CHANGING YOUR EQUATION

A debut guidebook offers advice on making fundamental life changes.

In their work, the Polczynskis explore a concept everyone knows but few ever achieve: the “ideal future,” which is not only a collection of hopes and aspirations, but also a mind frame of “living without regret and maximizing all the days of our lives.” A refreshingly direct nuts-and-bolts approach is adopted, a model aimed at helping readers to change—with the first step being to assess their lives, the “life elements” that make up their day-to-day reality: finances, relationships, education, ethics, career fundamentals, and the like. The authors are attentive coaches at looking at all these separate factors clearly, without letting wishful thinking cloud the picture. And once that portrait is clarified, the most important element of the book kicks in: “change agents,” the moving factors, the aspects that a person can alter to achieve more. The authors use a variety of organizational aids—charts, worksheets, entrepreneurial tips—to help readers balance the variables in their personal equations, consistently laying the responsibility for doing this squarely on the individual rather than on any program or guru. “Only when you accept responsibility for your own changes,” they write, “will you be empowered to reach your ideal future.” The practical advice about, for instance, finances—stressing the difference between wants and needs, always a vital reminder to chronic overspenders—is uniformly on target and concisely presented. But the book’s real strength lies in the clear force of its personal advice surrounding “change agents,” counsel often expressed with a startling simplicity. “Say no to vengeance,” the authors write, “and don't allow yourself to be helpless with self-pity.” These insights combine very smoothly with tips on how to embrace your inner entrepreneur, regardless of how that creativity is expressed.

A businesslike and savvy outline of how to cut through the confusion of present circumstances to forge a better future.