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Book Review: The Language of Love And Respect

April 18, 2010 18:36 by ckincincy

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I debated posting this on this blog. I try to keep this blog fairly technical, but do make an exception on occasion.

As techies, we sometimes have a hard time relating with others.  Plus our spouses need to be extra patient when we are on our 60+ hour schedules near the end of a project.  This book, while Christian at its core, is loaded with practical's for having a strong and healthy marriage.

As a member of the Thomas Nelson Blogging team I get the occasional free book to review.  When The Language of Love and Respect by Dr. Emerson Eggerichs came up as available I jumped all over it.

Many months later I am done.  I really struggled with reading this book because I have been reading and following Dr. Eggerichs’s teachings since he first aired on Focus on the Family many years ago.  I bought the CD of the Focus on the Family broadcast, bought and read the book, and went on a two day retreat around this teaching. 

The unfortunate side effect of this, is that there was little new in this book.  It was rehashing a lot of what I heard during the two day retreat focused on the book.  However, as I finally fought through the book I found the meat that made this book worthwhile.  Chapter 14 and on was very refreshing to read.  Several practical points with the Love and Respect teaching.  I’ll be going back over those chapters and making sure I pick up more of the pointers in them.

While my reading of this book was a bit saturated with past knowledge, if you haven’t been exposed to the Love and Respect teaching I would highly recommend this book.  This will change any marriage when applied.  Even if it doesn’t, when this book in particular is applied your perspective of your marriage will change.  It makes a difficult marriage something a person can work through personally.


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Obstacles Welcome by Ralph de la Vega

November 3, 2009 16:49 by ckincincy

imageThe third installment in the book review program with Thomas Nelson publishing, covered here, was  a leadership book written by the top executive of AT&T wireless, Ralph de la Vega. 

This book is an extremely easy read, almost story like.  This book was a review of de la Vega’s life, from a poor Cuban immigrant to who he is today.  Where the title comes from, is without the obstacles he has faced he wouldn’t be where he is today.  So obstacles should be welcomed, not avoided. 

This book was obviously de la Vega’s way to try and cement his legacy, filled with several great quotes and pointers about how to plan for success, in spite of obstacles.  Great words of wisdom on how to build a team that is destined for success. 

I’ll be passing this book onto the local VP of my employer.  There is nothing, if implemented correctly, in this book that would cause issues for the employee.  Then I’ll be re-reading parts of this book in the future to get a good handle on some of it’s concepts.

The only negative I have about this book is that, at times, it was a little too simple of a book.  Almost minimizing the real struggles and failures that happen, even when all the right steps were taken along the way.


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Book Review – The Well-Behaved Child

October 7, 2009 19:10 by ckincincy

image This is the second installment in my book review program with Thomas Nelson publishing. 

I had originally chosen a different book, but it had printing issues and they sent me this one instead.  I am very grateful for this change of plans.

I had never heard of John Rosemond before this book, so I had no idea what to expect.  It turns out that John Rosemond is the anti-psychologist psychologist.  Much of his book is based round his fundamental belief that psychologist have screwed up America’s children and over medicated them. 

Now out of full disclosure, one of my children go to a therapist almost weekly.  She is not my biological child and she has a heavy and damaging history. 

I found myself in 80 to 90 percent agreement with much of this book.  However I am a firm believer that drugs have their place in some treatment.  I do think we over medicate our children in a grand fashion, but that doesn’t mean they should be avoided 100%. 

Back to the book.  The author goes into pretty good detail what bad behavior is and how to treat them.  With sections devoted to some of the most common problems. 

If you have good children, buy this book.  If you have bad children, buy this book.  It is crammed full of practical wisdom.  Again, for full disclosure, this is a Christian book at its core.  But even the non-Christian would find this book very good.  It builds on Christian principals and is not a selling pitch for the Christian faith.

Great children don’t happen by accident, and I’ll  even say bad children don’t happen by accident as well.  There is an important role that parents need to play and for far to long parents have vacated those roles.


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Fearless by Max Lucado

September 7, 2009 21:05 by ckincincy

imageAs mentioned in my prior post, I will be doing the occasional book review on this site.  I am a member of the Thomas Nelson Blogger Book review program.

For many of my blog readers the name Max Lucado means nothing to you.  He is a well written Christian author who has a very identifiable style to his writing.  This book did not disappoint.  It focuses on Max Lucado’s specialty and that is talking about the grace of God.  This book goes over a new kind of fear in each chapter from the fear of screwing up your children, to the fear of God being mad at you. 

What it doesn’t aim to offer is a lot of practical pointers.  Its focus is more on encouraging one to rely more on God and not be fearful of the given topic. 

I will say that if you need some encouragement due to the recent economic downturn or job uncertainties, this isn’t a bad read.


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Book Review Program

August 15, 2009 10:06 by ckincincy

As I mentioned in my prior post, I have recently closed a personal blog and will post personal content on this blog on occasion. 

Today as I was going through my saved book marks I found this link which talks about free books if you agree to review them on your blog.  So I registered with their program, and I hope to get my first book soon and then I will review it here.

This is a Christian publisher so that will be the topic of those post.  One of the goals will be to show where my faith comes into play in my profession.

What I think is great about this is that the book industry is struggling and they know it.  Just like the music industry.  Many executives and companies are trying to find ways to prevent technology from changing the way they do business, but this publisher is trying to find ways to utilize the wave of technology to expand their business in new ways.  You have to celebrate that as a geek.