Category: Book Reviews

The Power of Attitude

by Mac Anderson

 

– Attitude is everything.

– Destiny is not a matter of chance, it is a matter of choice.

– Your happiness and success is determined by your attitude and that affects both you and everyone around you.

– Attitudes are contagious and we have to ask if we want our attitude shared with others.

– The only thing that stands between someone and their dreams is the will to try and the faith to see it through.

– You become what you think about

– First we make our attitudes and then our attitudes make us – Dennis Waitley

– If we choose to think positive thoughts, we will get positive results; if we choose to think negative thoughts then we will get negative results.

– Smile is a light on your face letting someone know that you are home.

– A positive attitude touches more people than you will know.

– Laugh loud and laugh often. Laughter is to the soul what soap is to the body. It can affect our brain and immune system in multiple ways.

– Decide you will never ever give up.

– Treat all people like humans, it does not matter what position or how much money they have.

– Manage stress before it manages you.

– Exercise will help you with stress. Stress is built up in energy and you must use that somewhere.

– Quiet time to think and meditate will help with stress.

– Anger and bitterness are like a cancer and if you do not treat it, it will put a ceiling on your life that will not let you go any higher.

– Forgiveness is the key that will allows the heavy weight that ties handcuffs to be released.

– You cannot live a life of comparing, it is always seeking more because it will never satisfy you.

– Do not focus on the critical, significant few.

– We should learn to be like a child and not take ourselves so seriously.

– Humility is not an act but an attitude; caring for and thinking more of others than you do yourself.

– The measure of a great man is how he measures a lesser man than himself

– The question is not if you will have fear but how you act when fear comes your way.

– Your imagination is what hold most people back.

– If you were to read 30 minutes every night, you would very quickly become knowledgeable in so many areas.

– Surround yourself with people who love and it will make all the difference in the world to you.

– You become what you think about – Earl Nightingale

– Your success in life is not determined by the failures or setbacks that you face but by how you react to them.

– Whatever does not kill us can make us stronger.

– We cannot change the past or circumstances, but we can have the right attitude.

– Life is 10% what happens to us and 90% how we react to it.

– We are in charge of our attitudes.

– Find the right mentor and it will change your life in many positive ways.

– You have to be before you do – don’t just make a living, make a life. You have to love and enjoy what you are doing or you will not be happy.

– One study said that 53% of Americans are not happy with the work they have. You must enjoy what you are doing in order to be happy. You cannot fake passion.

– Finding your reason for being can make you unstoppable.

– Attitudes are truly contagious, so decided today to make your attitude a worthy one to be caught.

– Attitudes are nothing more than thoughts and those thoughts come from habits, so start having the right habits.

The Positive Dog

by Jon Gordon

 

– Benefits of being positive:

1. Positive people outlive negative people.

2. A positive environment is much easier and better to work at.

3. Positive sales people sell more than pessimistic salesmen.

4. Positive leaders are able to make better decisions under pressure.

5. Marriages are more likely to survive when a couple uses 5 to 1 ratio of positive words rather than 1 to 1.

6. Positive people face problems with a positive outlook and are more healthy and likely to get through problems.

7. Positive people have a broader perspective and can see the big picture whereas negative people have a more narrow perspective and cannot see but one piece.

8. Positive thoughts and emotions counter negative thoughts and emotions. You cannot be positive and stressed at the same time.

9. Positive thoughts help athletes perform at a higher level.

10. Positive people have more friends which equals longevity in life as well as happiness.

11. Positive leaders are more likely to have followers, pay raises, and more success than those that are not positive.

 

– The cost of being negative:

1. 90% of doctors visits are connected to stress.

2. Negative employees scare off for good more customers.

3. At work, too many negative interactions can hurt the cause of the team.

4. Activity affects the morale, performance and effectiveness of a team.

5. A negative person can create a miserable office environment for everybody else.

6. One study shows that 90% of anxiety at work is created by the 5% of negative people at work.

7. Negative emotions are connected to shorter lifespan.

8. Negative emotions increase the chances of heart attacks and strokes.

9. Negativity is associated with worse health, more anxiety and less strength.

10. Negative people have fewer friends.

 

– We don’t base life off of reality rather off of our perspective of reality

– Practice gratitude every day and you will see the world through eyes of gratitude.

– How you define the world is how you see the world.

– Change your words and it will change your outlook:

• Say you get to instead of have to.

• Say blessed instead of stressed. Name three things you are thankful for the feel stressed it will change the way you feel.

• Turn complaints into solutions. Tell yourself that you will not complain unless you find one or two solutions to your complaints. Turn every negative situation into something positive.

– Feed the positive dog instead of the negative dog.

– Choose faith instead of fear. Anger, jealousy, and complaining are all rooted in fear. The antidote to fear is faith. Fear and faith both believe in the future, but fear believes in a negative future and faith believes in a positive future.

– Faith will help you turn challenges into opportunities.

– Challenges can make you better or worse. But the challenges can become fortune, not misfortune.

– Meditation and prayer reduce stress and give health and longevity.

– When you are positive, you are not the only one that benefits, everyone around you benefits from your positivity.

