Book notes: Be Useful by Arnold Schwarzenegger

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Be Useful: Seven Tools for Life by Arnold Schwarzenegger

Synopsis:

“The seven rules to follow to realize your true purpose in life—distilled by Arnold Schwarzenegger from his own journey of ceaseless reinvention and extraordinary achievement, and available for absolutely anyone.

The world’s greatest bodybuilder. The world’s highest-paid movie star. The leader of the world’s sixth-largest economy. That these are the same person sounds like the setup to a joke, but this is no joke. This is Arnold Schwarzenegger. And this did not happen by accident.

Arnold’s stratospheric success happened as part of a process. As the result of clear vision, big thinking, hard work, direct communication, resilient problem-solving, open-minded curiosity, and a commitment to giving back. All of it guided by the one lesson Arnold’s father hammered into him above all: be useful. As Arnold conquered every realm he entered, he kept his father’s adage close to his heart.

Written with his uniquely earnest, blunt, powerful voice, Be Useful takes readers on an inspirational tour through Arnold’s tool kit for a meaningful life. He shows us how to put those tools to work, in service of whatever fulfilling future we can dream up for ourselves. He brings his insights to vivid life with compelling personal stories, life-changing successes and life-threatening failures alike—some of them famous; some told here for the first time ever.

Too many of us struggle to disconnect from our self-pity and connect to our purpose. At an early age, Arnold forged the mental tools to build the ladder out of the poverty and narrow-mindedness of his rural Austrian hometown, tools he used to add rung after rung from there. Now he shares that wisdom with all of us. As he puts it, no one is going to come rescue you—you only have yourself. The good news, it turns out, is that you are all you need.” -Audible

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Opening thoughts:

I read Arnold’s other biography Total Recall a long time ago and it was one of my favorites and still is! I recently heard him on the Tim Ferriss podcast publicizing this new book and was excited to put it on my list. It seems like this book will be more focused on principles of success that he’s used in his life and that he believes will help others achieve their goals.

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Key notes:

• “Be useful” was the best piece of advice his father ever gave him 

Chapter 1: Have a Clear Vision

• Everything good and all great change starts with a clear vision
  • Vision is purpose and meaning
  • A clear vision is to have a picture of what you want your life to look like and a plan for how to get there
• People who feel lost often don’t realize that nobody forced them to make the decisions they made
  • These people feel like they had no choice in what became of their lives
• You can either start small and build out your vision, or start large and broad, then slowly focus and make it clearer 
• Taking time and space for yourself to walk and think is very important
  • Walking can increase creativity, inspire new ideas, and change people’s lives
• Even if you can figure out a big clear vision, start by making small goals to build up momentum
  • Then create time and space every day to think and daydream and let inspiration and ideas in
  • You have to check in with yourself every day to know where you stand

Chapter 2: Never Think Small

• Ignore the naysayers because they have never done anything big themselves
  • Otherwise, they would be encouraging you
• For the naysayers, you can either use them as motivation or ignore them
  • But don’t ever believe them 
• No plan B’s
• Once he got into politics, he discovered that the problem of gerrymandered districts led to nothing being done because no officials wanted to rock the boat even if they thought some proposed legislation was a good idea 
  • When it came to his redistricting initiative, his plan B was to succeed at plan A
  • Creating a plan B lessens your resolve for plan A, which is actually what you want and the great thing you could accomplish
• The only limits that truly exist are in our minds
• Going for your dreams and not giving up is not only good for your own happiness and success, but it can also inspire others to do the same

Chapter 3: Work Your Ass Off

• There is no substitute for putting in the work
  • In any area, you need to do the reps with proper form. Be all-in and focused for each one
• Pain and sacrifice are necessary for growth
  • Nothing builds character like resilience or perseverance through pain
  • Nothing destroys character like succumbing to pain and quitting
  • With that being said, enduring pain for no reason is stupid
    • We’re talking about productive pain that produces growth and builds character that gets you closer to achieving your vision
• Pain needs to have meaning for it to be bearable
  • Part of doing the hard work is following through until it’s done
• Busyness is bullshit
  • Everyone is busy. But if it matters to you, you’ll make the time
• When you’re chasing a vision and working towards that big goal, there’s nothing more energizing than making progress
• Maybe your problem isn’t time, but rather what you’re spending your time on

Chapter 4: Sell, Sell, Sell

• No matter what your vision is, you need to promote, communicate, and sell 
  • You need to know how to sell it and who to sell it to
• Technically, you are your first customer that you need to sell your vision to
• What is the value of trying to be someone that you’re not?
  • Of hiding from your true story and letting someone else tell it?
  • Where do you think that gets you in the end?
• Embrace who you are
  • Own your story, even if you don’t like it
  • Even if it’s bad and you’re ashamed
  • If you try to lie or hide from it, it’ll make you seem like a con artist, or worse, a politician
• He used language that better connected with people when trying to push the political initiatives he wanted to pass which led to more success and his reelection

