Be Useful: Seven Tools for Life

Arnold Schwarzenegger distills seven tools for realizing your life's purpose, drawn from his own repeated reinvention and achievements. He has been the world's greatest bodybuilder, the world's highest-paid movie star, and the leader of the world's sixth-largest economy—all the same person, and not by accident. Arnold's success resulted from a deliberate process: clear vision, big thinking, hard work, direct communication, resilient problem-solving, open-minded curiosity, and a commitment to giving back. All of it was guided by his father's core lesson: be useful. Written in Arnold's direct and powerful voice, this book takes readers through his toolkit for a meaningful life. He illustrates how to apply these tools to build whatever fulfilling future you envision, using personal stories of both life-changing successes and life-threatening failures—some well-known, some shared here for the first time. Arnold forged these mental tools early to escape poverty and narrow-mindedness in his rural Austrian hometown. He now shares this wisdom with readers, emphasizing that no one will rescue you—you only have yourself. The good news is that you are all you need.