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 Let me preface this with, I am not a reader, I won’t make myself out to be one. Reading Maxim or some other men’s magazine and occasionally my local newspaper are about as out there as my reading goes in the traditional sense. I do read a lot of blogs, hell that’s part of the reason I started this one, so I could bitch and complain about them. In any event, I often find myself craving more knowledge, and reading is somewhat relaxing for me, it’s something I’m trying to work into my not so busy schedule, part of trying to make a better me. Now that I’m done with the touch feely new age crap, onto the review!
Reading some blog over the weekend, sadly I honestly don’t recall which one, was an authors 5 books worth reading. One looked really interesting, The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick) by Seth Godin. Looks interesting, catchy title and a two sentence review on the book had me hooked. Being the lazy person I am and not wanting to head to the local bookstore to shell out a ton of cash, I search online for it. Then a thought came to me, let’s see if they have this as an audio book. Sure as shit, I find me a copy and started to download it.
Audio books kind of fascinate me; it is all the work of reading yet none of the sleepiness that comes along with it, for me at least. Added to the fact that I finally have my iPod hooked up in my car, what a great way to kill some time in my commute to work. So honestly, this isn’t a true book report in that I didn’t read the book, I listened to it. In any event, I did take some good from the words and I do plan to buy a print copy since the audio version I listened to was abridged.
Seth definitely tries to make this a somewhat uplifting book meant to provoke inner thoughts of change and force you to improve yourself by answering a couple simple questions. One of the things that caught my attention was that quitting is not always a bad idea. Seth quotes a very famous line from well known, loved and respected football coach and inspirational speaker that I’m sure we’ve all heard, Vince Lombardi’s, Winners never quit and quitters never win. Back in high school I remember a teacher showing a Lombardi video and hearing that in his speech, but what was Seth trying to get across?
He points out that quitting isn’t always bad, most of the time it is good, in nearly all aspects of life, jobs and relationships. One point he makes is that quitting the fast food job you had when you were 16 was probably a smart move. This is where the dip comes into play. Honestly, I need to read the book because I still don’t fully grasp it, but the dip is the deciding factor in when quitting is a positive or negative choice to make. When the dip is too big, or the reward is too far away, quitting is the best answer.
The audio book is about 90 minutes long, I blew through it in two days driving back and forth to work, the book itself is only 80 pages, I figure I should be able to breeze through it in less than a week, even at a snails pace. One thing I was really concerned with was that this was going to try to make me feel all warm and fuzzy inside, it doesn’t. The book makes the point that quitting your job now forces you to do something, to take action, same goes with a relationship. It is about making that choice to quite that is toughest for most of us.
Seth Godin also has a personal blog which has some pretty good content; I’ve added it to my RSS feed so expect to see me pulling some info from that sooner or later. It can be viewed at: http://sethgodin.typepad.com/
His book can be purchased through Amazon.com here: The Dip: A Little Book That Teaches You When to Quit (and When to Stick)
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