The concepts laid out in this book fly in the face of conventional wisdom, but as Buckingham develops them with numerous examples from both research and real life, you have that “Ah ha!” moment. As a mother of 2, with a full time job to pay the bills and a part time job that I love, I have had a constant struggle to find balance between doing what I love, spending time with my family, and being fully present at work. No matter what I do it doesn’t seem to work (and I have an incredibly supportive husband.) Then I read Buckinham’s explanation of balance and why it is an unfulfilling goal. Ah-ha! In order to balance, the scale must be perfectly still. There can be no movement from balance- once you achieve it you’re stuck.

This is just one of the numerous “Ah ha!” moments I had while reading this book. I dog-eared pages, I marked the parts I wanted my husband to read. The advice is real, actionable and practical. In fact, the final portion of the book is a sort of “FAQs of a Strong Life”- you’ve gained all of this amazing insight into yourself, your work, your family- here’s how to implement it.

Highly recommended. It’s written in a conversational style that I could have breezed right through, but it resonated in a way that made me constantly put it down and think about what I had just read and how it applied.