Po bronson what should i do

An award-winning team of journalists, designers, and videographers who tell brand stories through Fast Company's distinctive lens. The future of innovation and technology in government for the greater good. Leaders who are shaping the future of business in creative ways. New workplaces, new food sources, new medicine--even an entirely new economic system.

My wife was pregnant, the TV series I was writing for in L. It helped me relate to the story of others, who were in search of themselves through the search for meaningful work. A blank, non-specific urge. That's how it starts. Tell us what you like and we'll recommend books you'll love. Sign up and get a free ebook! Read by Po Bronson. Abridged Audio Download.

About The Book. About The Author. Po Bronson. About The Reader. Lots of parents have asked me for help in talking to their children, and so I'll pass this request back to you readers - I'd love to hear some stories about how parents helped their child figure this out after they struggled. Special thanks to Oprah Winfrey and her team, who put me on for an hour with others from the book.

Oh, and in the chapter about my first job, I mention our greeting cards. Here's a sample of four. Business is a tool to support what you believe in. Keep in mind even what you can't define. It is never too late to start over. Mar 01, Darryn rated it did not like it. Only read a couple chapters of this book but it was enough to make me want to put it down and stop reading which I rarely do. What really blew me away was the extent to which his narrative and commentary overrides the stories he claims to be presenting.

In Chapter two, he tells a story of a woman who chooses to remain unemployed in the hopes of holding out for her dream career. He discusses his frustration with this conversation, pointing out his "male need to fix things and the female need to Only read a couple chapters of this book but it was enough to make me want to put it down and stop reading which I rarely do. He discusses his frustration with this conversation, pointing out his "male need to fix things and the female need to listen" I'm paraphrasing , which was a huge turnoff sex stereotypes, much?

Then, he proceeds to explain how he thinks the woman is making a mistake by not accepting a job offered to her, and how according to his pseudo-psychological assessment the reason she's not taking it is because it would involve delving into the trauma of the past.

Is Po a psychologist? Is he a sociologist? Sorry, Po. Let the subjects speak for themselves. We'll learn much more from them than we will from your wanna-be analyses. View 1 comment. Jan 07, Mike rated it it was ok Shelves: non-fiction , biography , jobs-vocations-etc , z-read-in , thes-i-e This was very disappointing overall. This should have been interesting, given the premise and how extensively the author sought out people with interesting stories about their work lives he set up a website and heavily marketed it, and even became sort of a job counselor and marriage counselor and life counselor to all kinds of people in the process of meeting these people and compiling these stories--many of the people he interviewed initially got in touch with him to seek his guidance and cou This was very disappointing overall.

This should have been interesting, given the premise and how extensively the author sought out people with interesting stories about their work lives he set up a website and heavily marketed it, and even became sort of a job counselor and marriage counselor and life counselor to all kinds of people in the process of meeting these people and compiling these stories--many of the people he interviewed initially got in touch with him to seek his guidance and counseling, apparently, and as you'll see if you read this, he offers lots of counseling to almost everyone he interviews.

That was probably the most annoying aspect of this book: all of the author's silly interjections of his own thoughts and his own confusion about what life is all about, etc. The author doesn't seem to know how tell a life story without interjecting his own life story into it, which I found very annoying. There are 57 miniature biographies in here, and although a few of them were interesting all the way through, most started out promising and then quickly sank into a morass of the author's feelings about the subject and other kinds of digressions from the story.

I've never read anything else by this guy unless I've read magazine articles by him, which is very likely, I guess , but he doesn't seem like a good writer at all. At least not a good biographer. Maybe he's a good fiction writer--I'll certainly check out one of his novels now out of curiosity.

He's also apparently a very savvy marketer and book trade expert. I don't know if that has anything to do with the huge commercial success of this book, and all the time it spent on various bestseller lists, etc.

Hardly a blockbuster among goodreads readers. Here are the stories that I did like: --The lottery winner about a Yale graduate who became a teacher in an entrepreneurial inner-city school, and the best story in the book as far as I was concerned --A billion is chump change the author's own story of how he quit bond sales to become a writer --A fragile blow about a guy who quits a Ph. Sep 12, Judy rated it liked it.

Apr 02, Benjamin rated it it was amazing Recommends it for: everybody. Recommended to Benjamin by: Adam. I love this book because it is an honest book.

Po Bronson interviews hundreds of people and tells you a handful of compelling stories and does not try to fit it all into a Sing I remember the first time I saw a book titled "What Should I Do With My Life? Po Bronson interviews hundreds of people and tells you a handful of compelling stories and does not try to fit it all into a Single Unified Theory of Life.

He points out the patterns that emerged but doesn't force anecdotes to become life lessons. On a topic where so many authors want to come up with a system to explain it all, Bronson simply gathers evidence and presents it.

