Customer Reviews

The Type-Z Guide to Success: A Lazy Person's Manifesto to Wealth and Fulfillment

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I happened upon this book by chance and am so glad that I did. I've been beating myself up for a long time since I'm not a type A personality and felt that because I wasn't, success would be very difficult for me to achieve. Now, after reading this book and doing the exercises, my entire mindset has changed. Things are already starting to look up and I've started having some serendipitous moments just as Marc Allen describes will happen.

I highly recommend this book!

I have told people that I am a Type-Z person for years, which the Z stands for Zzzzz, i.e. snoring. Most smile at my silly joke, and that makes me think of myself as a comedian, but I never think that someone would publish a book with such a title ;)

The book, The Type-Z Guide to Success: A Lazy Person's Manifesto to Wealth and Fulfillment, is a manifestation to the book's objective. True to the Type-Z philosophy, the book is short and sweet and to the point. The author, Marc Allen, claims that he is as lazy and unorganized as it comes. He does not work on Monday, and frequently sleep until past 11, which I can completely relate.

However, there is no doubt about Marc's success, and he attributes his success to his laziness and his focus, via using intentional manifestation. In the book he describe a simple and easy system that he has devised since he was 30 years old.

Now - intentional manifestation is not a new concept, but few people probably tie that together with laziness. The conventional wisdom is that in order to become successful, one would have to focus, and in order to achieve that focus, that basically means the focus will consume a person's life. An especially prevalent view about entrepreneur completely matches this description - they are exchanging life for financial and professional rewards.

From Marc's point of view, though, he believes that the true accomplishment does not come from the doing, but rather the thinking. When one is truly focused but maintain relaxed state, one would invoke the subconscious to help with the effort. Instead of just doing a bunch of stuffs, having the time and energy to think will allow us to focus on the truly important, and allow our subconscious to help show us the way.

Thus - it is important not to confuse lazy as unfocused - laziness along does not reduce our chance of being successful. Example - many computer people have a degree of laziness - after all, they rather think of better solutions than doing things manually ;)

I love the concept of having a short book. I believe that a book should be to the point and has no fillers. However, I did not find the interactive features that came with the eBook as being all that useful. Maybe this is because the interactive features actually interrupt my train of thought as I go through the book. I might try to re-read the book through again in the future and do the interactive feature separately to see if I feel differently.

Who will get benefit from this book?

If you are a Type-Z person like me, you will probably be rejoiced that someone else has given the affirmation that you too can be successful without having to change your lifestyle. Unless, of course, you want to.

However, I think the benefit really belongs to the Type-A people. The truth is that these days people are really just getting busy without getting things done, and many Type-A people fall into that trap. This book can help the Type-A people to rethink about whether they are really getting somewhere, or just having the appearance of getting busy, but nothing to show for it.

If you have not sat down and have a quality meal with a quality conversation with your family, significant other, or good friends lately, then you need this book.

You will find gems in it.

I came across this book in a used book store and really enjoyed it. It's small, easy to read, the author regularly summarizes the key points for the "lazy" reader, and it has very useful information.

Both the style that the author uses to write the book, and the message of the book itself, communicates the value of pursuing success in a relaxed manner. A sense of relaxation came over me just reading the book.

I like his use of affirmations that are positive and yes, relaxed, such as "I am now achieving my goals in an easy and relaxed manner, in a healthy and positive way." Allen promotes affirming and writing down your goals, a valuable habit that produces results.

I made a list of goals some 20 years ago after reading an article about the value of setting goals. I carried that list in my billfold for several years. A few days ago I came across that list. A few items from my list were:

1. Learn to speak fluent Spanish
2. Live and work in Latin America
3. Write a book that would be helpful for others

Almost everything that I had written on my list had come to pass. As the author says, "The universe gives us exactly what we ask for, no more, no less. So ask away."

Allen also frequently quotes passages from one of my favorite books, James Allen's As You Think: Second Edition. Marc Allen readily states that James Allen's book changed his life.

The author lays out an easy-to-follow and time-tested way to reach your goals. I suggest reading both Marc Allen's and James Allen's books.

I found this book to be as easy to read and useful as other Marc Allen books I've read (Visionary Business is excellent!) In keeping with the title, he even writes his book to accommodate your level of laziness. You can read the whole thing, or just take note of the key points in blue boxes. I have used just a few of his simple suggestions for affirming the life I desire and am already seeing results. This is a quick read and it's loaded with sound advice from someone who has the fulfilling lifestyle and success to support his ideas and plan.

