I
picked up Neil Pasricha’s The Happiness
Equation at the library because a book I thought I had on hold wasn’t there
after all. Mr. Pasricha has nine basic suggestions for happiness, of which I’d
agree with maybe eight. The one I’d take issue with is: Never retire. I was
heavily influenced by Paul Terhorst’s Cashing
in on the American Dream, Joe Dominguez’ and Vicki Robin’s Your Money or Your Life, and the 1938
film version of Philip Barry’s Holiday. I first
retired in my mid-forties because I had a disagreement with my employer,
Company L, over work-life balance. I thought there should be one.
Mr.
Pasricha presents many reasons for not retiring including structure and having
a social network. I love being able to determine my own structure, and I wonder
if Mr. Pasricha, who is Canadian, has set foot in corporate America recently.
(He did say he’d visited Wal-Mart’s headquarters and was quite taken with the
friendliness of the people he met there; perhaps the friendliness was real and
perhaps not—sometimes these things can be faked, especially for a visitor.) With
few exceptions—very few—I would not want the backstabbing brownnosers I worked
with at Company L in my life, let alone in my social network.
In Mr.
Pasricha’s favor, his last suggestion is not to follow suggestions. And that’s
a good suggestion.
I found
Cheryl Richardson’s Take Time for Your
Life at an estate sale. I almost didn’t buy the book because the cover
features a woman who appears to be having an orgasm, but having had my own
experiences with publishers slapping inappropriate covers on a book (The Simple Life, a book primarily about
frugality, which I edited, featured… a blade of grass), I took a closer look,
and I’m glad I plunked down my 50¢ for this book. Ms. Richardson
presents a seven-step program to help take control of our lives. I was most
taken by her criteria for her clients’ choosing a job, which include:
Work
must never cause them to compromise their integrity
The
required hours must allow them to have a life outside work
Their
contribution must be acknowledged and appreciated
Their
work must be challenging and fulfilling
They
must have an opportunity to use their best talents and gifts fully
They
must be able to provide their input for important decisions
They
must be paid fairly for the work they perform.
I guess
if I could find a job that would do all these things (especially the last one), I might be willing to
follow Mr. Pasricha’s advice and never retire. Perhaps there are unicorns out
there after all.
The
final book, Real Cause, Real Cure, by
Jacob Teitelbaum, MD, and Bill Gottlieb, CHC is another estate sale find I
almost didn’t buy. I mean buying health books at an estate sale? These people
died, after all. What good did the book do its previous owner? Anyway, I plunked down a whole
dollar for this one and was pleasantly surprised. The authors give nine “real
causes” of health problems. The chapter on prescription medications is worth
the price I paid for the book. If the authors are right, many patients being
treated for Alzheimer’s are suffering only from being overmedicated. The “real
cures” part of the book deals with specific conditions.
I
definitely recommend this book. Most books I buy find their way to Half Price
Books; this one’s staying on my bookshelf.
© 2017 Larry Roth
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