Monday, March 21, 2011

Life Without Limits was a bit....limited.

I was given the book "Life Without Limits" by Nick Vujicic, for free by Waterbrook Multnomah in order to write this review.
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  When I heard about the book "Life Without Limits" I was intrigued by the description of what this book would be about. A man born without arms or legs and yet overcoming this disability to live a rich, abundant and independent life sounded pretty extraordinary to me! Add to the mix that he is a Christian and inspirational speaker and there was no way I could pass this book up. When it finally arrived in the mail I excitedly tore open the box and started devouring the book page after page...for the first few chapters. But as my title hints at...the book was lacking something, it felt limited, stunted, not as deep as I expected it to be. Now I know Nick isn't a professional writer, per se, and that he is simply relaying what he has overcome throughout his life, but I still felt like each chapter was very repetitious, that it took him pages upon pages to say one point and that it all felt a little superficial. I felt like his main point was to encourage people going through tough things to try harder, push further, smile bigger, etc and life's problems would melt away. He used his example of overcoming a life without limbs as proof that if we just try, try, try that we will have a great life. I didn't feel like his focus was on the sovereignty of God and that sometimes life IS hard and things won't turn out right if we just think positively and put a smile on our face. I was disappointed with this book and struggled to even want to finish it. While his story is interesting I don't feel like I would recommend this book to many people because of the "you do your best and God will do the rest" mentality that he actually states in the book. I don't agree with that statement and I wouldn't want to encourage my friends/family to believe that as well. Is it interesting? Sure, some of the stories are. But other than that, a sad disappointment.

**update** while the book wasn't that great for me, Nick's story is simply amazing so I recommend checking him out on Youtube. He learns to surf with Bethany Hamilton and there are other numerous videos about how he gets through daily tasks. That to me is fascinating.

Nick learning to surf. and The Butterfly Circus

To read my review at Waterbrook go here and give it a ranking if you are interested. Thanks! :)

2 comments:

Kristin said...

I still need to do mine! But also, have you seen the Butterfly Circus? with him in it? It's about 20 minutes, and really good. My parents made me watch it, was annoying initially, but I really would recommend it.

http://www.thedoorpost.com/hope/film/?film=4dd298f102c77b625cf37a9e7744ac68

Becky said...

Hey Kristin, no I haven't watched it but I'll look for it. Also, even though my review suggests that the book isn't all that great, his story really is fascinating. Watching him surf on youtube was pretty neat, too! So thanks for the suggestion!