Don’t Ask Stupid Questions – There Are No Stupid Questions – Book Review

I bet you think I picked up this book to mock the title, didn’t you? And maybe last year I would have done; but like I tweeted Tim Brownson, the man himself, my resolution this year is to be less provocative, more prohelpative.  And I do mean that more or less sincerely, depending on what kinds of posts I am writing that day. Why I Hate My Message Board? Those posts probably don’t help anyone. But today I am putting on my more or less helping cap so bear with me while I tell you about this gem of a book.

Disclaimer: While I don’t really know Tim Brownson in person, I do consider him a Twitter buddy so I am probably a little inclined to think favorably of him. I also asked him if I could be his free life-coachee, but that was after I read the book and decided to review it, so I am not kissing up. On the other hand my mother gave me the precious gift of life and I’m not shy about pointing out her flaws.

Tim Brownson is a life coach, you can learn more about him at A Daring Adventure. “Don’t Ask Stupid Questions – There Are No Stupid Questions” gives you questions to ask yourself, to challenge you to step outside your comfort zone and start living up to your potential.

I’ll be honest, before I met a life coach, I always pictured them as Tony Robbins doing some sort of parody of himself in a comedy movie. All charisma and catchphrases but very little of substance and nothing I’d be interested in. I am, after all, a natural born scoffer and cynic and general naysayer of everything.

And that’s the beauty of this book for me, Tim has a wicked sense of humor and I get the impression that although he is a great believer of whatever works, do it; he’s also not into a lot of self indulgent wankery. So, I decided to give his blog, The Discomfort Zone, a read and realized that a lot of what he said made sense and was what I needed to read right now.

Which is how I came to purchase a copy of “Don’t Ask Stupid Questions” even though it was far outside of my comfort zone. Thank goodness for Amazon! I read it all in one sitting; it’s a short book and very quickly read. Of course, it was too much information to take in all at once, but I got the general gist and was greatly energized. Tim has an easy, conversational writing style and a knack for picking out great quotes for the beginning of the chapters to emphasize his points. I am now re-reading the book, a chapter at a time. Each chapter is just a few pages long and at the end is a question designed to help you in some way.

Since there are too many helpful bits in the book to list them all, I’ll just tell you about one that stood out for me. Chapter 23 is titled “SMARTER Goals”. It seems “SMART goals” is a well known kind of goal setting technique, but I’d never heard of it. Tim adds the ER, to make:

Specific
Measurable
Action Oriented
Realistic
Timebound
Ecological
Reward

Ecological is emphasized because reading what Tim had to say about it parted the clouds and let the sun shine in for me. He doesn’t mean “ecological” as relates to nature, but to mean the circumstances under which you presently live. He says:

I mean external factors have to be taken into consideration.

Now, my husband and everyone else that is near and dear to me is going to scream at me “WE TOLD YOU THIS!!” but I kind of needed a genuine life coach to make me realize that I have five children, 2 still in diapers, and all the time and financial constraints that come with that. Actually, I was very aware of this but I had a very hard time making peace with the idea that I had to keep that in mind when making goals.  It is crucial for me to think about external factors when making my goals – otherwise I am dooming myself to either fail or succeed at too high of a price.

Tim is very clear that taking your external factors into consideration does NOT mean you give up on your goals, rather that you have to understand the problems that could arise when working to meet your goals and plan on how to deal with them. For example, I need to put in a fair amount of work every day to build my business. If I work too much and ignore my children, they will feel neglected and look for any way, even negative, to get my attention. This is not good for them or me or my goals. Any plan I make to achieve my goals will have to account for this, and it’s just a relief to know that’s okay.

It sounds silly but it did make me feel almost like a failure that I couldn’t work all through the night and get by on 3 hours sleep or find some way to cram 4 hours of work into a 90 minute nap time. Intellectually, I knew it was impossible but my image of myself is indefatigable. It’s hard to let go of your own self image that but reading Tim’s words let me do that.

“Don’t Ask Stupid Questions – There Are No Stupid Questions” is full of little aha moments like that and I recommend it, even to cynical people who might not be into the whole self help thing. You can buy the book at Tim’s store, the ebook is on sale for $9.99 and the hardcover is on sale for $14.99 plus shipping.

And remember to check out Tim Brownson’s Blog!

Disclaimer that came too late: I don’t really know how to write a book review. If you made it this far, bless you. And read Tim’s book! You need to learn to how to exit situations that just aren’t working! Erm, wink.

Tagged as: goals, life coaching, living up to your potential