A Tough Critic

Almost all Fluffy stories, barely anything actionable

Revisado: 08-10-21

If you want to listen to lots of stories told in an ornate, fictionalized-style manner, then this is the book for you.

But if you want to get to the point and hear actionable advice and strategies, this is not for you.

The latter is very sparse and hard to come by. I would say this book is basically nonfiction narrative mixed with philosophical musings about success.

Not for me.

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Full of bromides and generic advice

Revisado: 03-03-21

Replete with wisdom such as "Be assertive" or "be patient" etc etc and so on. The techniques taught are mostly common sense broad advice like that. Frankly, it was so irritating I couldn't listen to it all.

May be helpful to some people who've never explored conflict resolution before, but someone more advanced and looking for powerful, concrete techniques.

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Not helpful for me. More theory than action

Revisado: 10-19-20

Most of this book is filled with long, dialogue-based examples of boundary-breaking interactions, and then analyses each of them, and explain why they are boundary violations. A small percentage of the book actually provides actionable, immediate and simple tools to start building boundaries.

The cumulative effective of this book, therefore, is a deeper understanding of boundaries and the contexts where they happen, which is helpful, but it still does not enable you to effectively handle your next 5, 10 or 20 boundary violation situations. In such situations, you may analyze them in the aftermath and then realize, hey, that was a boundary violation just like the book explained. You are maybe better at analysis in such a manner, but no better at being able to immediately recognize and quickly fend of boundary violations. This book simply does not focus on such tools.

So, if theory and deeper context and some motivation is what you'd like, this book is for you.

However, if what you want are immediately effectively toolbox of particular phrases, say, to memorize and use, and other immediately actionable tips, this book doesn't really have them. Or, if it does, the tools get lost under the sea of theory and analysis.

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esto le resultó útil a 3 personas

Actionable helpful advice

Revisado: 10-17-20

This is one of those rare books that does not dwell on theory or motivation but cuts to the chase and shows you how to handle situations and change ones overall approach to human interactions.

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Scant practical responses

Revisado: 08-09-20

This book is all about 1: convincing you to be more No oriented and 2: getting you to become aware how No oriented you are.

It does not provide any meaningful practical examples or canned responses etc.

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esto le resultó útil a 1 persona

Content is good but distracting sibilant sounds

Revisado: 06-13-20

Good book. it is a mix of CBT and mindfulness.

The narrator is very good except the sound mix has allowed the narrator’s silibant sounds for “t” are so incredibly loud and jarring it sounds like a high pitched whistle when he enunciates words that end in “t”. Quite jarring and difficult to listen fully.

The audio engineers who worked on this should have minimized this.

I can only listen to this on a device that has equalizer controls so I can turn down the high pitch sounds very low.

Otherwise the narrator was great.

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esto le resultó útil a 5 personas

Motivation and analysis. Not a How-To

Revisado: 05-02-20

It’s a book to try to convince you of assertiveness. Tried to teach you the mindset of assertiveness, I suppose.

But Very scant on practical how to. What to say. When to say it. Etc.

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For detailed polishing, not for initial draft

Revisado: 09-25-18

This book didn't help me write my first draft - yet. It's not good in the early to middle stage of your writing. It seems to be helpful at the very late stages of detailed polishing.

For instance the author gives lots of recommendations on how particular lines can be rewritten more effectively. He doesn't give high level help, with outlining, or story arcs, character arcs, etc. It's the sort of advice that's good if you're ready to go thick in the weeds, very low to the ground, and hash out minutiae and details.

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Update: downgrade due to bad credibility

Revisado: 09-12-16

I rated this book highly. That is, until I learned a few months back that Howard Schultz lied about his childhood and upbringing. He was raised firmly in a middle class to upper-middle class background while in the book he makes it a point to talk about his impoverished upbringing. That and the platform he was trying to stand on when he was interested in running for President put me off. Now I can't believe much of the book.
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It's not my top 5 business biography but it's very good. The reader did an excellent job and was pleasant to listen to

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