This hobby simply involves trying to determine someone’s type from their behavior. Hunter shows you how to determine the type of both real people and fictional characters, including Albert Einstein, Forrest Gump, Randy Pausch and Darth Vader. Of course once you have read “The Personality Puzzle” and are armed with a newfound knowledge of the MBTI you will be able to typewatch any person you so choose. But be warned: disagreements are common when trying to determine the type of certain people (eg Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama).

As I hope you can see, Hunter has put a lot of effort into making this book fun. But I should also note that the MBTI has some important practical applications – eg it could help save a marriage or avoid conflict with a co-worker. You may laugh at this, but think about it for moment: if we each better understand the ways we’re similar to and different from others, we will then know how to better get along with each other.

Is it worth buying?

If you are like me you will find the book fascinating. The tests that Hunter links to in the book identified me as an INFP, so I was curious to find out 1) whether this indicator was correct and 2) what this could tell me about myself. As I read through the book I didn’t have any doubts that I was indeed an INFP, and I certainly wasn’t disappointed with the insights this gave me about myself.

The 67 page e-book is normally $27.00, but Hunter is offering Pick The Brain readers 50% off this price for a limited time only. To find out more about the e-book and details of how take advantage of this offer follow this link:

“The Personality Puzzle: Understanding What Makes People Tick”

If you’re still not sure whether or not the book is for you, Hunter has kindly made available a preview copy:

Download Preview Copy of “The Personality Puzzle”

Finally, if you have any questions or comments about the MBTI and/ or “The Personality Puzzle” please share them below.

The first idea in The Little Book of Productivity, the new e-book written by Scott Young, is to understand the reasons for wanting to get more done in less time. Many of you will be familiar with Scott’s work from his regular contributions to Pick The Brain over the past year and his own self-titled blog, Scott H Young.

Of course everyone will have their own individual reasons for wanting to be productive. Personally, productivity is a subject I have taken an interest in due to the pressures of working two jobs and being the father of two boys under the age of two. I need to be able to get things done quickly and efficiently. As Scott points out, by becoming aware of these reasons you will be naturally motivated to stay productive instead of slipping into lazy habits.

There are many more excellent ideas in this book, including timeboxing, sprinting theory, Hofstadter’s Rule and operant conditioning. And that is exactly what The Little Book of Productivity is: a book of ideas. Scott’s book looks at 99 ideas related to productivity, with each idea taking up one page.

The book is very well organized (as you would hope a productivity book would be) and covers the following topics:

• Beating Procrastination
• Becoming Organized
• Staying Energized
• Getting Things Finished
• Automate Your Routine
• Productivity Hacks
• Doing the Right Work

Returning to my first point in this review – the backlash against productivity – I would like to point out that a book such as this doesn’t pretend to be answering life’s big questions. But there are plenty of other books for that. The Little Book of Productivity does, however, hope to improve your life. And as I’m sure you will agree, sometimes it only takes one idea to do this.

If you are interested in The Little Book of Productivity you can purchase a copy for $9.95 USD by clicking the following button:

If you would like to know more about this e-book, Scott has made the first chapter available to read for free here.

This e-book includes my best articles from my first year of blogging both on Pick The Brain and my own personal blog, The Change Blog. During this year I married, became a first-time father and relocated from Australia to Canada. Perhaps more importantly, during this time I underwent a personal transformation that changed both how I see my life and the world in which we live.

To grab yourself a copy of this free e-book, you simply need to sign up to my monthly newsletter, The Change Blog Newsletter.

I pack this newsletter full of inspiring and useful personal growth material. And I guarantee your information will be kept private and not shared.

Peter Clemens is Editor of Pick The Brain. 

Bill Strickland is an amazing man. However, instead of me telling you why, I would like to invite you to watch the above video from TED in which Bill shares his astonishing tale of redemption through arts, music and unlikely partnerships (with subtle accompaniment by longtime friend Herbie Hancock).

Competition

Bill Strickland has recently released a book, Make the Impossible Possible. I have read the book, and loved it, so I am very excited to have 15 copies of it to give away. All you have to do to be in the running to win a copy is to leave a comment below. Share your thoughts about the video, or tell us one thing you once believed to be impossible that you have since discovered is possible.

Find Out More

If you would like to learn more about Bill Strickland, see also:

• BillStrickland.org
• Manchester Bidwell
• TED Speakers: Bill Strickland

An interesting product I’ve been using for the past several months is the Paraliminals series from Learning Strategies. The best way to describe Paraliminals is a combination of guided meditation and neuro-linguistic programming. It’s best experienced with stereo head phones because it works by playing two different audio tracks simultaneously.

