Life. Be There at 10 'Til: A Collection of Homegrown Wisdoms

R. Dean Johnson
iUniverse Star (2005)
ISBN 1583482326
Reviewed by Paige Lovitt for Reader Views (10/06)

Author R. Dean Johnson gained a lot of insight into human behavior by always observing what was going on around him.  He calls it “homegrown wisdom.”   He shares his homegrown wisdom with us to teach us to look for these kinds of life lessons in everything.  Johnson’s writings made me feel like he was someone that I wished I knew personally.  He looks at life very basically and offers his musings with a touch of southern class.  He offers a lot of common sense.  In his book, he takes each chapter and muses about an experience he had and what he learned from it.  He talks about the importance of having our basic needs be met.  For example, if we have known true hunger, we learn to really appreciate food.  If we haven’t known true hunger, then we need to appreciate this fact and be grateful for the abundance in our lives.

Johnson also writes about how the process of change is important and necessary for us to grow.  But he also says that constancy and familiarity feed our souls.  Each chapter is enjoyable to read and is a welcome respite from the current times that we are in where people seem to forget about personal accountability and get so caught up in materialism that they lose a sense of the importance of belonging.

“Life. Be There at 10 ‘Til” is really an enjoyable book to read.  It would make a wonderful gift for all ages.  I think that older people would enjoy it for its simplicity and that younger people could learn a lot about life in general from it.  For me, I enjoyed being able to sit down with it and take a break from all the stress going on in my world.  Johnson’s reflections made me realize that I take too much in life seriously and that I need to slow down and learn to appreciate the lessons that are offered to me in each experience.

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