How to Be Better at Almost Everything

Disclaimer: I'm still reading the book so this is not a finished review. But... first, I can breath a sigh of relief a a long-term generalist there is finally a book that understands ... ME! I grew up at a time when generalism was frowned upon in the working world, whereas now generalists are needed more than ever. As a customer services manager I must look at finance, make reports, deal with customer complaints (from a wide range of people) and I have done well at this because - I have a lot of general knowledge of how to do things.

This book breaks down why that is useful and how to use these 5 principles of generalism to stay head of the curve. No-doubt some people will hate this book as being a specialist is still a doctrinal necessity for certain professions such as doctor or lawyer.

Ironically, at this stage of my reading I am finding the information - rather general - and I hope as I read further there will be specific processes to improve my skill-sets. But, at this point - it's good to be understood!

The premise of this book is that to be better at most things you have to combine and stack skills,and you do so by using 5 principles.
1-Analyze what steps you need to achieve your goal
2-Become a short term specialist in each one of them
3-Stop improving one step when you are at 80% mastery,then just do maintenance on it while you focus on the next one
4-Integrate the steps by practicing them contextually
5-Repeat and increase resistance

I found it intriguing,specially the cut-off rule at 80% to avoid too much specialization,and believe the author has written a useful book that will help those interested in improving their general level of skill acquisition.

On the negative,the book is repetitive,could have been shortter and more specific and the author should have explained his credentials way deeper than he did.And for this,I detract one star.

Is the book worth reading and useful?Yes...4 Stars

A lot of us would want to be known as someone who’s truly great at one thing. But because of some reason or another, most of us don’t really get to achieve that level of greatness. Author Pat Flynn, in his book “How to Be Better at Almost Everything,” shares his secrets to learning, how to combine interests, so we could be better than most people in any field.

As a generalist myself, I appreciate his insights. Having many interests, I know I can’t be “the best” at one thing, but I’d like to be good at many things. In this fast-paced, constantly changing, technology-centric world we live in, it pays to be a multi-skilled generalist.

Flynn’s thoughts on skill stacking, repetition and resistance are valuable in today’s world.

The first thing I noticed about Pat Flynn’s style of writing was that it was very casual. He would throw in a bit of humor here and there and that was what made this book easy to relate to. The idea behind generalism is not a new one but one that is rarely written about in a good self-help book. This is the whole premise behind //How To Be Better At Almost Everything//. As Pat Flynn describes it, this book is about “becoming good or great at many things and at least fairly competent at (almost) everything else, and then learning to combine abilities to form a competitive advantage while at the same time finding total and complete fulfillment in life.” He does a great job of explaining why this method works and gives solid examples of successful people of today and the past who have used this method to become the top performer in their game. What Pat said in this book really resonated with me and at times I thought he was actually talking directly to me. As a young child, my mom told me I wasn’t good at just one thing, that I was mediocre. As I grew up I realized this wasn’t a bad thing. I knew a lot about a lot and became better at the things I liked and as an adult, outsourced the things I didn’t really care about. This is what generalism is all about. Taking all of the different skills, all the life lessons, all the mistakes made, and putting them all together to make one big, happy life for yourself. As a personal trainer, I also connected with the fact that Pat is a fitness guru and many of his examples were fitness-related. I guess you could say he was speaking my language. I would recommend this book to anyone who wants to get ahead in their game and really figure out how to reach their goals without wasting anymore precious time. This book is not like other self-help books.