Customer Reviews

The Measure of Our Success: A Letter to My Children and Yours

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This book is truly one of the most oustanding books on success, Life fufillment and child care. The author gives some really powerful principles on success and achievement, such as never stop learning and improving your mind, Setting goals and working quietly and systematicly to achieve them and never giving up no matter what happens or struggles that you face.This book really inspired and motivated me to succeed and I believe anyone who puts it's principles to work will succeed to.

Drawing from inspirational experiences from her own childhood, Dr. Edelman talks to (not at) her own children, urging them, in whatever occupation they may choose, to serve the community at large. This is also a book for adults (parents, educators, and religious and community leaders) to read, to live a life of principles and a desire to somehow make the world a better place - in short, to serve as the strong, positive role model that so many of our children have had to do without.

The book is also an indictment on how American society and political leadership do a great job at paying lip service to the needs of children but fails miserably in their actions. Complaining, however, is not enough; if children are to grow up to be conscientious and caring citizens, adults must set a good example.

It's a small book with a big heart and a great message. I strongly recommend it to anyone who cares about children and social justice in general.

I was moved deeply by this book. I have never felt so strongly about a book. I feel that it is a must for all members of my family and it is certainly on my wish list for all my friends and family. I'm sorry I did not learn of this book earlier.

The book is short -- less than 100 pages. Yet, I spent many more hours reading this book than most. Why? Edelman has the ability to really draw you into her heart and her mind. I found myself rereading pages, lessons, and chapters because I enjoyed them so much the first time. I've read this book cover to cover three or four times.

It's a wonderful, emotional, insightful, inspirational 97 pages. Buy two copies, and give one to your parents or children.

Sometimes when we think our parents are about to talk to us, we automatically assume we will be in for another lecture. This book is not the case. The author takes the time to translate 25 mini-life lessons handed down to her by her parents and interprets them into the fail proof actions her children should follow in order to fully become productive members of our American society.

This is definitely what every parent, parent association, mentoring program, and teacher should read. It speaks volumes on so many issues that affect our children. It provokes one to action. It also sets a tone of excellence that can be realized in each child despite their race, gender, or economic status. It emphasizes drawing on the resources within to make it in life.

A valuable component is the author's challenge to have young people learn the value of serving others.

This is one book that reads easy and speaks a lot of truth. You must have it in your personal library collection.

I wish I'd read this a lot soon. As a white foster mom of 2 afro-american girls, this is a treasury of wisdom, hope and promise. I will be sure both my foster daughters have a copy of this book and will hope that as they get older, they will refer to the wisdom and thoughts of Marian Wright Edelman with frequency and habit.

The author has written a book which combines traditional values with extraordinary wisdom and an eloquent statement of a needed American agenda to get children out of poverty. A black woman married to a somewhat prominent Jewish attorney (Peter Edelman) who has made his own impact on public policy, the author addresses this book to her three sons as they face growing up with the rare combination of being black, Jewish, and the sons of prominent people in the world of governmental policy-making.

The author protects her children's privacy, and gives us few personal anecdotes about them. She wants her children to successfully make their way in the world, and hopes that they will find the examples of their parents and grandparents to be inspiring and useful.

The heart of this book is the author's 25 lessons for life. It is a message of personal responsibility that the most hardened conservative would have problems disagreeeing with. But she breaks with conservatives in asking that the notion of personal responsibility cover responsibility for getting the government and other agents of society to take care of needy children even if their parents do not have the personal responsibility or the resources to do what they should do themselves.

