cover image Right Risk: 10 Powerful Principles for Taking Giant Leaps with Your Life

Right Risk: 10 Powerful Principles for Taking Giant Leaps with Your Life

Bill Treasurer. Berrett-Koehler Publishers, $16.95 (200pp) ISBN 978-1-57675-246-3

Teamwork and leadership consultant Treasurer--formerly known as the fire-diving stuntman Captain Inferno--here encourages readers to take risks calculated to catapult them out of the lukewarm safety of mediocrity and into""an intimate encounter with the magnificence of their own souls."" Treasurer chooses intriguing anecdotes, often from his seven years as a member of the U.S. High Diving Team (which is where he first leapt from a diving board, engulfed in flames, and plunged into a pool 100 feet below) to illustrate how to take good risks.""When we don't take risks,"" Treasurer says,""we get stuck in a rut of safety. Over time, we become trapped inside our own life, like a pearl confined to its shell."" He offers 10 principles to encourage such healthy risks, from""finding your golden silence"" (becoming attuned to your needs and identifing intelligent risks) to""exposing yourself"" emotionally (embracing honesty and avoiding the build-up of resentments). His clear, colloquial chapters encourage readers to overcome inertia, write""risk scripts"" and turn fear into a positive force. Admonitions to go ahead and be imperfect and embrace the possibilities inherent in risks--whether they're professional or personal--should spark many readers to vow to live more deliberately, energetically and authentically, and the questions Treasurer poses to readers at each chapter's conclusion are helpful tools for self-guidance.