If you’ve spent any time at all looking around the personal development blogosphere, you’ve probably read the work of Alex Blackwell at The Next 45 Years. Alex has a compelling story as a person who realized a few years ago that his life was nowhere near where he wanted it to be, so he began to actively work on personal development and change. As he writes on his blog:

This was the sum of life until the summer of 2003 when I turned 41. Separated from my wife, emotionally distanced from my teenage son and daughter and alienated from God, my life was in emotionally and spiritually decay and my self-confidence had eroded.

He shares many of the lessons that he has learned along the way at his blog. Now he has released his first eBook, How to Finish Strong in Life.

What is it About?

This book is a compilation of the best posts from the blog, collected and reformatted into a 52 page document. The book is divided into 3 sections:

• Growth
• Love
• Faith

Most of the book features short tips with a small amount of longer, more philosophical passages to connect some of the dots. Here is one of my favorite tips from the Growth section:

Stop doing what you’ve been doing that doesn’t work.
Comfort can be your biggest obstacle to growth. When you get nestled down deep into your comfort zone you may become reluctant to break away because the fear of the unknown can be paralyzing. Sometimes your own unhappiness is not even enough to inspire you to take the leap of faith and step into the fear that surrounds your comfort zone.
Take an honest look at your own life. Are you doing things you know don’t work; but you keep doing them nonetheless because either you are too scared to try something new or you don’t know any other way?

Who Should Buy This?

Because this book is written mostly in a tips format, I would recommend it for people who are looking for a resource to keep on their desktops (or printed out and kept on their bookshelf) for a “quick hit” of inspiration. Alex’s writing style is very uplifting, but can also challenge you to achieve more and look at your life in new ways.

I’ll be honest and tell you all that the content in this book is not revolutionary. In fact, all of the content is freely available at Alex’s website. He is following in the footsteps of other high profile bloggers like Leo at Zen Habits, whose latest offering, Zen Handbook for Life, is a “best of the blog” eBook. However, at $4.95 for a .pdf download, you can’t go wrong.

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