Because of that, the book contains real truth. I recently re-read the book in February but first read it a few years ago. In that time I've probably loaned or given a copy of this book to a dozen people. I can't say that about any other book I've read. Aug 02, M. Soriano rated it it was ok. The good thing about this book is its sustained focus on an extremely important topic.

The bad thing about this book is nearly everything else. Po Bronson writes in a clunky, Journalism style, with wooden introductions of his subjects fumbled into the text. He digresses often, judges his subjects too harshly for my tastes, and generally spends more time holding forth on his own ideas than he does relaying the opinions and experiences of the people he interviews.

Once or twice, while I read t The good thing about this book is its sustained focus on an extremely important topic. Once or twice, while I read this book, I actually said out loud: "Shut the fuck up, Po! Let me hear what your subject has to say. Which brings up another qualm I had: Po comes across as a closet yuppie, most often impressed by people who make obscene amounts of money or approach work with an MBA mindset.

It's ironic because our societies worship-the-dollar mentality and relentless prestige-focuses careerism seem to be two of the factors contributing most to our general dissatisfaction with life. Even so, if you dedicate pages to an meaningful topic, and include accounts from dozens of people though a great many of those accounts felt frustratingly abbreviated , you can't help but turn up the occasional rewarding nugget.

There are a few of those in this book, to be sure, but I don't really think it's worth the digging. Jul 11, Irwan rated it did not like it Shelves: finished. Despite the enticing title - people tend to search for clues about what to do with their life - this book did put me off. No depth, simply a series of snapshot of people's life written rather dryly and bluntly. It is like watching Oprah without the "ooohh, aaah Jul 21, Allie Harris rated it it was amazing Shelves: owned-paperbacks. I read this book at a very pivotal time in my life - a time when I've felt the desire to have this question answered more than any other time.

The book doesn't attempt to answer the question, but it was inspiring and uplifting, and told the stories of people who have been in similar situations as I am and much much different situations and how they made changes, and what their outcomes were. Not all the stories were happy, or relatable, but they were all real. And they made me realize that doi I read this book at a very pivotal time in my life - a time when I've felt the desire to have this question answered more than any other time.

And they made me realize that doing something is better than doing nothing. Nothing is safe, and nothing is complacent, and nothing gets you nowhere. If you do something, you might fail, but then you can just something again. And again. And eventually maybe you'll get somewhere.

I learned some valuable lessons about making changes in your life, about how it's never too late to change your big picture, a goal is never too far out of reach if you really want it, and that change rarely happens overnight.

I bookmarked probably 20 different pages of quotes from people across the globe that I connected to, and I have a feeling I'm going to be going back to this book more than once.

This book is actually a meaningful read in the end, but there are certainly some rough patches along the way. This being noted, I urge others to read on, as the early uneveness of the book gives way to far more consistently insightful passages in its second half. Simply put, some of the early stories are not particularly revealing or, even more acutely put, do not evidence clearly why Bronson chose to include them , but by the end they are a tiny minority of many riveting, important narratives.

So, slog through the first half of the book and you will be rewarded richly by its conclusion. The style of the book is to share vignettes about particular individuals or, in a few cases, couples who have effectively asked and answered what the author describes as the ultimate question which is the title of the book.

Along the way, we learn a good deal about what lead them to ask themselves the question in the first place, how they have gone about answering it and what the results have been.

A parallel and similarly important narrative theme is the author's own journey, which he chronciles alongside the other subjects'. We also learn some other important things like that our expectation of experiencing a eureka moment when we discover our purpose is mistaken it turns out that it's typically a far more faint feeling or realization , that the journey is usually long and hard so keep looking , that you have to have the courage to find out who you really are and then live the life that this suggests despite what trusted others and your circumstances or background may compel , etc.

Not to spoil it for others, but this is not a tome with dozens of get-rich-quick secrets; in most scenarios, the protagonists actually walk away from the gilded life to find something much more meaningful and usually less materially remunerative. In fact, the author is the poster boy for this trend though he does, in the end, experience material abundance in additon to greater fulfillment by having the guts to pursue his passion - writing - professionally.

In summary, this is a very worthwhile read, as most of the vignettes feature protagonists whose stories are compelling, insightful and transferable. It will not likely give you an answer to its titular question, but it will point you in the right direction to discover your own.

After finding this book on some tech blog's must read list I decided to give it a shot. I now find myself regretting this course of action. Po Bronson interviewed, and then proceeded to tell them how to fix their life or how much their decisions sucked. The interviews are much more a platform for Bronson to present his own thoughts and views on how life should be, and he disagrees very strongly with anyone that After finding this book on some tech blog's must read list I decided to give it a shot.

The interviews are much more a platform for Bronson to present his own thoughts and views on how life should be, and he disagrees very strongly with anyone that does not meet these viewpoints. I could only stomach through chapter There were a few interesting stories, but then you were torn out of them pretty jarringly when Bronson decides to interject his own thoughts, criticisms and ideas. He seems to approach things with a very Hollywood mentality, which could be expected given his career history.