Thrive: The Third Metric to Redefining Success and Creating a Life of Well-Being, Wisdom, and Wonder

In this book, the author redefines the definition of success in today’s world. Money and Power alone is not everything. The author compares Money and Power to two legs of a three legged stool. With a two legged stool may temporarily hold up but it would eventually topple over.We need a third metric for defining success and to lead a healthy, meaningful, productive life. In order to lead a meaningful life, the third metric comprises of well-being, wisdom, wonder and giving. The four sections in this book elaborates on these 4 topics of Well being, Wisdom, Wonder and Giving.Well Being:A New blueprint is required to renovate the architecture of our lives. What we really value is out of sync with how we live our lives. Our work culture considers exhaustion and burnout as a badge of honor.Burnout has become a common disease that we are willing to live with. Burnout, stress and depression has become common epidemics.So in this section on Well Being, the book covers in detail how to take care of your physical / emotional well being / health.Healthy Employees, Healthy Bottom Lines – There is a direct correlation between the long term health of a company’s bottom line and health of the employees.Meditation – It is not just for Enlightenment anymore. One of easier way to be healthier and happier is through mindfulness and meditation. Meditation practiced regularly can transform your health and life.Over connectivity – The snake in our digital garden of Eden. Due to the ever increasing creep of technology into our lives, families, bedrooms and our brains, it is much harder to renew ourselves.Securing your own mask first – Meditation, Yoga, Mindfulness, napping and deep breathing are important for our well being and better performance. When people are taking care of themselves, they will be more effective in taking care of others.Sleep your way to the top – Most basic shift in redefining success in our lives is to do with our strained relationship to sleep. We have a mistaken belief that success is proportional to the amount of time we put in work, instead of the quality of the time we put in. Hence to gain time we sacrifice on sleep. Our creativity, ingenuity, confidence and decision making can be enhanced simply by getting enough sleep.WisdomWisdom is about recognizing what we are really seeking; connection and love. In order to find them we need to drop our relentless pursuit of success as society defines it for something more genuine, more meaningful and more fulfilling.Power of the Hunch – When your inner voice speaks, shut up and listen – This section elaborates on the importance of intuition – our inner knowing. It is important to understand that intuition is not intellect. Meditation, Yoga and Mindfulness help us to still noise of the world so we can listen to our inner voice.iParadox – Your smartphone is not making you Wiser. This section elaborates on how our increasing dependence on technology is making it harder to connect with our wisdom.Hurry Sickness and Time famine – This section elaborates on the importance of slowing down. It is important to overcome the obsession with time and deficit crisis.Evicting the obnoxious roommate in our head – The self talk within our head that is putting us down and strengthening our insecurities and doubts. This section is all about how you stop all the negative self-talk.Breaking bad habits – what we can learn from minotaurs, seat belts and stoics – This section is all about liberating ourselves from our old habits, building new healthy habits. It is important to find the thread that work for us.It is important to listen to our inner wisdom and let go anything that we no longer need – something that is draining our energy without benefitting in anyway. Disconnecting from the digital world will help you reconnect to the inner wisdom, intuition and creativity.WonderWonder is not a product of what we see – of how beautiful or mysterious or singular or incomprehensible something may be. It is a product of our state of mind, our being, the perspective from which we are looking at the world. Countless things in our daily lives can awaken the almost constant state of wonder.Silence, My Old Friend – The silence in our lives is under assault on all fronts; headline news, alarms, buzzing and chirping smart phones etc. This section is all about how to gain our silence in our lives.Coincidences – Life’s secret door to wonder – The pathway to awakening wonder in our lives is the serendipity of coincidence. This section elaborates on the important role coincidences play in our lives.Memento Mori – This section elaborates on the role of death and how it results in transformation and renewal.GivingGiving is all about widening the boundaries of our caring. Well being, Wisdom, Wonder – All are critical to redefining success and thriving, but they are incomplete without the fourth element of the Third metric – giving.Giving, loving, caring, empathy and compassion, going beyond ourselves and stepping out of our comfort zones to help server others – this is the only viable answer to the multitude of problems the world is facing.Don’t wait for a Natural Disaster for us to Tap into our Natural Humanity – We live in a connected world and every action of ours touch people every day in ways we may never know. This section elaborates on the importance of giving and helping not just in time of disaster but going beyond that.Go-Getters are good; Go-Givers are Better – The topic itself is self explaining.Science Proves – Love Grows Brains – There are studies that proves that volunteering activities were more likely to engage in brain building activities that lowers the risk of diseases. All about giving and how it impacts our lives.Press 1 to Donate – Technology meets philanthropy – This section is about how technology has leveled the giving field.Lessons in giving – It is not a trade but an offering. Giving is not bartering is the message.“Onward, Upward and Inward”We are living in a world of distractions. What is required is to find your place of wisdom and peace and strength. Remake the world in the our own image, according to our own definition of success, so that all of us can thrive and live our lives with more grace, more joy, more compassion, more gratitude and more love.In summary, I liked this book and its message. It would have been better if the author has split the sections in each topics into separate sub chapter. There are places where the presentation was monotonous.

