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If You Want to be Successful, Don't Study at University
A radical manifesto for those who reject the traditional path of university, job, and obedience… and seek true freedom from within.
Don’t read this book just to finish it quickly.
And don’t read it if you’re only looking for information to add to your cultural knowledge, or if you’re seeking entertainment or superficial edification.
And don’t read it if you’re waiting for ready-made recipes that will change your life without changing you first.
And don’t read it to convince others that you are cultured, or to accelerate your steps toward “success” with familiar, superficial concepts.
And don’t read it if you’re afraid to re-examine ideas you’ve considered “truths” your entire life.
Read it only if you are willing to face yourself.
If you have the courage to let go of what you’ve learned unconsciously.
If you dare to
Who am I? Why do I live this way? Can I be something else?
What if it wasn’t you?
What if your thoughts, habits, choices, and even your ambitions… were just the results of old programming you didn’t choose?
Read it if you are willing to reconsider
The education you received, the job you unconsciously drifted into, the ideas planted in you since childhood, the programming that made you believe that success is a job, that money is evil, that order is more important than passion, and that obedience is better than freedom.
In this book, you won’t find traditional advice, nor will you find promises of quick change.
Instead, you will find a cry of awareness.
A journey of deconstruction and reassembly.
A refutation of the system that shaped you, and an invitation to genuine reprogramming, starting from
from feeling, from identity, from the belief that you are not a copy of others.
You will read about money, discipline, health, sleep, education, society, relationships, and work…
but you will not see them as you see them in usual self-help books
You will discover that much of what you live was not a “choice,” but a result of adaptation to a system not designed for you.
And that liberation does not begin from the outside, but from dismantling the inner the stuck feeling, the inherited fear, and the habit that turned into destiny.
You will learn about the “Emotional Approach”, a new and practical philosophy that changes your behavior from the root, because it doesn’t treat behavior as a surface, but as the final scene of a much deeper feeling.
Through it, you won’t just build good habits, but you will create a new human being…
a version of yourself, but more mature, smarter, and more authentic.
Don’t read this book just to finish it quickly.
And don’t read it if you’re only looking for information to add to your cultural knowledge, or if you’re seeking entertainment or superficial edification.
And don’t read it if you’re waiting for ready-made recipes that will change your life without changing you first.
And don’t read it to convince others that you are cultured, or to accelerate your steps toward “success” with familiar, superficial concepts.
And don’t read it if you’re afraid to re-examine ideas you’ve considered “truths” your entire life.
Read it only if you are willing to face yourself.
If you have the courage to let go of what you’ve learned unconsciously.
If you dare to
Who am I? Why do I live this way? Can I be something else?
What if it wasn’t you?
What if your thoughts, habits, choices, and even your ambitions… were just the results of old programming you didn’t choose?
Read it if you are willing to reconsider
The education you received, the job you unconsciously drifted into, the ideas planted in you since childhood, the programming that made you believe that success is a job, that money is evil, that order is more important than passion, and that obedience is better than freedom.
In this book, you won’t find traditional advice, nor will you find promises of quick change.
Instead, you will find a cry of awareness.
A journey of deconstruction and reassembly.
A refutation of the system that shaped you, and an invitation to genuine reprogramming, starting from
from feeling, from identity, from the belief that you are not a copy of others.
You will read about money, discipline, health, sleep, education, society, relationships, and work…
but you will not see them as you see them in usual self-help books
You will discover that much of what you live was not a “choice,” but a result of adaptation to a system not designed for you.
And that liberation does not begin from the outside, but from dismantling the inner the stuck feeling, the inherited fear, and the habit that turned into destiny.
You will learn about the “Emotional Approach”, a new and practical philosophy that changes your behavior from the root, because it doesn’t treat behavior as a surface, but as the final scene of a much deeper feeling.
Through it, you won’t just build good habits, but you will create a new human being…
a version of yourself, but more mature, smarter, and more authentic.