The experience is difficult to explain, but the two soundtracks compliment each other in such a way that it’s impossible to concentrate on either but your brain is able to absorb both. One voice usually tells a story, relevant to the theme of the session while the other repeats affirmative messages. The sessions cover a wide range of self improvement topics, including health, relationships, personal charisma, and motivation.

Behind the audible voice tracks are soothing nature sounds accompanied by binaural beats. The real power of the program is the binaural beats, which work by using two complimentary frequencies that interfere with each other to create pulsating phantom frequencies.

The beats affect brainwave patterns and help bring the mind to a state of focused relaxation. If you’ve ever used a guided relaxation program, where the instructor takes you through the process of relaxing each part of the body, then you’ll recognize the feeling of your body being totally relaxed while the mind remains alert.

The benefit of Paraliminals is that it allows you to reach this state much more quickly and helps to block out distractions. I’ve found myself using Paraliminals as a substitute for naps.

Instead of going to sleep and waking up groggy, I lay down for 20 minutes and listen to one of the CDs. There are a wide range of topics covered in the Ultimate You series, so I can usually find something that matches my goals for the near future. After listening to the program I get up relaxed, refreshed, and motivated to take action.

Does It Work?

I don’t think anyone is silly enough to believe that listening to a CD will somehow take the work out of success. If you approach Paraliminals with this attitude then you’ll probably be disappointed. That being said, I think those who have a strong desire to bring about positive improvements will find Paraliminals to be a helpful tool.

The biggest benefit that I’ve experienced with the program is the ability to reach focused relaxation in a matter of minutes. Instead of having to find an isolated place and exert effort to clear my mind, Paraliminals puts the process on autopilot. I can just lay back and listen.

If you’re interested in learning more, I’ve put together a page with more information about my experience with Paraliminals. I’ve also gone to the trouble of negotiating a significant discount, available only to PickTheBrain readers. Check out the Paraliminals page for all the details.

Some of you might recall when PickTheBrain first mentioned Happier, after Tal-Ben Shahar’s appearance on The Daily Show a few months back. It was exciting to see that self improvement is spreading to Harvard classrooms and being legitimized by academia and the mainstream media.

After finally finishing the book, my overall impression is a good one. Although I wouldn’t put it in the same league as The Magic of Thinking Big, it is definitely a worthwhile book that introduced me to some new ideas and gave me a lot to think about.

Structure and Content

Happier is divided into 3 main parts. The first asks the question, ‘what is happiness?’ and goes about trying to answer it. Shahar groups most people into 3 mindsets:

• The Rat Racer: This group works constantly for the future, but in pursuit of wealth and success fails to enjoy the present.
• The Hedonist: This group lives in pursuit of physical pleasure and in avoidance of pain. By living only for the superficial, they aren’t able to find any meaning in life.
• The Nihilist: This group holds the opinion that sustainable happiness isn’t possible. If you’ll never be happy, there’s no point in trying.

Personally I’ve grappled which of these mindsets at different times, so it was helpful to have each of them explained. Shahar contends that each of these mindsets is fundamentally flawed, and that there is a happy balance where meaning and pleasure can both be combined.

The second part of the book deals with happiness applied to education, the workplace, and relationships. The book provides numerous helpful suggestions for balancing challenge and anxiety so you can find meaning without inflicting unnecessary pain on yourself. Each chapter also contains questions that prompt the reader to evaluate their personal situation as they go along.

The third part of the book is called meditations on happiness. Each chapter is a reflection on a particular aspect of happiness that aims to encourage the reader to embrace it. There are 7 meditations in all:

1. Self-Interest and Benevolence
2. Happiness Boosters
3. Beyond the Temporary High
4. Letting Our Light Shine
5. Imagine
6. Take Your Time
7. The Happiness Revolution

I found this section to be the most substantial and interesting of the entire book. This is where Shahar opens up and provides his most inspiring reflections on the nature of happiness and how we can bring more of it to our lives.

Final Thoughts

Overall, Happier is an enjoyable and well written book. It contains a diverse range of information from academic and non-academic sources and the exercises that conclude each chapter make it easy to involve yourself with the content.

The book feels like a college course and this has it’s pros and cons. The benefit is that it’s interesting to imagine yourself as a student at Harvard moving through the course as the semester progresses. The downside is that the book lacks a conversational feel. Instead an intimate conversation with Shahar, it feels distant, like you’re hearing him lecture from a podium. There is also a slight over-reliance on quotations that occassionally interrupts the flow of the book. Although the chosen quotes are interesting, sometimes I felt myself wishing Shahar would use his own words.