– Positive energy is contagious.

– If you’re negative, you impact people around you in a negative way but if you’re positive you impact people around you in a positive way.

– Each day you can choose whether to be a germ and infect people in a negative way or be vitamin C and impact them in a positive way.

– Kindness Feeds others. When you feed others, you are also feeding yourself. Other people need your kindness — kind action, kind word and positive attitude.

– Encourage others and speak into the lives of others. People need your encouragement.

The Passionate Preaching of Martyn-Lloyd Jones

by Steven Lawson

 

– He was a doctor but realized that he was fixing bodies to send them back to the world where they would just die, so he decided to become a preacher. News spread like wild fire that he left the medical field, people did not understand why he would give up such a good career to be just another preacher. He said that those people did not understand what the Gospel could do.

– A God-called man would rather die if he cannot preach.

– Jones said that no seminary could make a man of God, only God could do that.

– He read two chapters in the morning and two chapters in the evening of the Bible. He knew the Bible so well that people called him the walking Bible.

– He believed it was his job to declare the Bible, not defend the Bible; he was a preacher, not an apologist.

– The essential role of the preacher is to make the Bible come alive to the people.

– The preacher is to be a persuader, making people want to come to Christ.

– You’re not preparing a sermon for doctors and professors but for every kind of person that is in the congregation. Be practical, remember the people who you are preaching to.

– Information starts at the intellect, but preaching starts at the heart.

– The sermon must be clear to the one in the pulpit if it is to be understood by the ones in the pews.

– Just as in the Old Testament the wood had to be cut and gathered before placed on fire for a sacrifice, so it must happen with preaching – the pastor must prepare his message and then take it to the pulpit so that God can set it on fire. Jones believed that God would bless sermon preparation, not the lack of it.

The One Minute Negotiator

by Don Hutson

 

– Tough times do not endure, but tough people do.

– You can always learn new things if you are willing.

– To generate change, we sometimes have to be slapped in the face.

– Our past is a result of the decisions we have made and the future is made up of our choices today and those to come.

– Life presents us with many learning opportunities, if we ignore them we are choosing our own obsolescence.

The New Strong-Willed Child

by James Dobson

 

– Children can and will be defiant towards their parents, but we have to remember that this is nothing new since Adam and Eve did the same thing with God.

– If there are multiple children in the household, one is likely to be defiant and the other compliant. Why this works out this way no one knows, but it is usually the case.

– If the strong-willed child’s will is not brought under subjection as a child, he/she will only bring more trouble and later be subjected in a harsher way.

– To a degree, children see their parental authority as they will see God’s authority. They must learn to obey authority.

– Distinguish boundaries of what is permitted and not permitted for the child.

– The will (them wanting to get their own way) must be broken without breaking their spirit.

– The will must be guided, shaped and brought under the parental subjection.

– Be very careful with your words (comparing your children, saying they are dumb, fat, lazy, not smart, etc.) because a child’s will can be broken by a parents words.

– If you say something to your children that can hurt them, be quick to apologize and mend things.

– You do not need anger to control children, you do need strategic action.

– Discipline is important, but discipline in love is more important.

– Spanking should not be enforced on impulse or when a parent is out of control.

– Spanking should be used for the purpose of teaching in love, never in or for revenge or hatred.

– Spanking should always be done in private and not in public.

– Spanking should be followed up by an embrace and reassurance of the parent’s love.

– Spanking should happen after the warning was given and the child knows it is coming as a result of disobedience.

– Middle school time is one of the most difficult times for a young person. Parents need to be there for children at every stage in life, but especially this one.

– Love means freedom. A relationship where someone holds the loved one so close will, will end up in losing them. Our God could force us to serve him but he gives us freedom. So we as parents must allow our children freedom and not try to hold them so tight.

– Bathe our kids in prayer every day. We cannot raise our children alone.

The New Rules for Love, Sex, and Dating

by Andy Stanley

 

– Start living like the person that you want to marry. Do you have all the qualities and characteristics of the person that you yourself are trying to look for in a mate?

– Become a person that the person you are looking for is looking for.

– Instead of working so hard on looking, work hard on becoming the right person.

– Your relationships will never be any healthier than you are.

– If you cannot learn self-control right now, you will not do it later on when you get married. The only thing that changes when you get married is a last name, not your habits.

– Most guys think that when they meet the right body, they will have no more need for the artificial body (by looking at porn and lusting over girls), but that is not true. If anything, it will only accelerate your desire and need.

– Porn is not a past-time, it is a pathway – a pathway to destruction! It destroys relationships, marriages, thought patterns, behaviors and expectations.

– You should know that your sexual decisions before you get married will affect your sexual decisions after you get married.

– Purity now paves the way for intimacy later. Sex is more than just physical.

– Sexual sins is like no other sin; not because it’s unforgivable or more wicked than others, but because it is against your own body. Jesus did not say this because he will not forgive you, but because it brings so many problems, scars, regrets and pains to your life.

– Practice makes perfect does not apply to sex. It undermines intimacy!

