How should you use this book?

If you have read this far, then you probably want to either change something in your life or help someone else in their change. You may have a specific change in mind, or perhaps you know that you wish to improve yourself in some way but haven’t yet figured out exactly what that improvement is. In either case, this book can help you make any change you want to make. You can use it on its own or to help you implement something you learned in another book. If you don’t already know what you want to change, it will help you identify that. Then it will give you the key to answering the question of how to make that change.

This is not a traditional book that is meant to be read cover to cover in a couple of days. There are exercises throughout this book that ask you to stop, think, and take concrete action. I recommend that you complete these activities as you go. Sometimes you may feel the need to redo prior exercises and/or reread prior chapters. Change does not follow a single path, nor does it follow a consistent timeline. You may complete this book and reach the final stages of maintaining your change within a couple of weeks. Alternatively, you could spend months actively working on one change; it all depends on the strength of your self-addiction and the effort—the commitment and energy—you put into the change.

As you complete the exercises in this book, you will be asked to record various thoughts, commitments, actions, and observations. I recommend you record all these items in one location so that you can easily review them on a regular basis. You can purchase a notebook specifically for this purpose.