Chapter 5: Shift Gears

• His rule: No complaining about a situation unless you’re prepared to do something to make it better
  • If you see a problem, and don’t come to the table with a potential solution, don’t start whining about how bad it is
• Negativity bias is what scientists think is a survival mechanism to keep us focused on the bad things 
  • In order to thrive, we have to get better at embracing our circumstances and shifting our perspective by finding what’s positive in whichever situation we find ourselves in
  • Being positive can have powerful effects on your health and life 
• Despite how hard his upbringing was, he’s grateful because it made him the person he is today
• He had a surprise open heart surgery that would have delayed filming for his new movie
  • However, he used the same processes of tracking and visualizing his progress which allowed him to get out of the hospital on time and begin strength training again
  • He knew the risks and actually never even considered suing the hospital or doctors
• He actually knew of the risks and prepared for it by asking for an open heart team to help ready for a worst-case scenario
  • Beyond that, he knew the doctors would do their best and they’re only human

You cannot control what happens to you in your life, but you can always control what you will feel and do about what happens to you

Viktor Frankl

• Failure is not fatal
  • It’s a cliche but the truth
• When failure is a positive part of the game that you play, it’s much less scary to search for the limit of your ability
• Risk and risk tolerance is relative
• Movie reference: Free Solo
• The real question when thinking about risk is: What do you have to lose? 

Chapter 6: Shut Your Mouth, Open Your Mind

• College and getting a degree can be great and has its place if your career or vision requires it
  • However, it doesn’t fulfill a purpose if you either don’t know what you want to do or if you’re sure of your vision which doesn’t require a degree
  • Ultimately, you’re just going to saddle yourself and your family with debt for no reason, which is one of the biggest problems for young people and an issue that society perpetuates
• For his life, the most valuable things he’s learned in the gym and putting in the work outside a classroom
  • Goal setting, planning, working hard, pushing through failure, communicating, and the value of helping others
• In many cases, the expensive education system that puts college on a pedestal can make people feel like they cannot afford to dream just because they can’t afford college
• Be curious
  • Important, interesting, powerful people are drawn to those who ask a lot of questions and listen well
    • When you’re curious and humble enough to admit you don’t know everything, people like that want to talk to you and want to help you
• Be a sponge

Chapter 7: Break Your Mirrors

• He was always confused when people called him a “self-made man” because he knew a lot of people helped him along the way
  • Even if there weren’t people who helped you but actually hurt you, they at least taught you something
    • Lessons learned, what not to do, and what not to be
• No one has ever done anything alone
  • We’ve always had help or guidance
  • Because of this, you have the responsibility to give back
  • To help others and send the ladder back down and lift the next group up
  • To pay it forward and be useful 
• Everyone benefits when you give back
  • Eventually, you’ll see it as a privilege you’ll never want to give up
  • Life isn’t zero-sum
    • We can all grow together, get rich together, get strong together
    • Everyone can win in their own time and own way
• You will get back exactly what you give
  • A study showed that it’s the act of giving that produces increased happiness, regardless of the amount of money
• You don’t have to rearrange your life to help other people
  • You just have to keep your eyes and ears open and be engaged with the world around you
• In our society that is so self-absorbed, begin to look less at yourself and less in the mirror, and more at each other

A Final Thank-You

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Closing thoughts:

This was a really solid book! I appreciate the overall message which is to give back, in addition to the tools the reader can leverage to create success in their own lives.

While the book doesn’t go too deep into any one area, I like how it’s broad enough to cover the main points as well as impart some easy steps to apply in one’s own life. I also like how he details the principles next to his real-life stories so that the ideas have some context to them. They aren’t just nice ideas, they’re actually principles he’s lived by in his own life. I feel like when ideas have real-life context, they can be more impactful for the reader.

Overall, I think this is a great book and would recommend this to anyone interested in personal development and who wants to hear about Arnold’s unbelievable life, spanning four different careers.

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One Takeaway / Putting into practice:

Even though most of the ideas in the book are very impactful, there’s nothing inherently unique to this book that hasn’t been covered in a multitude of other books. However, my main takeaway from this book would have to be the idea of “be useful” hence the title of the book. I think this idea is best described in these two notes:

• No one has ever done anything alone
• Everyone benefits when you give back

One thing that makes Arnold very likable is that he seems to exude a lot of humility for someone who is so accomplished. He acknowledges that others call him “self-made” but strongly feels that he’s a product of many people helping him along the way. Because of this, the overarching idea of this book is that it’s our responsibility to give back to others in order to pay it forward.

Better yet, giving back and being useful is something that benefits everyone in the long run, so it just makes sense.

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Nutshell:

Arnold Schwarzenegger imparts seven tools for living a successful life in this inspiring and motivational work.

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Similar books:

• Can’t Hurt Me by David Goggins
• Man’s Search for Meaning by Viktor Frankl
• Open by Andre Agassi
• Greenlights by Matthew McConaughey
• Endure by Cameron Hanes
• The Comfort Crisis by Michael Easter

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Rating:

4/5

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