The One Thing by Gary Keller [Book Review]

The One Thing! This book has been on my radar for years and not only did I keep seeing it in the local bookstores when I would visit but it was recommended to me by two guys I really respect in the business.

First Nick Grimshawe talked about The One Thing in a blog post he did a while ago and I said to myself…If Nick likes it, that’s a must read for me. Then two weeks ago, I saw my good friend Sergio Felix rave about the book on Facebook…That was it!

I dove into The One Thing by Gary Keller and Jay Papasan early this week and it became my obsession for the next 7 days. The book is filled with awesome resources, great graphics and an easy to read format that makes time management and personal growth a topic that anyone can get into.

O.K. let’s talk about the book…

The One Thing describes how you should keep things super simple in your business and life. In areas of your life, the authors argue we spend way too much time and effort on ALL THINGS instead of focusing on ‘the ONE thing‘ that can change our life and business for good.

The book is broken into 3 parts; The first is ‘The Lies‘, the second ‘The Truth‘ and the third ‘Extraordinary Results‘.

The ‘Lies’ section was probably my favorite part of the book. Mostly because of all the self-observations I made while reading it. I was guilty and still am of falling ‘victim’ to the dangers of these chapters…From multi tasking to trying to lead a balanced life, this book showed me how I truly was trying to be a jack of all trades. Thus becomign a master of none…

I thoroughly enjoyed the end of each section as it went over the ‘Big Ideas’ for each chapter. This really helped drive the point home.

The second part of this book talked about the strategies needed to build a solid game plan for ‘The One Thing’.

And finally, to tie it all together the third part of the book discussed how to put it all together. Comparing successful habits as a domino effect was a huge take away for me. The point was to think of goals smaller and master them. Which led to mastering bigger and bigger goals thus creating successful habits for the long term. This is huge for our future self.

All in all, this was one of the best books I’ve ever read about time management, productivity and personal growth. I’d even put this in to my top 25 books of all time that I’ve read. Yeah it’s THAT good!

I believe every entrepreneur should pick this up and not only read through it, but go to the website and print out the material provided to readers that helps them with each step in the process.

A great book, fantastic resources and an experience you will be talking about for years to come!

8 thoughts to “The One Thing by Gary Keller [Book Review]”

  1. I stayed up to read your review. Joking Jon. Great review of the book and you reminded me of some of the really good features of the book, including all the stuff up on the web site.

    Recently someone else I follow did a review of the book and had a similar reaction which lead me to simplify my goals this year into the one goal that would make all the others unnecessary or easier. It was like a penny dropping.

    I plan to reread this when I get back to Canada, in the meantime it certainly helped me get here to Panama. That is as good a comment as I can make about this really amazing book.

    Oh and thanks for the plug.

    Nick

    Glad you weren’t disappoint after all the hype.

    Nick

    1. So worth it man. Havent stopped working on my ONE thing in all aspects of my life since I stopped the book. it really fired me up.

  2. Glad you picked this one Jon. I have not read the book yet, but have watched Jay’s excellent talk at Google on the book – one of the best talks on financial planning focus I’ve heard (go to Youtube and search Jay Papasan Google). Gary is becoming a real estate legend in Texas for his laser focus on success – so, these two authors are truly living it. Look forward to the discussion and the book is on my list.

    1. Yeah it’s pretty much one of the best books I’ve read in a long long time. It’s been a few days since I read it and I’m still thinking about it all the time lol Great concepts and techniques.

  3. Hey what’s up Jon,

    Thanks a lot for the plug to my blog and I’m really glad you liked the book so much.

    When I was reading it myself, I kept doing these pauses to think about a lot of things I had done in the past and what I was currently doing at the moment and took tons of notes on what I should be doing instead.

    It was a wonderful read indeed and I’m still following up on the advice I found in it, definitely a MUST READ! for anyone looking to upgrade their life in every single aspect.

    Sergio

    1. Started on the 66 Day Challenge today….

      See how it goes, only going to worry about that one thing for the next 66 days lol

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