Paul Angone has really made a splash with his book, “101 Secrets for Your 20s,” or at least he has in my opinion. I’ve been following his blog All Groan Up (www.allgroanup.com) and I have been privileged to read the book for myself. (At this point, I’m going to apologize to Paul, because I was supposed to have this up quite a while ago, but life got in the way.) Anyway, this book has been a serious life changer for me. I’m on the cusp of 20-somethingness, but that didn’t make this book any less applicable to how I feel sometimes, and how I’m sure you feel at times too.
Paul has put himself out there to say what most people feel, but no one talks about. He talks about how alone and lost and scared we are as we are starting out into this brave new world we’ve landed in, and tells us two things. One, it’s okay that we feel this way, but we aren’t as alone as we feel, and two, how to feel less alone. Whether its humorously telling us we may (or may not) be as adult as we think we are, or seriously telling us to seek the help of a therapist (or psychologist, or trusted mentor) for the help we need, or semi-seriously teaching us Wineology so we are never cast out to the kiddie table again, Paul manages to help us feel at ease and feel like we are talking to someone our age, who totally gets it. And he gets it because he’s gone through it, and to some extent probably is, right Paul?
And that probably teaches us another good lesson. That as much as we think the only ones who understand us are our peers, but that older people– coworkers, parents, aunts/uncles/grandparents, neighbors, elders, etc. went through these things and do know how we are feeling, and want to help. We just have to ask.
Paul wanted to help, and that is why he wrote “101 Secrets for Your 20s.” And that’s why I’m telling you to get this book. Paul will challenge you to change your way of thinking so you can pursue those dreams that you have rattling around in your head, because he wants you to succeed and he wants you to live awesomely. Even if you don’t totally agree with everything he has to say, or believes, or some of these “Secrets” aren’t really applicable, the amount of them that are, is so worth the price. You won’t find something cheaper that will be this immediately applicable to your life. You’ll come back to this book again and again, looking for the solace in its pages.
You’ll have to buy the book and see for yourself, or convince someone else to buy it for you.
The Walk to Womanhood 