290 pages, Kindle Edition
Published July 27, 2025
1 person want to read
About the author
Lagnard Benz
3 books2 followersLagnard Benz is a former teacher who spent eight years inside the very system he now challenges. Passionate about self-education, personal growth, and breaking free from societal programming, he left the security of a stable job to pursue freedom on his own terms. Drawing from psychology, sociology, and real-life experience, Lagnard writes to inspire others to question the status quo and take control of their lives. Don’t Study at University is his debut English-language book, written to spark change and empower readers to reprogram their minds, habits, and futures.
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Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews
November 12, 2025
Don’t Study at University is a self-help book with a difference, offering much more than the title suggests, covering extensive, often esoteric ground. Benz essentially lays out a manifesto, backed by personal experience and thorough research, that scrutinizes traditional educational methods and, consequently, expected career/life trajectories.
He rigorously questions and, in many cases, debunks prescribed belief systems, urging the reader to do likewise, offering stimulating theoretical debate, comprehensive advice, and forthright solutions for reprogramming their mindsets and changing negative habits.
Benz opens his illuminating book with a candid if slightly tentative Introduction. It’s immediately interesting, and, as he concisely lays out his reasons for writing Don’t Study at University, his motivations become fiercely apparent, both for himself and the reader. It’s powerful and intriguing, free of woolly rhetoric or glib patronization.
Chapter One addresses the book’s moniker, which is, to a certain extent, deliberately provocative, and Benz makes no apologies for this. He wants the reader to feel uncomfortable, question everything, and examine what, in all likelihood, they have been taught and accepted as fundamental truths.
His meticulous unpicking, discussion, and deconstruction of established academic tenets and the mental subjugation of the scholastic environment are eye-opening and thought-provoking. Having spent the best part of a decade as a teaching professor, Benz writes with single-minded conviction and first-hand knowledge, driving his persuasive argument home with force and insight.
Although there is a lot to absorb, and Benz presents his material in an uncompromising style, he is an intelligent, personable writer, directly addressing the reader in a sincere, straightforward manner that is engaging and connective.
Additionally, he shares personal details by way of illustration and peppers his chapters with observations from high achievers who did not follow the path of mainstream academia.
Chapter Two, “How Were We Programmed?”, is enlightening. Benz delves deep into the topic, offering profoundly fascinating theories, especially on the nature of emotions and, later in Chapter Four, the formation of bad habits and their psychology.
Posing questions and scenarios, Benz draws the reader in, challenging them to re-examine their lives and their levels of awareness. It’s refreshing, hard-hitting in places, and Benz’s controlled enthusiasm is contagious.
Chapters that focus on providing guidance and instruction are loaded with common sense and provide several cerebral light-bulb moments. There is nothing inaccessible in Don’t Study at University, but a combination of reflective, meditative, and proactive exercises.
Throughout, Benz remains focused, maintaining a constant thread between the book’s title and the chapter topics. Although he uses subheadings and tabling in the later chapters, the book is occasionally a little textually dense in the early ones.
Nonetheless, the last two chapters, which compare the lives of the wealthy and the poor, are full of whip-smart, realistic observations that are as sobering as they are motivating.
Don’t Study at University is an unconventional, perceptive, and emotionally intelligent self-help guide written with infectious self-awareness, passion, and positivity. Highly recommended.
He rigorously questions and, in many cases, debunks prescribed belief systems, urging the reader to do likewise, offering stimulating theoretical debate, comprehensive advice, and forthright solutions for reprogramming their mindsets and changing negative habits.
Benz opens his illuminating book with a candid if slightly tentative Introduction. It’s immediately interesting, and, as he concisely lays out his reasons for writing Don’t Study at University, his motivations become fiercely apparent, both for himself and the reader. It’s powerful and intriguing, free of woolly rhetoric or glib patronization.
Chapter One addresses the book’s moniker, which is, to a certain extent, deliberately provocative, and Benz makes no apologies for this. He wants the reader to feel uncomfortable, question everything, and examine what, in all likelihood, they have been taught and accepted as fundamental truths.