Her 25 Lessons for Life are as follows: "(1) There is no free lunch. Don't feel entitled to anything you don't sweat and struggle for; (2) Set goals and work quietly and systematically toward them; (3) Assign yourself; (4) Never work just for money or for power. They won't save your soul or help you sleep at night; (5) Don't be afraid of taking risks or of being criticized; (6) Take parenting and family life seriously and insist that those you work for and who represent you do; (7) Remember that you wife is not your mother or your maid, but your partner and friend; (8) Forming families is serious business; (9)Be honest; (10)Remember and help America remember that the fellowship of human beings is more important than the fellowship of race and class and gender in a democratic society; (11) Don't confuse style with substance; (12) Never give up; (13) Be confident that you can make a difference; (14) Don't ever stop learning and improving your mind; (15) Don't be afraid of hard work or of teaching your children to work; (16) Slow down and live; (17) Choose your firends carefully; (18) Be a can-do, will-try person; (19) Try to live in the present; (20) Use your political and ecnomic power for the community and others less fortunate; (21) Listen for 'the sound of the genuine' within yourself and others; (22) You are in charge of your own attitude; (23) Remember your roots, your history, and the forbears' shoulders on which you stand; (24) Be reliable; Be faithful; finish what you start; (25) Always remember that you are never alone.

Each lesson is accompanied by an essay that places it in both personal and societal context. The lesson on being confident that you can make a difference, for instance, offers the personal advice not to get overwhelmed, to take each day and each task as they come, and to break all the tasks into manageable pieces of action while you still are striving to see the whole without thinking you need to win in order to make a difference.

The personal advice is followed by eloquent quotes from the theologian Reinhold Niebuhr ("Nothing that is worth doing can be achieved in our lifetime; therefore we must be saved by hope....by faith....by love....by...forgiveness") and Sojourner Truth, the ex-slave and abolitionist who urged her audiences to remember the bite of a flea and keep oppressors scratching.

"Remember it's sometimes important to lose for things that matter and that many fruits of your labor will not become manifest for many, many years, " the author says.

The author has an eye for eloquent quotes from people from Einstein to Eisenhower, but she herself is as eloquent as anyone she quotes. "Ironically," she writes, "as Communism is collapsing all around the world, the American Dream is collapsing all around America for millions of children, youths and families of all racial and income groups. American is pitted against American as economic uncertainty and downturn increase our fears, our business failures, our poverty rates, our racial divisions, and the dangers of political demagoguery.....

"All our children are growing up today in an ethically polluted nation where instant sex without responsibility, instant gratification without effort, instant solutions without sacrifice, getting rather than giving, and hoarding rather than sharing are the too-frequent signals of our mass media, business, and poltiical life....

"No parent can shut out completely the pollution of our airwaves and popular culture, which glorify excessive violence, profligate consumption, easy sex and greed, and depict deadly alcohol and tobacco products as fun, glamorous, and macho...

"{T)he standard for success for too many Americans has become personal greed rather than the common good, and as it has become enough to get by rather than do one's best.

"All our children are affected by escalating violdence fueled by unbridled trafficking in guns and in the drugs that are pervasive in suburb, rural area, and inner city alike.

"Young families of all races, on whom we count to raise healthy children for America's future, are in extraordinary trouble...."

Despite her passion, eloquence, and commitment, neither the author nor her causes have received enough attention from the federal government in the years since she wrote this book. This reviewer hopes that the author will be an active and influential voice in Washington if the Democrats win the Presidency in 2008.

Every semester since I first read this book, I read it again. All of my college students are thankful for this assigned reading. I feel like I could have written so many parts, especially the lessons to the children.

The book was in very good condition and it was fast delivery. I would definitely order from this seller again.

She feels it is the responsibility of you and I, through government (by paying enough taxes), to elliminate poor families in America. She writes that one should not feel 'entitled' to anything they didnt 'sweat' and 'work for'. Then says 'we' should 'give' to the poor instead of buying more things for ourselves.

I have to say, a lot of what she says, I agree with. But, I think it should predominantly be the place of individuals and churches, not the government, to bring aid and love to the poor. Communist and socialist governments have NOT proven their supperiority to capitalism. Why do you think people in communist and socialist countries keep trying to come to America? This book seems like standard Clinton ideology.

She tells us not to make, snicker, of stand for racial jokes. Then in the next chapter she tells one of her own in support of black pride. She doesnt seem to be consistent or color blind. Seems like hypocracy at times.

If you have a passion for the poor and oppressed and want a book that will give you some practical ways to change the world, read "Irrisistible Revolution", by Claiborne. This book is a lot more inspiring and thought-provoking in my opinion. Claiborne focuses on community activism changing society, rather than the government changing people. A better road to hoe if you ask me