The Summit Mindset: Winning the Battle of You Versus You
Scott Miller & James C. Moore
Greenleaf Books Group Press (September 2023)

“We have met the enemy and he is us.”  Pogo the Possum

Scott Miller and James Moore agree with Walt Kelly’s marsupial: “The greatest obstacles to any achievement may lie in the conflict within us. We must overcome reliance on external influencEs and opinions. We must break free frrom the constraints we have placed on ourselves because of teaching or experience. The ‘You’ that you are has to find the right approach to become the ‘You’ that you want to be. This challenge requires you to recognize what’s holding you back.”

They go on to suggest that, as a fundamental requirement of meeting that challenge, “we must identify our personal strengths and weaknesses and then lay out a path that is paved with a strategic thinking, hard effort, and a detailed vision.” Many people do not have a purpose, and without one they are adrift.

The Summit Mindset will explain “how to avoid that fate with processes that help you make deposits into the equity account of who you are and want to become. We do not have assets that are more valuable than ourselves, and when we do the work to add to that value, it makes us feel alive.”

In his classic work, The Denial of Death (1973), Ernest Becker acknowledges that physical death is inevitable for everyone but there is another form of death that can be denied: That which occurs when we become wholly preoccupied with fulfilling others’ expectations of us.

Miller and Moore wrote this book in order to help as many people as possible to “win the battles” to which Pogo and Becker refer. That is the WHAT. As for the HOW, that is best revealed in the narrative, with suggestions provided in context, within a frame of reference.

Here are two concluding suggestions while reading The Summit Mindset: Highlight key passages, and, record your comments, questions, action steps (preferably with deadlines), and page references as well as your responses to questions posed and to lessons you have learned. Also, be sure to complete the end-of-chapter exercises, and do so with candor. These two simple tactics will facilitate, indeed expedite frequent reviews of key material later.