Top critical review
3.0 out of 5 starsWonderful Advice, but not as Visionary or Devotional as I Hoped it Would Be
Reviewed in the United States 🇺🇸 on October 21, 2010
Coach John Wooden was legendary for his success in coaching UCLA basketball teams which won 7 consecutive NCAA titles and a total of 10, as well as winning 88 straight games. But people off the court have also recognized him as a great teacher.
His "Pyramid for Success" is a widely used motivational, self-help method/book, and it is filled with useful life information. His definition of success, for example, is very useful for those distracted by more worldly and more selfish measures of success. For Wooden, success is "a peace of mind that is the direct result of self-satisfaction in knowing you did your best to become the best that you are capable of becoming." Anyone who reads this book will not fail to come away with some important lessons in life.
I also like the way that Jay Carty has taken Wooden's principles and then applied them to the life of Christians from the Bible: what a wonderful enhancement to Wooden's work!
I do, however, have 2 criticisms of the book. First, I'm not convinced that all of the 15 "building blocks" and 10 "mortar qualities" necessarily build on each other the way the book implies. They seem more like disjointed points which, though excellent, don't add up to a coherent vision to understand and live life. My second criticism is that by building a devotional book on top of Wooden's pyramid, one comes away sometimes with the idea that one is building up oneself in terms of faith or salvation. Wooden's advice is based on human experience and endeavor and doesn't begin with the gospel of grace. For this reason, the devotional part of the book, while very useful in some ways, is insufficient and even misleading.
