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Damian Barr’s book, Get It Together, is a guide
for surviving your life after university graduation. Get It Together offers
excellent advice and points readers in the way of valuable resources. The only flaw in
the book is that it is essentially only geared towards those who have gone to university.
A person who never went to university but instead got a job right after graduation from
high school might feel left out.
The book is dedicated to Barr’s friend
John Anderson. Anderson, unfortunately, committed suicide. His death obviously affected
Barr, and is a major part of the reason Barr wrote this book. The book explores the
misconceptions fed to young people concerning the value of a degree. Many young people
are lead to believe that upon graduation they will automatically get these fantastic
jobs. Of course, after graduation, or even before, these young people will learn the
errors of their ways.
Who puts all this pressure on the young people Barr
interviewed for the book? In many of the cases it seemed that parents, who didn’t take
the initiative to make dramatic changes in their lives, were seeking to relive their
lives by molding their children into what they secretly always wanted to
be.
The best thing about the book is that Barr explores what strategies
young people can do to survive these crises. He offers solid advice and resources, but
is completely non judgmental about what path to take. If a young person is unsure of
what do after graduation, Barr offers pros and cons of going to work directly, going to
graduate school, interning, becoming self employed, whether to buy or rent, etc. Barr’s
book explores these options for those who hate their current jobs as well. It’s fairly
common for young British people to spend a year or so traveling, so important resources
for traveling are included.
Barr’s book also reassured distraught
twenty-somethings that few people are high income earners in their twenties. He’s
right. The people he writes about have all made major accomplishments in their 20s, even
if they don’t see it that way. Perhaps if they looked at the average twenty-something
who has only done blue collar or low level work, or who has never traveled they’d be
able to put it more in perspective.
I highly recommend this book for
people going through personal or career crises at any age. You certainly don’t have to
be in your 20s to be able to make good use of the advice and resources in this book.
