Life throws you curveballs, barriers, roadblocks and obstacles, regardless of who you are. Ever wonder how or why they keep getting in the way? The answer itself may be a curveball. Kevin E. Eastman delivers an unprecedented, no-holds-barred approach combining observation with common sense and experience, to reveal some surprising truths about what may be making life complicated. Growth only occurs by getting beyond the boundaries of comfort, and this book is going to test those boundaries. Gambling on improvement shouldn't be done if the odds don't favor you, and Kevin reduces the guesswork of getting them there. This is a must-read for anyone tired of "detours" blocking the path to success and happiness. The jaw-dropping explanations are raw, hard-hitting, and in your face... but fun, engaging, and most importantly, informative - 100% real!

Self-help book, designed to help people identify potential problem areas in there lives, and methods to improve them.

Life throws you curveballs, barriers, roadblocks and obstacles, regardless of who you are. Ever wonder how or why they keep getting in the way? The answer itself may be a curveball. Kevin E. Eastman delivers an unprecedented, no-holds-barred approach combining observation with common sense and experience, to reveal some surprising truths about what may be making life complicated. Growth only occurs by getting beyond the boundaries of comfort, and this book is going to test those boundaries. Gambling on improvement shouldn't be done if the odds don't favor you, and Kevin reduces the guesswork of getting them there. This is a must-read for anyone tired of "detours" blocking the path to success and happiness. The jaw-dropping explanations are raw, hard-hitting, and in your face... but fun, engaging, and most importantly, informative - 100% real!

A Wall Street Journal bestseller, now in paperback. Poker champion turned decision strategist Annie Duke teaches you how to get comfortable with uncertainty and make better decisions. Even the best decision doesn't yield the best outcome every time. There's always an element of luck that you can't control, and there's always information hidden from view. So the key to long-term success (and avoiding worrying yourself to death) is to think in bets: How sure am I? What are the possible ways things could turn out? What decision has the highest odds of success? Did I land in the unlucky 10% on the strategy that works 90% of the time? Or is my success attributable to dumb luck rather than great decision making? Annie Duke, a former World Series of Poker champion turned consultant, draws on examples from business, sports, politics, and (of course) poker to share tools anyone can use to embrace uncertainty and make better decisions. For most people, it's difficult to say "I'm not sure" in a world that values and, even, rewards the appearance of certainty. But professional poker players are comfortable with the fact that great decisions don't always lead to great outcomes, and bad decisions don't always lead to bad outcomes. By shifting your thinking from a need for certainty to a goal of accurately assessing what you know and what you don't, you'll be less vulnerable to reactive emotions, knee-jerk biases, and destructive habits in your decision making. You'll become more confident, calm, compassionate, and successful in the long run.

A gripping, true story of one man’s forty-year struggle with compulsive gambling and his hard-won recovery. "My history of gambling really began before I was born." So opens Born to Lose, Bill Lee's self-told story of gambling addiction, set in San Francisco's Chinatown and steeped in a culture where it is not unheard of for gamblers (Lee's grandfather included) to lose their children to a bet. From wagering away his beloved baseball card collection as a youngster to forfeiting everything he owned at black jack tables in Las Vegas, Lee describes what gambling addiction feels like from the inside and how recovery is possible through the Twelve Step program.

machines stems from the consumer, the product, or the interplay between the two. --

Ten years of research uncover the secret source of growth and profit … Those who center their business on improving people’s lives have a growth rate triple that of competitors and outperform the market by a huge margin. They dominate their categories, create new categories and maximize profit in the long term. Pulling from a unique ten year growth study involving 50,000 brands, Jim Stengel shows how the world's 50 best businesses—as diverse as Method, Red Bull, Lindt, Petrobras, Samsung, Discovery Communications, Visa, Zappos, and Innocent—have a cause and effect relationship between financial performance and their ability to connect with fundamental human emotions, hopes, values and greater purposes. In fact, over the 2000s an investment in these companies—“The Stengel 50”—would have been 400 percent more profitable than an investment in the S&P 500. Grow is based on unprecedented empirical research, inspired (when Stengel was Global Marketing Officer of Procter & Gamble) by a study of companies growing faster than P&G. After leaving P&G in 2008, Stengel designed a new study, in collaboration with global research firm Millward Brown Optimor. This study tracked the connection over a ten year period between financial performance and customer engagement, loyalty and advocacy. Then, in a further investigation of what goes on in the “black box” of the consumer’s mind, Stengel and his team tapped into neuroscience research to look at customer engagement and measure subconscious attitudes to determine whether the top businesses in the Stengel Study were more associated with higher ideals than were others. Grow thus deftly blends timeless truths about human behavior and values into an action framework – how you discover, build, communicate, deliver and evaluate your ideal. Through colorful stories drawn from his fascinating personal experiences and “deep dives” that bring out the true reasons for such successes as the Pampers, HP, Discovery Channel, Jack Daniels and Zappos, Grow unlocks the code for twenty-first century business success.

We all go through life with similar struggles and desires, but not everyone follows their childhood dreams, not everyone is successful, or at least feels that way. There are also moments in your life when something unusual happens. An accident, a health problem, or something bigger than your job, your career. In those moments, life loses its meaning and you start to think: Is what I am doing now all there is? Is this what I dreamed of as a child? What am I here for? Similar questions have been on my mind for more than two decades of my life, and I have found answers that I am willing to share with you in this book. People who are truly successful do things differently than most, and it is not too late for you to learn what they know. Without finding your purpose, true success can be very difficult to achieve. It is never too late to change the way you think, to act differently, and to make a difference. Everyone needs to believe in something, even if it is only in their own abilities. I invite you on an exciting journey of self-discovery and the beginning of a new phase of your life. What you will find in this book is a great insight into the psychology of who you are and a different perspective on widely accepted truths. It will teach you how to work on yourself and apply the knowledge you find to your own life. I've turned my life around, and so can you. You already have what you need. Find out how you can live the life of your dreams! "The world of subjective contrast and compassion Is a false world, built entirely By each person’s imagination. Nothing is as it seems...” ~ Zen proverb

For four years, Munish Bansal has chatted with thousands of people online and in emails in his quest to reduce suffering and empower humanity. His message of hope and love and worldwide understanding permeate every page of this life-affirming book. Why are we here? How can we make our lives better? How can we end wars and ensure that every person on the planet has enough to eat and a decent place to live? Through fables, personal anecdotes, conversations, emails and chat transcripts, Bansal shows us how often the way to create more charitable people is simply through talk. Part of Bansal's mission is to start a charity project to effect worldwide change, including a film and more books, with all proceeds going to fund hospitals, schools and more goodwill activities. Empowering and inspiring, A Human Life could change your life-and the lives of everyone on the planet.

Get into the minds of the greatest gamblers of all time. Read in-depth interviews with eight masters of the games. Learn how they think, how they play, and what made them successful. The interview subjects include: Billy Walters (sports betting), Chip Reese (poker), Doyle Brunson (poker), Mike Svobodny (backgammon), Stan Tomchin (backgammon and sports betting), Cathy Hulbert (blackjack and poker), Alan Woods (blackjack and horse racing), and Tommy Hyland (blackjack).