Despite these minor flaws, Happier is still a must read for anyone interested in becoming a little bit, well, happier. It’s extremely interesting to see pyschology and self improvement merge into a new genre that captures the best parts of both. If anyone else has read the book, I’d love to hear your thoughts.

A wise man is the master of his own mind
A fool is a slave to his
-Publilius Syrus

David Schwartz uses the above quote to close his classic work, The Magic of Thinking Big. It’s an excellent summary of the book’s contents.

The focus of The Magic of Thinking Big is the different thought patterns that repeatedly lead to success. It explains how your mind works and how you can harness it to achieve success instead of allowing it to torture you.

This isn’t another batch of quick fixes, Schwartz was a PhD and Professor of Psychology and Georgia State University. His advice is rooted in psychology and personal experience and he draws on an enormous number of practical anecdotes to illustrate his points.

I’m going to come right out and say that I love this book. It isn’t just one the best self improvement books I’ve read, it’s one of the best books period. Schwartz is a skilled writer and his prose is a pleasure to read. Perhaps because the book was published over 50 years ago, it lacks the fast food information feel of many modern books.

To give you an idea of the contents, here are brief summaries of a few chapters and aspects I found most valuable.

Believe You Can Succeed and You Will

The first chapter starts off by explaining the book’s central princpal, the importance positive beliefs. In order to accomplish anything you need to believe first that it’s possible. Most people never really believe in themselves, and as a result, they never get far. The moment you truly believe that you will succeed, your mind starts to think of ways to get there.

Cure Yourself of Excusitis

The next chapter deals with the common excuses people make and how you can break the habit of making them yourself. According to Schwartz, the top three types of excusitis are age (I’m too old/young), health (I don’t have the energy), and lack of intelligence (I’m not smart enough). This section illuminated the pattern of excuses I’ve used in the past and made me see why they don’t hold any weight.

How to Think and Dream Creatively

In this chapter, Schwartz examines the different mindsets that lead to creative thinking and how you can use them to solve problems. When facing a problem, start with believing it can be done. Don’t allow tradition to paralyze your mind. Always think progressively: how can we make it better?

Think Right Toward People

Although most of the book is inward focused, this chapter deals with the way you think and act towards other people. I found it to be one of the most valuable of all, and it frequently influences the way I view my day-to-day interactions with other people.

Schwartz advocates being extremely friendly and always taking the iniative to form a new relationship. He condemns gossip and other forms of negative language, and recommends listening to other people and respecting their right to be different.

How to Think Like a Leader

In the final chapter, Schwartz discusses the characteristics that make great leaders. He breaks it down to a few essential ways of thinking:

• Trading minds with the people you deal with
• Applying kindness to every situation
• Constantly thinking progressively
• Using solitude to tap your inner creative giant

To be honest, this book contains so much helpful information that I could write about it for weeks, dedicating an entire post to each chapter. Another useful feature is that each chapter ends with a brief summary of all the important points. There are also interactive thinking exercises that encourage you to apply the principles to your own situation.

Because of the way it can impact your perspective on beliefs, goals, and success, this is a book everyone should read. If you’ve ever battled self doubt and hopelessness, this book will help you understand those thoughts and provide help in on overcoming them.

If you don’t feel like ordering a copy off Amazon, then at least go borrow one from your public library. Time and money invested in this book will more than pay for itself.

• What books have influenced your thought the most?
• What books have changed your life?
• What books do you strongly recommend to others?

I’m really interested in the results. This should be great for building a killer reading list.

Note: Rather than doing a straight review of The 4 Hour Work Week (I’m sure you’ve read a few already) I’ve compiled some suggestions for how to apply the information it contains.

When Tim Ferriss came out with the promise of the The 4-Hour work Week you probably scoffed, “Impossible! Who does this guy think he is, tearing down our cultural institutions and promoting delusions of world travel and perpetual semi-retirement!” This was natural. All new ideas are initially resisted. It’s hard to accept a concept that radically opposes everything you’ve been taught about money, employment, and the ideal lifestyle. The book prompted me reevaluate my direction, and from what I’ve read, it had the same effect on many others.

Now that we’ve had time to digest the ideas, the powerful logic behind The 4-Hour work Week is impossible to ignore. Who wouldn’t want to trade those monotonous days under neon lights in a beige windowless room for a backpacking trip through the Alps or a crash course in SCUBA diving? If it’s so easy to automate income and join the New Rich, why not me too?