His meticulous unpicking, discussion, and deconstruction of established academic tenets and the mental subjugation of the scholastic environment are eye-opening and thought-provoking. Having spent the best part of a decade as a teaching professor, Benz writes with single-minded conviction and first-hand knowledge, driving his persuasive argument home with force and insight.
Although there is a lot to absorb, and Benz presents his material in an uncompromising style, he is an intelligent, personable writer, directly addressing the reader in a sincere, straightforward manner that is engaging and connective.
Additionally, he shares personal details by way of illustration and peppers his chapters with observations from high achievers who did not follow the path of mainstream academia.
Chapter Two, “How Were We Programmed?”, is enlightening. Benz delves deep into the topic, offering profoundly fascinating theories, especially on the nature of emotions and, later in Chapter Four, the formation of bad habits and their psychology.
Posing questions and scenarios, Benz draws the reader in, challenging them to re-examine their lives and their levels of awareness. It’s refreshing, hard-hitting in places, and Benz’s controlled enthusiasm is contagious.
Chapters that focus on providing guidance and instruction are loaded with common sense and provide several cerebral light-bulb moments. There is nothing inaccessible in Don’t Study at University, but a combination of reflective, meditative, and proactive exercises.
Throughout, Benz remains focused, maintaining a constant thread between the book’s title and the chapter topics. Although he uses subheadings and tabling in the later chapters, the book is occasionally a little textually dense in the early ones.
Nonetheless, the last two chapters, which compare the lives of the wealthy and the poor, are full of whip-smart, realistic observations that are as sobering as they are motivating.
Don’t Study at University is an unconventional, perceptive, and emotionally intelligent self-help guide written with infectious self-awareness, passion, and positivity. Highly recommended.
August 13, 2025
If You Want to be Successful, Don't Study at University is written by Lagnard Benz. This book has been written with an approach to help its readers unlock their minds from traditional methods of learning. Writer himself explained his experiences as a school teacher and how he found an urge to write on this topic.
After reading this book I could say that this book is an outcome of well researched topics and theories to support writer’s point of view. Traditional educational method in Universities is just making slaves so that these modern slaves could be hired by industrialists. As an outcome, jobs are confining employees’ mindsets and are hindering them to excel as an entrepreneur, that’s how jobs are responsible for increase in graphs of poverty. Writer supported this statement by giving real life examples of some successful entrepreneurs who were not even graduated from any university but they built empires of their own.
Instead of burdening students to learn multiple subjects in schools and colleges, they must be trained in specific areas of interest during their initial study years so that they could excel faster instead of being stuck in the loop after studying so many subjects to select one at the end.
Firstly; author explained with examples and with theories on life style how we are programmed by certain factors and how can we reprogram ourselves to find success. Factors that are programming us are; the effect of our geographical areas, environment in which we live, influence of family and friends, societal impact, influence of modern media etc.
Then he explained solutions so that we could reprogram ourselves. He described how we could replace our memory with new learning’s, read good books and use critical thinking to overcome current challenges of traditional education methods.
This is a good self-help book as reader could find help to realize problems of traditional Universities teaching methods and then this book will breakdown all problems with solutions to achieve success in life. So those are who struggling in this area to find answers, should read this book.
After reading this book I could say that this book is an outcome of well researched topics and theories to support writer’s point of view. Traditional educational method in Universities is just making slaves so that these modern slaves could be hired by industrialists. As an outcome, jobs are confining employees’ mindsets and are hindering them to excel as an entrepreneur, that’s how jobs are responsible for increase in graphs of poverty. Writer supported this statement by giving real life examples of some successful entrepreneurs who were not even graduated from any university but they built empires of their own.
Instead of burdening students to learn multiple subjects in schools and colleges, they must be trained in specific areas of interest during their initial study years so that they could excel faster instead of being stuck in the loop after studying so many subjects to select one at the end.
Firstly; author explained with examples and with theories on life style how we are programmed by certain factors and how can we reprogram ourselves to find success. Factors that are programming us are; the effect of our geographical areas, environment in which we live, influence of family and friends, societal impact, influence of modern media etc.