– Every time you say no, you’re saying yes: yes to a better future, yes to purity, yes to a better you, yes to intimacy, and yes to trust

The Leader in You

by Dale Carnegie

 

– You cannot lead by directive, you must leave by influence.

– The ability to communicate with people is essential in leadership. It’s what turns a good idea into a great idea, it’s what ignites people.

– People will not listen to what you have to say unless you have a sincere interest.

– Treat people as if they are smart and capable and then get out of their way – that will get the job done. Respect them and appreciate their work.

– Making someone feel important is not a one time thing, it is several little small things such as returning a phone call, remembering their name, thanking them, etc.

– Good listening is key to affective communication.

– Good listening is better than speaking other languages or knowing all about every subject.

– No one could possibly know everything. Listening to others is the single most important thing in learning.

– No one is more persuasive than a good listener. You almost never forget a good listener when you meet one.

– Good leaders talk in plural, how we need, how we accomplished, etc. People need to feel like their contributions are important.

– Share the glory but always accept the blame.

– Criticize your mistakes before anyone else gets an opportunity to do it.

– Think twice before you criticize or blame.

– If you do have to criticize, walk softly and do not bring along a big stick. Praise first and then critique a kind way.

– If you are shouting for arguing with someone you have already lost.

– Be quick to admit mistakes and slow to criticize

– Set goals, they give us something to shoot for and look towards. Without goals, it is easy to drift. A goal is a dream with a deadline.

– Patience and perseverance will accomplish more in this world than a fast run at something.

– Having a goal is important but is only half of it; the other half is discipline and focus.

– Leaders do not lose focus, they keep their focus.

– Consistently high-performance comes from a balance of both hard work and leisure. You have to have both to continue for a long time.

– When something is going on and you are worried, you have to ask yourself how much it’s worth. Is it worth losing a night sleep, a week of anxiety, etc.? Very few things are worth worrying so much about. Keep things in perspective.

– Instead of worrying so much, ask yourself what the reality of this coming to pass. Next, what is the worst case scenario if this happens. And lastly, what can you do to fix or help the situation.

– There are very few motivators as a positive, upbeat attitude.

– The way to be enthusiastic is to believe in what you are doing and believe in yourself that you can do it.

– True enthusiasm is made up of both eagerness and assurance.

The Intimate Marriage

by RC Sproul

 

– Why do we have marriage? Is it just some traditional thing that we do. Marriage was created, ordained and instituted by God, not by man.

– Marriage is one of the greatest institutions created, but is also one of the most dangerous. Marriage is where you can have the greatest happiness as well as have the greatest disappointments, most frustration and most pain.

– They were naked and unashamed. Nakedness is usually equated with shame – no one wants to be naked in front of others. Yet God sees us naked and still loves us. The only place that nakedness is not a shame is in the bond of marriage.

– You can be naked in your marriage in every way – should never humiliate each other, rather totally open. The clothes are off because you have nothing to hide.

– The Bible many times uses the phrase “to know” as to have sex with… not because the Bible is avoiding the word sex, but because intimacy is truly knowing someone.

– You can impress someone by putting on cologne, looking macho or dressing nicely, but what will they think of you when they truly know you. Marriage is truly knowing someone. When dating, you only think you know someone, but in marriage you really get to know the person. Intimacy takes place when you truly know someone.

– Marriage cannot be sustained by feelings, you must have knowledge… we must get to know our spouse.

– To have knowledge, to get to know something, we must study it.

– Two reasons why people cannot have sex with their spouse (although we try to call it impotency or fidgety, etc.)

1. Fear Fear of performance. But the more you demonstrate love, the fear vanishes. Perfect love cast out all fear according to I John 4:18. Fear of being hurt physically – some women have been abused as children or even raped. (Some husbands may be tough, but not tender.)

2. Fear of discovery – that your kids will walk in, no privacy, etc. Fear of pregnancy We need to communicate to find out what each other are afraid of, we should never force our spouse to do something they do not want to do.

3. Guilt – of past sins, etc. We must get rid of guilt.

 

– The three biggest enemies of harmony in marriage, according to secular psychologist, are: sex, money and interferences of in-laws.

– Words or disregarding remarks are a great destroyer of marriages.

– The book of Song of Solomon is filled with complements between spouses. The tongue and usage of words is very important in marriage.

– The book of James says that the most destructive member of the body is the tongue. With it we bless God and curse man.

– We say that sticks and stones may break our bones but words will never hurt us, but that is a lie. We can break an arm and heal, but the words cut deeper and hurt us.

– When first married, you went out of your way to cherish your wife, and your words were one of the biggest ways you did that… and you still can and should do that. What you say with your mouth will reveal how much cherish your wife.

– There are certain things that we cannot take back – a flying arrow, etc. And in that list is a spoken word. We may say something and then say we should not have said it, but it is too late. Think before you speak.

– Psychologist say that it takes 9 complements to outweigh 1 criticism.

– As Christ is preparing to present his bride unblemished & perfect to God, so should a husband with his bride – not with bruises, or marred up, but perfect.

– We are to love our wife as we do our own body, to love and cherish her – that is my job, to love and cherish her.