Book Reflection: Happy Sexy Millionaire by Steven Bartlett
Over the weekend, I finished reading a book that I’ve been waiting for months to finally get my hands on. My incredible sister pre-ordered it for me as a birthday gift. I was thrilled when it arrived and could hardly put the book down once I started reading it. I have been following Steven on Instagram for the past two years and am always inspired by his authentic, thought-provoking content.
This book has helped me to start unlearning those self-limiting beliefs that I didn’t even realize I was having. You must first learn, then unlearn. The first step to transforming your life is to recognize what needs transforming.
Steve himself talks candidly about his mental health, battling labels and stereotypes, unlearning limiting beliefs, parenting his inner child and healing from trauma, navigating a juggle between career, relationships, and personal development. He’s not afraid to share the raw, real-life experiences behind the flashy headlines and social media highlight reels we often are exposed to.
In this post, I will share my key takeaways and reflections from the book. To start off, I want to clarify what Steven means by those three catchy words in the title:
Happy = Fulfillment, an internal feeling that isn’t driven by external factors and validation
Sexy = Love, the pursuit of it. The desire to form romantic relationships and the value that a great partner can have in our lives.
Millionaire = Success, a subjective concept based on what you aim for and determined by what matters to you
This is a book about fulfillment, love, and success. My reflections of the book will be broken up into these three sections as well.
HAPPY
One of the first parts of the book that stood out to me was about something we all may have experienced before but couldn’t quite put a name to it: destination addiction. It’s the idea that happiness is in the next place, the next job, and with the next partner. Until we give up the idea that happiness is somewhere else, it will never be where we are.
I learned how gratitude for our present lives is key for our emotional well-being and for having a better quality of life.
One of the key barriers that robs us of experiencing personal happiness and self worth is comparison. Comparison is the thief of joy and appreciation for how far we’ve come. Social media makes it easier for us to compare our bodies, lifestyles, perceived financial circumstances, relationships, and other areas of our lives to that of strangers and even friends. We need to be watchful of this. By default, our minds are comparison-obsessed, so we have to be intentional about fighting off these thoughts.
The only worthwhile comparison is YOU yesterday/past YOU vs. YOU today/current YOU.
Follow your own path. You can actually even be happier with less. Although Steven didn’t explicitly mention this, several parts of the book reminded me of minimalism and how rather than being so focused on filling our lives with material possessions and trying to ‘keep up with the Kardashians’, we can rather seek out more meaningful things: travel, relationships, wellness, knowledge.
SEXY
Steven talked a lot about how there is no script to live and you don’t have to do things on someone else’s/society’s timeline. You can live life on your own terms. You’re not running out of time.
Also, oftentimes we only think of feelings and situations in life in the binary. One common example is the concept of being in love. When we’re dating someone, we’re often asked ‘Is it love? Are you in love?” This can be quite complicated as no two human beings can quite experience the exact same feelings and feelings can be difficult to articulate.
Steven suggests that instead of using these arbitrary terms, why don’t we just accept that our experiences and feelings are ever-evolving and that we can enjoy relationships without having to over-complicate them with labels.
I agree, and in my personal opinion, trust and honesty are also important for relationships and because of the fact that feelings can be difficult to articulate, open communication is important for our relationships. We can’t read minds — yet!
Cultivating our relationships are key despite our hustle-obsessed culture. We shouldn’t put relationships (of all kinds) on the backburner. We are social creatures by nature. That’s what really matters.
As humans, our key psychological needs are: attention, exercise, seeing our families, love, and everything in between. (*Google: Maslow’s hierachy of needs for more examples). It’s important that we make time for them too. Steven calls this the journey back to human. It’s not all work and no play.It’s finding a healthy balance or juggle that works for you.
I also appreciated how Steven addressed a very real factor that can follow us into adulthood: childhood experiences and our first example of relationships: our parents’ relationship. We must ask ourselves: how did our parents/guardians relationship or lack thereof shape our view of relationships- either positively or negatively? How did they treat each other? What are some beliefs that we carried with us into adulthood?
Especially if those are negative, we have to start doing the work to unlearn and heal from those experiences.
Finally, on building relationships, you must put yourself out there. If you fear rejection of any kind, you may miss out on many possibilities — both personally and professionally. A sign of low self esteem is actually going to great lengths to avoid the possibility of rejection. This is incredibly harmful to our growth and ability to reach our potential.
MILLIONAIRE. How to build your career and achieve financial wellness. Steven’s story is nothing short of inspiring. When he was 18, he wrote in his diary that he wants to accomplish the following by age 25:
- technical millionaire,range range will be first car, hold a long-term relationship, work on body image
He surpassed all of those goals, but most importantly he learned about how to build a fulfilling career and lifestyle.
I’m in my junior year in college and the dominant thoughts that are looming in my head are about my career, specifically how to create a career that is fulfilling, lucrative, and impactful. Is it possible? Yes. Does it take time and intentional effort? Yes.
In the book, Steven shares 5 elements of a career that have been psychologically proven to increase human satisfaction:
- engaging work — work that pulls you in and isn’t always mind-numbing. freedom to decide how you perform your work. variety in the types of tasks. feedback on your work so you can keep improving.
- works that helps others — focus on the issues in the world you’re truly passionate about. Reminder: you can have role models and look up to people who are making social change, but remember that you can be a great person too- a great version of yourself. you don’t have to be just like someone else, you can be you.
- don’t just do what you love, do what you’re good at —focus on your strengths and build up career capital: things that put you in a position to make a difference in your future career such as skills, connections, qualifications, and resources. Essentially: what you know (knowledge), who you know (network), what you’re able to do (skills), what others think of you (reputation), and what you have/can get (resources)
- supportive work environment/colleagues (company you work for or company you build) — ask yourself: would you want to be friends with them? what’s the workplace culture like?
- work-life harmony — trying to make time for both profession and personal life and relationships, travel, and experiencing life
Another reminder from the book is that it’s okay to chart your own path and you don’t have to pursue something just because others are doing it. Listen to your desires from within and honor them. You owe it to yourself to live a life and pursue work that aligns with your values.
Finally, remember this: you are more than enough. You don’t need external validation (likes, followers, comments, praise, etc.) to confirm this. You are enough as you are. Identify the areas that need personal development, and give yourself grace and you improve and grow.
It’s realizing that you are enough that creates that ambition to go after your greatest internal goals that you set for yourself.
One of my favorite quotes from the book:
“Growth is achieved by learning and unlearning at the same time. Reading books is a great way to learn. Reading yourself (self awareness) is a great way to unlearn. If you can do both, you can make progress.”
This is definitely a book I’ll be referencing again and again!
