It's Not About You

A Brief Guide to a Meaningful Life

By: Tom Rath

Narrated by: Scott Merriman

Length: 54 mins

Publisher's Summary

From the author of the #1 bestseller StrengthsFinder 2.0 comes a moving memoir and inspiring call to action for bettering your own life by doing your best for others.

Life is not about you. It’s about what you do for others. That’s the realization that has driven Tom Rath - the mega-bestselling expert in self-development research - to evolve his focus from one’s inward search for strength to the larger outward search for purposeful contribution to others. It’s Not About You is a short introduction to the next chapter in the life and career of perhaps our greatest living self-help writer.

Diagnosed with a rare genetic condition at age sixteen, Tom’s awareness of his own mortality drove him to pursue a meaningful life in the nurturing care of his family, including his eventual mentor and collaborator, Tom’s grandfather Don Clifton. In this empowering hybrid of a self-help memoir, Tom remembers and celebrates his greatest teacher as he emphatically encourages each and every one of us to answer life’s great question: What can I put into the world?

©2019 Thomas Rath (P)2019 Brilliance Publishing, Inc., all rights reserved

Irresponsible

I had to stop about halfway, when the author admitted to having 2 kids, knowing full well that he would likely die horribly before they turned 10, from a genetic disease that he would almost certainly pass along to them or their descendants. I hope neither of these happens or happened, but his willingness to do that to them sickened me, and destroyed the rest of the message

What an amazing book!

This book is a 58 minute life changer. I couldn’t turn it off once I started listening. It grabbed my heart and didn’t let go, simply amazing! Thank you Tom Rath!

Great!!!

great book ! perfect length... loved it! current and appropriate for the times we are living in...

It's about Tom

Best part was its brevity. If you want to be told how profound and enriching your life can be if you do what the author says he did, then this book is for you. If you struggle with self- care and with validating your own needs, then this is NOT the book for you. If you create codependent relationships by giving to others at the expense of your own well being, then this is NOT the book for you.

Maybe better in print, but probably not much

Perhaps this is helpful if you're self-centered, but if you're already doing a lot for others, it's just repetitive and not even affirming, because it was so much about how enlightened he feels. The audiobook version just sounds preachy ("you should do this..."), but it might be that the emphasis in the reading made it sound worse.

And if he's so conscious about doing things for others, why did he have two kids? This was a huge shock to me, and might have been what really turned me off to his story.

Not only did he risk giving his miserable generic disease to his kids, which thankfully he did not, he but he seemed more interested in experiencing having kids than considering what they might feel losing a parent prematurely to cancer. I have personally seen what losing a parent to cancer does to your kids, and felt what the surviving parent feels, not just losing a partner, but becoming a single parent of partially orphaned kids. Seems like he wrote the book to justify his decision, sorry to say.

I'm glad he found meaning to his life, but this book just didn't work for me. Normally I try to not say bad things unnecessarily, but I came for affirmation, and left feeling disturbed, so just wanted to warn others. I got the book for free, but it wasn't worth it.

such motivation

I cried through much of this book. Truer words were never spoken... and yet I was left feeling a bit empty... wondering what I could possibly do at this late age of my life... perhaps the next book will have my answer.

Made me stop and think.

Well done on all aspects, thank you for sharing your thoughts and wisdom. Your story has given me something to think about. Take care!

Profound & Life Changing

It left me wanting more!!!
It was INCREDIBLE, & came at a perfect time by answering my question; should I open my healing center. My contribution (business), will support life & wellbeing for others which will continue, long after I'm gone.
This book/audio, will have a continuous ripple effect to infinity & beyond.
Praise God for You Tom &
Your Blessed Grandfather!!!

Not worth the listen.

I would give it 1/2 star if I could. Narration is horrible. Trite sayings and nothing memorable.

It’s not about you

Thank you for this story! It spoke to my heart and soul and it is exactly what I needed to remind me of the important things. Thank you and Mr. Rath, you are in my prayers for healing.

Not my thing at all

I found it slightly boring and think the message can be summed up with the title without the story. It's not about you, the writer says and then says this several times throughout. The reader talks a lot about how we shouldn't look inwards and should spend our lives making others happy and not worrying about our own and I couldn't really finish it even though it's just a short one. I think it's the wrong message to be honest. We need to do both - look outwards but also look inwards. I believe it's about balance and don't believe we're here just to sacrifice ourselves for the benefits of everybody else. If we don't look out for ourselves who will? This book goes against almost everything I believe in about self-love.

not really the message I needed...

struggled to finish. not really a useful message in this era of being overstretched to our individual detriment

thought provoking

it's a short listen but packed with thought provoking ideas of the authors life on how to put the focus in your life on doing good for others instead of feeding your own ego. I enjoyed it.

Storytelling with little content

Short, well read, and engaging stories. But very light on insight and learning. Entertaining enough, but also rather forgettable.

It's about living a life of purpose

I loved every bit of it. It is short, straight to the point, straight to the heart and most effective. I would love to share with every member of my family and friends. In fact I would love to share with the whole world. Highly recommend, especially for this younger generation.

No better way to spend a spare hour your time

changed my perspective on my own life for the better in less than an hour. No harm in giving it a listen to see if it does the same for you