A good and very sincere book written by a very successful businesswoman. The main idea is both highly simple and very old: it's high time to redefine what means to be successful in life or "what is a good life?" Over time "success, money, and power have practically become synonymous in the minds of many" but this idea works – at least appear to work – only in the short term. As A. Huffington (AH) writes "over the long term, money and power by themselves are like two-legged stool – you can balance on them for a while, but eventually you are going to topple over". So, we – people - need to have a third measure of success – she calls it a Third Metric. In her eyes it consists of four constituents: well-being, wisdom, wonder and giving. In fact the book is devoted to a careful discussion around these four notions. All logic of AH is based on two assumptions. "The first is that we all have within us a centered place of wisdom, harmony and strength…The second … is that we're all going to veer away from that place again and again and again".Then in the first chapter she step by step discusses the problems of the present-day society linked closely with well-being:Burnout – as a result of a zeal to overwork that leads to high level of stress and decreases productivity;The link between the health of employees and bottom lines;Overconnectivity of modern life and the state of being drowned in plenty of data;The constant lack of time for all our tasks and our multitasking fever.Her recipes: sleep enough, meditate, do not overwork, turn off your gadgets regularly, use general well-being instead of GDP as an indicator of economic successNext chapter is about wisdom. In fact she is speaking about the same problems as in the previous chapter but at another point of view: "Wisdom is precisely what is missing when – like rats in the famous experiment by B.F. Skinner … -we press the same levers again and again even though there is no longer any real reward". Here AH mentions in passing about the notion of Data-Information-Knowledge-Wisdom and Big Data. Her recipe: listen to your inner wisdom, break bad habits, change yourself…A chapter named Wonder is about the purpose of life itself – and "that purpose is self-actualization…"; about silence – "ask your soul"; about coincidences which awaken wonder in our lives; about death which is inseparable side of life.At last the chapter Giving is about compassion and altruism: "helping others makes us happier"…"Onward, upward, and inward!" – these are the last words of this book.It's worth noting that the author gives a lot of examples both from scientific studies and from her life and the life of her family as well as from the lives of her close friends. Especially touching – at least for me – were the pieces where AH tells about lessons that she got from her mom and about her mom's death. All mentions on people, events or names are carefully described in Notes. There are Appendices as well where a reader can find references about tools/sites for meditation, relaxing, giving, volunteering, etc.What I don't agree with:The third metric model tacitly equals the human side of human being with money and power. I think that money are necessary only as the means for self-actualization but can't be the purpose of a wisdom man. The more the power may be a purpose only for a very limited number of people. Of course AH is right when she writes that modern society forces us to think that money and power mean success but nevertheless I consider them as lower steps of Maslow hierarchy.And my second doubt is about the assumption "… that we all have within us a centered place of wisdom, harmony and strength". I'm afraid that not all have… and I don't know what is the part of those who have… Of course potentially all people may have… but in reality …

I genuinely thought this book would inspire given the great reviews. It did not inspire me.The style of writing was irritating - a mix of journalistic and academic writing that seemed to pluck evidence from random studies and surveys to justify every point made. The barriers to change for an ordinary person were not acknowledged, and there were few practical steps recommended to achieving a thriving life. The vast majority of people who are failing to thrive are either in poor relationships they feel unable to change, in jobs where they work too hard for too little pay, with debts and childcare they seem unable to afford or with ill health that is not getting better. It is difficult for people in these situations to instantly get a job in a company that allows pets, has meditation rooms or yoga classes, or to take the time and finance required to change their lives. All of this is ignored, as if the reader is in an ideal practical position and simply has to join a yoga class!Changing behaviour is not about evidence of what works; it is about taking the small steps towards a healthier life, and finding ways of overcoming the barriers to do so.

This book totally resonated with me, picking up some of the conclusions I’ve come to myself about living a better life but weaving all the ideas into a coherent framework. And all communicated in such a mellifluous easy to follow style. A true joy to read/listen to - and I believe a truly important work if only enough of us act on it.

It took me a little while to get into this book but now I’ve finished it I want to read it again immediately. Such a positive book. A must read for all but especially if your in a senior leadership position. Expect to have your values challenged and start a new personal journey to what “good” looks like

I saw Ariana on Super Soul Sunday (Oprah Winfrey) and thought she was an incredible lady. I loved and resonated with her story and purchased this book once her interview finished. She truly is an inspiration and delivers a message that we should all hear.Definitely a feel good book that will make you feel more positive and motivated! A great read! A great role model!

There were some good ‘one-liners’ in here which have made me think about life but on the whole, this was a disappointing read. So much so, I skipped the last third and guessed at what was being said. It’s not written in the easiest style; too much embedding of research and ‘he said she said’ anecdotes. On the whole, highly disappointing as I really wanted to love it; only really suited to those in cooperate business roles with families.