Books about Guidance from Amazon.com

The paperback edition of Daniel H. Pink's groundbreaking book, A Whole New Mind.

Described by reviewers as "an audacious and powerful work," "a profound read," "right on the money," and "a miracle," the book reveals the six abilities individuals must master in an outsourced and automated world. Several publications named A Whole New Mind one of the best business books of 2005. It is now being translated into 12 languages -- and will appear across Europe and Asia in 2006.

For this updated and expanded edition, Pink has added dozens of new tools, tips, and exercises to help individuals and organizations sharpen their right-brain capacities. Find out why Thomas L. Friedman, author of the mega-bestseller The World is Flat, calls A Whole New Mind his "favorite business book.".
Price: $8.44 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Unfortunately, most of us have little sense of our talents and strengths, much less the ability to build our lives around them. Instead, guided by our parents, by our teachers, by our managers, and by psychology's fascination with pathology, we become experts in our weaknesses and spend our lives trying to repair these flaws, while our strengths lie dormant and neglected.

Marcus Buckingham, coauthor of the national bestseller First, Break All the Rules, and Donald O. Clifton, Chair of the Gallup International Research & Education Center, have created a revolutionary program to help readers identify their talents, build them into strengths, and enjoy consistent, near-perfect performance. At the heart of the book is the Internet-based StrengthsFinder® Profile, the product of a 25-year, multimillion-dollar effort to identify the most prevalent human strengths. The program introduces 34 dominant "themes" with thousands of possible combinations, and reveals how they can best be translated into personal and career success. In developing this program, Gallup has conducted psychological profiles with more than two million individuals to help readers learn how to focus and perfect these themes.

So how does it work? This book contains a unique identification number that allows you access to the StrengthsFinder Profile on the Internet. This Web-based interview analyzes your instinctive reactions and immediately presents you with your five most powerful signature themes. Once you know which of the 34 themes -- such as Achiever, Activator, Empathy, Futuristic, or Strategic -- you lead with, the book will show you how to leverage them for powerful results at three levels: for your own development, for your success as a manager, and for the success of your organization.

With accessible and profound insights on how to turn talents into strengths, and with the immediate on-line feedback of StrengthsFinder at its core, Now, Discover Your Strengths is one of the most groundbreaking and useful business books ever written..
Price: $5.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

America’s most sought-after executive coach shows how to climb the last few rungs of the ladder

The corporate world is filled with executives, men and women who have worked hard for years to reach the upper levels of management They’re intelligent, skilled, and even charismatic But only a handful of them will ever reach the pinnacle -- and as executive coach Marshall Goldsmith shows in this book, subtle nuances make all the difference. These are small "transactional flaws" performed by one person against another (as simple as not saying thank you enough), which lead to negative perceptions that can hold any executive back. Using Goldsmith’s straightforward, jargonfree advice, it’s amazingly easy behavior to change.

Executives who hire Goldsmith for one-on-one coaching pay $250,000 for the privilege. With this book, his help is available for 1/10,000th of the price..
Price: $12.23 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Still the best-selling job-hunting book in the world, WHAT COLOR IS YOUR PARACHUTE? is the most complete guide for first-time job seekers as well as second and encore careers changers. For more than three decades, it remains a mainstay on best-seller lists, from Amazon.com to Business Week to the New York Times, where it has spent more than six years, and it has been translated into 20 languages. The 2009 edition is an even more useful book, with its updated, inspiring, and detailed plan for changing readers' lives. With new examples, instructions, and cautionary advice, PARACHUTE is, to quote Fortune magazine, "the gold standard of career guides.".
Price: $12.00 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The project that captured a nation's imagination

The instructions were simple, but the results were extraordinary

"You are invited to anonymously contribute a secret to a group art project. Your secret can be a regret, fear, betrayal, desire, confession, or childhood humiliation. Reveal anything -- as long as it is true and you have never shared it with anyone before. Be brief. Be legible. Be creative."

It all began with an idea Frank Warren had for a community art project. He began handing out postcards to strangers and leaving them in public places -- asking people to write down a secret they had never told anyone and mail it to him, anonymously.

The response was overwhelming. The secrets were both provocative and profound, and the cards themselves were works of art -- carefully and creatively constructed by hand. Addictively compelling, the cards reveal our deepest fears, desires, regrets, and obsessions. Frank calls them "graphic haiku," beautiful, elegant, and small in structure but powerfully emotional.

As Frank began posting the cards on his website, PostSecret took on a life of its own, becoming much more than a simple art project. It has grown into a global phenomenon, exposing our individual aspirations, fantasies, and frailties -- our common humanity.

Every day dozens of postcards still make their way to Frank, with postmarks from around the world, touching on every aspect of human experience. This extraordinary collection brings together the most powerful, personal, and beautifully intimate secrets Frank Warren has received -- and brilliantly illuminates that human emotions can be unique and universal at the same time..
Price: $15.51 [Notify me when price goes down.]

