Lisa's review

Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself
by Alan Alda

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<a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/82535.Things_I_Overheard_While_Talking_to_Myself?utm_medium=api&amp;utm_source=blog_review" style="float: left; padding-right: 20px"><img alt="Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself" border="0" src="http://photo.goodreads.com/books/1190177711m/82535.jpg" /></a> <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/book/show/82535.Things_I_Overheard_While_Talking_to_Myself?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">Things I Overheard While Talking to Myself</a> by <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/author/show/43587.Alan_Alda">Alan Alda</a> 
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/show/8377131?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review"><h3>My review</h3></a>
 rating: 4 of 5 stars This is a really inspiring book to read if you are stuck at a point in life and wonder if you are where you need to be, if you are down and need a good kick to get moving again and appreciate life again. Alda gives lots of speeches at college commencements, and it seems like someone is always asking him to give meaning to their life. I loved how eloquently he spoke for example....
 
 "It seems to me that your life will have meaning when you can give meaning to it. And not until then. Because no one else will give meaning to your life. There isn't a job or title or a degree that has meaning in itself. The world will go stumbling on without you no matter how high your office. And there isn't any liquor that will give meaning to your life, or any drug or any type of sexual congress either. Not for long, anyway."
 
 It sort of reminded me of my favorite quote on Goodreads 
 "Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option." Annonymous.
 
 The whole emphasis of the book is Alda deciding if all the things he has done, all the fame, awards etc. over the years has made his life full. With all the awards and sucess he saw in his life does he consider his life lived to its fullest or were things taken for granted, opportunities missed.He starts the book with a health crisis which made him question everything. I can relate to that and thought it ironic that I was reading this book from a hospital room as I fought a life threatening infection. It was as if he were talking to me saying "wake up and start living your life, really living it, not just going about the motions"
 
 I picked the book up because of an interview with Alda that I saw just as the book was being released. I always loved to watch him on MASH when I was little, his short stay as a doctor on ER, then I watched him on Scientific American Frontiers and which is probably the most enjoyable Science shows made for those of us not fluent in the study of Science. I felt a little self conscience while reading the book in the hospital. The nurses, I guess thought I should be reading some smut romance novel while I was laying there.
 <a href="http://www.goodreads.com/review/list/568109?utm_medium=api&utm_source=blog_review">View all my reviews.</a>

Lisa's review
rating:

bookshelves: nonfiction-memoir
recommended for: everyone
status: Read in February, 2008

This is a really inspiring book to read if you are stuck at a point in life and wonder if you are where you need to be, if you are down and need a good kick to get moving again and appreciate life again. Alda gives lots of speeches at college commencements, and it seems like someone is always asking him to give meaning to their life. I loved how eloquently he spoke for example....

"It seems to me that your life will have meaning when you can give meaning to it. And not until then. Because no one else will give meaning to your life. There isn't a job or title or a degree that has meaning in itself. The world will go stumbling on without you no matter how high your office. And there isn't any liquor that will give meaning to your life, or any drug or any type of sexual congress either. Not for long, anyway."

It sort of reminded me of my favorite quote on Goodreads
"Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option." Annon...more This is a really inspiring book to read if you are stuck at a point in life and wonder if you are where you need to be, if you are down and need a good kick to get moving again and appreciate life again. Alda gives lots of speeches at college commencements, and it seems like someone is always asking him to give meaning to their life. I loved how eloquently he spoke for example....

"It seems to me that your life will have meaning when you can give meaning to it. And not until then. Because no one else will give meaning to your life. There isn't a job or title or a degree that has meaning in itself. The world will go stumbling on without you no matter how high your office. And there isn't any liquor that will give meaning to your life, or any drug or any type of sexual congress either. Not for long, anyway."

It sort of reminded me of my favorite quote on Goodreads
"Never allow someone to be your priority while allowing yourself to be their option." Annonymous.

The whole emphasis of the book is Alda deciding if all the things he has done, all the fame, awards etc. over the years has made his life full. With all the awards and sucess he saw in his life does he consider his life lived to its fullest or were things taken for granted, opportunities missed.He starts the book with a health crisis which made him question everything. I can relate to that and thought it ironic that I was reading this book from a hospital room as I fought a life threatening infection. It was as if he were talking to me saying "wake up and start living your life, really living it, not just going about the motions"

I picked the book up because of an interview with Alda that I saw just as the book was being released. I always loved to watch him on MASH when I was little, his short stay as a doctor on ER, then I watched him on Scientific American Frontiers and which is probably the most enjoyable Science shows made for those of us not fluent in the study of Science. I felt a little self conscience while reading the book in the hospital. The nurses, I guess thought I should be reading some smut romance novel while I was laying there....less

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