I appreciate books that not only educate you about the topic, but give you concrete steps to follow. This book not only gives you steps to follow, but it does it in such a way that you can easily make a difference for yourself in a few hours, as opposed to several hours a day for a few weeks.

The part of the book I like the best, however, is the next to last chapter entitled, "Course Correction." It addresses that thing that happens to all of us humans when we read a book or take a class or workshop and start out inspired and in action. Then the inevitable falling of the course happens. Marc Allen explains how this wandering off course is natural and gives us tips to continuously make our own course correction.

This book is quick and easy to read, to put into action and has made a difference in my life.

I love Marc Allen's book, I thought it was a very enjoyable and useful read.
The book shows you how you can lead a more relaxed life ánd still fulfill your dreams. It blows the myth that you need to work hard and kill yourself in order to have success, includes practical steps to discover what your ideal life would look like, how you can plan and work towards it and how to overcome doubts and difficulties, and all this in a positive and relaxed manner.
It helped me to get clear about what I wanted from life, and also learn to accept that there's nothing wrong with my natural speed, which is in fact very, and I mean VERY slow. I have always pushed myself to live a high paced life (like three times the pace than is good for me) to keep up with modern life's demands and become succesful, and this book helped me to take things slower and follow my own pace. Highly recommended.

I have been following Marc Allen for a few years and if you are anything like me this book is going to get you thinking. Most of us not only grew up with the "being successful takes hard work" advice, we live the hard work part without gaining the concomitant successes. Marc Allen introduces us to the opposite of the "Type A workaholic personality" with the "Type Z personality-the laZy personality". The way he presents it and has more or less proven through a lifetime of Type Z success it seems to be not only doable but is also much more appealing than the way most of us have chosen to conduct our work lives.

This book is also a testament to his Type Z approach; there is very little information in this book that is not already covered in his previously published "The Millionaire Course". This book is a condensed version of that great book. "The Type Z Guide to Success" is a very quick read-about two and a half hours and full of very doable and usable Type Z approaches to business and life. Great read.

post script Oct 4, 2007
For an amazing type Z approach check out "The 4 hour Work Week" by Tim Ferris. It may just make your head spin. Great stuff.

In this piece I am reviewing Marc Allen's "The Type-Z Guide to Success: A Lazy Person's Manifesto for Wealth and Fulfillment" (Novato: New World Library, 2006). But, to be fair, this book should be reviewed together with Marc Allen's "The Millionaire Course: A Visionary Plan for Creating the Life of your Dreams" (Novato: New World Library, 2003) and especially Marc Allen's "The Secret of All: Moving from Abundance to a Life Of True Fulfillment" (Novato: New World Library, 2008). In fact, I have produced a summary of all these books with the following title, "The Secret of Being a Millionaire the Lazy Way". It can be secured for free from me, Dr Jusuf Hariman, at J.hariman@optusnet.com.au. And now to the task at hand, Marc Allen is a lazy man. He seldom gets up before 12 AM. In his 20's he was fired from several jobs including busboy, dishwasher and typesetter. Yet, whilst he was 30, with zero money, he built New World Library. 6 years later, he became a millionaire. He is now a multi - millionaire. Marc Allen's modus operandi is four-fold: (1). Dream; (2). Imagine; (3). Believe; and (4). Create. They are extensively explained in the book. Furthermore, Marc Allen learned "course correction" to make sure that his business is on track. And lastly, Marc Allen describes that we should move from "abundance" to "fulfillment". He believes that this is the secret of all ie loving and serving yourself and others. This is the key to fulfillment, happiness and inner peace.

Great book! I've read so many books of this type, but not a lot of them have helped. They all say, "Just believe... Law of Attraction, attract how you feel... Get in the gap..." But I've always felt after reading those books, "Great, but how?" Well Marc Allen tells you how. And, since it's the "Lazy man's way" it's easy to do and easy to follow. I've already noticed a change in my life. I think as a society, we all want something instatnt, like magic. Well, everything takes hard work and practice to achieve, and this will too. But it's easy to impliment in your daily life. Easy as eating breakfast every day, and just as fast. So I recommend buying the book.

I read The Millionaire Course a few years ago and was really inspired by it, especially those little quotes he had on most pages. Those quotes were something I considered putting all over the place, but then decided it would be too much work. This book is full of those quotes and now it is in an easier and lazier format. I've read this book on Kindle, and it is really good and although it may not have the depth of The Millionaire Course, it certainly doesn't lose the core ideas and actionable steps, so it pretty much cuts to the chase, without any unneeded reading. I prefer what I would call minimalist writing, and this book is pretty close to that ideal. Definitely worth the money you'll spend on it. Buy it and reap the rewards.