Joyce Meyer is one busy lady. Apart from the normal demands of life, she teaches daily on TV and radio, writes books, holds conferences in dozens of cities every year and ministers around the world...and she runs JoyceMeyerMinistries. So she's had to learn how to make the most of every minute of the day! In 100 Ways to Simplify Your Life, Joyce shares the most effective secrets she's learned over the years for making the most of each minute of the day. In less than two pages per entry, Joyce gives us eminently 'doable' tips that are clearcut and ...well, SIMPLE. But they can change your whole outlook, not to mention your schedule..
Price: $9.67 [Notify me when price goes down.]

The award-winning PostSecret project's most profound and stunning postcards to date

For the past three years Frank Warren has invited people of all backgrounds and nationalities to send him creatively decorated postcards bearing secrets they have never before revealed. He has shared these PostSecrets on his award-winning blog, www.PostSecret.com, in an internationally traveling art exhibit, and in three electrifying books: the bestselling PostSecret, My Secret, and The Secret Lives of Men and Women.

Now, in his most extraordinary book yet, Warren again delves into our collective confessions, presenting a never-before-seen selection of provocative and moving PostSecrets. A Lifetime of Secrets lays bare our private fears, hopes, regrets, and desires, from people as young as eight and as old as eighty. From painful admissions of infidelity to breathtaking revelations and endearing sentiments, Warren's latest collection will shock and move readers of every age, revealing secrets that have haunted their creators for a lifetime.

Six PostSecrets from A Lifetime of Secrets

Here are six of the PostSecrets included in A Lifetime of Secrets, and never before seen online. Click on each image to see a larger version.

Frank Warren's Introduction to A Lifetime of Secrets

When I told my father I was collecting secrets from strangers for an art project, he didn’t know what to think. I tried to explain how the thousands of secrets that had been mailed to me were more than mere confessions. They could be beautiful, funny, sorrowful, inspiring.

"But, Frank," he asked, "why are you soliciting secrets from strangers, and why would anyone tell you a real secret?"

I invited my father to fly out for a PostSecret art exhibit in Washington, D.C., where hundreds of the postcards were on display. More than 15,000 people came to see the secrets, and my father was there, day after day, to hear many of their transformative stories. Some people told me they recognized a hidden part of themselves on a stranger’s postcard. Others shared personal experiences of how talking about a painful secret had helped heal a lifelong relationship.

The exhibit came to an end and I took my father back to the airport to catch a red-eye flight home. During our drive we passed through a long dark stretch of highway when my father broke the silence by asking me, "Do you want to know my secret?" He bravely recounted a traumatic childhood experience. When he finished, we had a true talk that gave me a richer understanding of my father and recast our relationship.

• • •

For A Lifetime of Secrets, the fourth PostSecret book, I've selected postcards that show how secrets can reveal a momentary impulse or haunt us for decades and arranged them by age to follow the common journey we all take through childhood, adolescence, adulthood, maturity. Stretched over a full lifespan, the secrets expose the meaningful ways we change over time, and the surprising ways we don't.

The postcards narrate childhood stories that have never been spoken; they voice the guarded confessions of our parents and grandparents. They confirm that our rich interior lives are not defined by how old we are, and that with aging comes not only loss but also the possibility of grace and wisdom.

The following two secrets arrived in my mailbox the same week. The postmarks on each card were different, but when I posted them together on the PostSecret website (www.postsecret.com) they seemed as though they could have been written by the same person at two different points in her life.

I am a junior in high school. I have good friends and a loving family. I am smart. I am a good athlete and musician. But I would trade all that in if it meant I would be beautiful.

I spent my high school years believing I was UGLY. I just went through a photo album that had pictures of me over the last 20 years. Turns out I was/am kind of cute. No more wasting time on thinking otherwise.

• • •

When I give PostSecret presentations at college campuses, my hope is that people I have never met will be inspired to change their lives through the secrets and stories being shared. Not long ago, at one of my talks, it was my life that was changed, and the secret that inspired me came from a stranger in the front row.

I began my presentation by handing out blank postcards to everyone in the auditorium. I invited each person to anonymously write down a secret on a card and then pass it on. For the next hour, the postcards circulated and were read silently multiple times. At the end of my talk, I asked if anyone would like to stand and read the secret they were holding at that moment. A man in the front row stood up and haltingly read:

I wish I could apologize to my younger brother for the way I treated him growing up.

He sat down and exchanged a long look with the young man next to him. After more volunteers read aloud some of the other secrets that had been passed around, I collected all the cards. The man in the front row handed me the postcard he had read from, and the two men walked out together.

His postcard was blank.

I have witnessed many times how the courage of sharing a secret can be contagious. When I realized that the man had been pretending to read someone else’s secret and that the person he had left with was likely his brother, I was inspired.

Growing up, I was not an ideal older brother. As an adult, I have wished for an opportunity to apologize for some of my actions but did not want to open old wounds. I have not shared this secret with my brother . . . until now.

--Frank Warren

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Price: $17.14 [Notify me when price goes down.]

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