Then he explained solutions so that we could reprogram ourselves. He described how we could replace our memory with new learning’s, read good books and use critical thinking to overcome current challenges of traditional education methods.
This is a good self-help book as reader could find help to realize problems of traditional Universities teaching methods and then this book will breakdown all problems with solutions to achieve success in life. So those are who struggling in this area to find answers, should read this book.
August 7, 2025
If you want to be successful, DON'T STUDY AT UNIVERSITY
By: LAGNARD BENZ
Publisher: Independently Published
Published Date: July 27, 2025
ASIN: B0FK5VCKJ7
Page Count: 295
Triggers: Institutional gaslighting, reprogramming your inner robot, anti-traditional values
Star Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This one’s not for the faint of ego. It doesn’t hold your hand—it holds up a mirror. And then it dares you to smash it, sweep it up, and rebuild yourself from the shards. Would recommend—but only if you're ready to be wildly uncomfortable in the best possible way.
What Did I Just Walk Into?
Well, I opened the book expecting another anti-college rant and ended up questioning my life choices, my sleep schedule, my job, and why I still flinch when someone asks me to “follow protocol.” This isn’t a book—it’s a philosophical slap in the face wrapped in a manifesto disguised as a therapy session.
Here’s What Slapped:
The vibe: Less “drop out and YOLO” and more “burn it all down, but with introspection.”
No fluff, no dopamine bait. Just one author screaming (gently) that you’ve been conditioned since birth and it’s time to wake up.
It’s equal parts cult initiation and personal awakening, minus the matching robes.
The “Emotional Approach” isn't just a catchy phrase—it’s a full personality reboot kit. Some assembly (read: effort) required.
What Could’ve Been Better:
Some chapters felt like a TED Talk got lost in a philosophy major’s fever dream.
If you’re looking for bullet points or life hacks, you’ve wandered into the wrong existential alleyway.
Perfect for Readers Who Love:
Ripping apart the system while sipping herbal tea.
Being called out on their coping mechanisms with love and a megaphone.
Books that ask more questions than they answer… and somehow that’s the point.
Not trusting institutions, tradition, or their own knee-jerk reactions anymore.
Reviewed by Robin for Robin’s Review
By: LAGNARD BENZ
Publisher: Independently Published
Published Date: July 27, 2025
ASIN: B0FK5VCKJ7
Page Count: 295
Triggers: Institutional gaslighting, reprogramming your inner robot, anti-traditional values
Star Rating: ⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
This one’s not for the faint of ego. It doesn’t hold your hand—it holds up a mirror. And then it dares you to smash it, sweep it up, and rebuild yourself from the shards. Would recommend—but only if you're ready to be wildly uncomfortable in the best possible way.
What Did I Just Walk Into?
Well, I opened the book expecting another anti-college rant and ended up questioning my life choices, my sleep schedule, my job, and why I still flinch when someone asks me to “follow protocol.” This isn’t a book—it’s a philosophical slap in the face wrapped in a manifesto disguised as a therapy session.
Here’s What Slapped:
The vibe: Less “drop out and YOLO” and more “burn it all down, but with introspection.”
No fluff, no dopamine bait. Just one author screaming (gently) that you’ve been conditioned since birth and it’s time to wake up.
It’s equal parts cult initiation and personal awakening, minus the matching robes.
The “Emotional Approach” isn't just a catchy phrase—it’s a full personality reboot kit. Some assembly (read: effort) required.
What Could’ve Been Better:
Some chapters felt like a TED Talk got lost in a philosophy major’s fever dream.
If you’re looking for bullet points or life hacks, you’ve wandered into the wrong existential alleyway.
Perfect for Readers Who Love:
Ripping apart the system while sipping herbal tea.
Being called out on their coping mechanisms with love and a megaphone.
Books that ask more questions than they answer… and somehow that’s the point.
Not trusting institutions, tradition, or their own knee-jerk reactions anymore.
Reviewed by Robin for Robin’s Review
Displaying 1 - 3 of 3 reviews