Unfortunately, going from a steady office job to New Rich is easier said than done. Even when you understand the concepts of The 4-Hour work Week, there is still the practical business of developing an income stream, testing, automating, and scaling to the point where you can support your ideal lifestyle with room to spare. These changes don’t happen overnight, and for first time entrepreneurs, building a business from scratch is an intimidating task. Most of us have rent and other expenses that require a steady income stream. We can’t afford to walk away from our day jobs without anything to fall back on.

Although we can’t join the New Rich today, a 4 hour work week is attainable. The beauty of the idea is that automated income can be developed on the side. If you plan on keeping your job, you don’t even have to do that much. A 4 hour work week is easier said than done, but following these simple recommendations will put you on the path to reaching your goal.

1. Develop Time Management Skills

The ability to process information quickly and effectively is the cornerstone of the 4 hour work week. Unfortunately, the typical office job trains you to do exactly the opposite. Everyone needs to look busy for 8 hours a day, so there isn’t any motivation to work efficiently. Simple tasks tend to drag on for hours and distractions are a welcome break from the monotony.

To join the New Rich you’ll need to break out of this mindset and master time management. A great place to start is batching. Instead of letting email be a constant interruption, close Outlook (trust me, it can be done) and only open it at specific times during the day. You’ll find plowing through 20-30 emails at once is exponentially faster than answering one at a time. The concept of batching can be applied to any group of similar tasks. Your biggest problem will be figuring out how to use all the spare time.

2. Investigate Niche Markets

By far, the biggest obstacle to a four hour work week is creating an automatable moneymaker, or as Tim calls it, finding the Muse. No one can tell you exactly how to do this because every person and every opportunity is unique. For someone with no entrepreneurial experience it seems impossible.

Fortunately, the book provides a framework for finding a niche market, testing it for profitability, and launching your product. If you’re interested in doing this, you need to read the book. The process is far too detailed to explain here, but the first step is brainstorming a niche.

To create a profitable business, you’ll need to solve an existing problem and reach people who need that problem solved. The best place to start is targeting people similar to yourself because you’re able understand their needs. What type of specialized knowledge do you possess? What social groups do you belong to? What past problems have you overcome? Turning these questions into a successful business won’t be easy, but the sooner you start investigating niche markets the more likely you’ll find a golden opportunity.

3. Build a Cash Reserve

Although launching a small business doesn’t require millions of dollars, it is a significant investment. Market testing, product development, manufacturing, and advertising all cost money. You can rack up thousands of dollars in credit card debt (like Tim did), but building up a cash reserve to draw from is a safer alternative.

What this comes down to is prioritizing your expenses. Would you rather eat out a few times a week, or cook at home and invest the money you save in creating your ideal lifestyle? When you think about it this way the choice is easy. Those fancy restaurants, expensive gadgets, and other superfluous luxuries quickly lose their appeal.

4. Become a Superstar Employee

You’re probably thinking, “How does this make sense? I thought the idea was to ditch the day job?” Oddly enough, becoming a better employee can help achieve this objective. If you don’t plan to leave your job this is the most important step. You need to make yourself as valuable as possible to your employer so that when you attempt to negotiate a remote work arrangement, giving you what you want will be more appealing than losing you to a competitor.

This is also important for aspiring entrepreneurs. Even if you don’t want to be an employee forever, sulking around the office won’t get you anywhere. I’m not suggesting you start putting in 14 hour days, but why not make the best of the situation? Becoming a great employee will help you develop excellent work habits, make connections you can leverage down the road, and allow you to learn what works and what doesn’t work when running a business.

5. Make use of your spare time

Above all, this is the most important point. A 4 hour work week isn’t going to build itself. Creating your ideal lifestyle will require an enormous effort with many failures along the way. There’s a reason most people work 40 hour weeks – sticking with the status quo is easy. You don’t have to do anything except show up and do a good enough job not to get fired.

What it comes down to is desire. How bad you want the life of your dreams? Are you willing to sacrifice every moment of your spare time in the present in order to liberate yourself in the future? This appears to be an easy choice, but implementing it is difficult. You’ll need to delay gratification for months, maybe years, until your hard work comes to fruition.

By writing The 4-Hour work Week, Tim has given us the blueprint to the ideal lifestyle. The rest falls on our shoulders. Can you put off enjoying your life until retirement? This is a choice everyone makes whether they are conscious of it or not. Now that you know working 40+ hours a week into your 60’s isn’t the only alternative, what are you going to do about it?