Stop Stepping on Rakes

In 1979, fifteen-year-old Ken Konet walked barefoot into a dark backyard, stepped on a steel rake, and took the handle directly to the forehead. Three holes in his foot. A cartoon knot on his head. A nurse asking if he'd been hanging around with Wile E. Coyote.

Forty-some years later, he found out the rakes get bigger.

This is a self-help book for people who are sick of self-help books. No morning routine. No five-step system. No guru telling you to manifest your way out of a Tuesday. Just twelve named, numbered rakes, the specific things that keep flattening you, and a very funny guide to seeing them coming.

The twelve rakes include:

• The Shame Rake - it hits you twice, and the second hit is optional


• The Too Big Rake - your goal was never too hard, it was too big


• The Right Now Rake - nobody quits at rock bottom, they quit on day nine


• The All-or-Nothing Rake - twenty sloppy days beat eight perfect ones


• The Death Grip Rake - you can't catch anything with your fists full


• The Burnout Rake - rest isn't the absence of work, it's the second half of it

Two new chapters. A full Rake Index. Far less homework. And a preface the first edition couldn't have contained.

Between editions, the author had spinal surgery, woke up unable to move, and spent four months in daily physical therapy earning his body back one humiliating inch at a time. He finished books from a recliner because it was the only thing his body would still let him do. Then, three quarters recovered and genuinely excited to return to work, he was laid off.

The first edition was written by a guy who had stepped on rakes and gotten up. This one was written from the yard, with a bloody foot, laughing, telling you it still works.

Every tool in this book got tested this year under conditions nobody would volunteer for. All of them held.

• You've quit the same goal more times than you'd like to admit


• One missed day makes you write off the whole month


• You're waiting to "feel ready" and it hasn't happened yet


• Something landed on your life that you didn't choose


• You want practical help that doesn't sound like a motivational poster

Sarcastic. Warm. Occasionally profane. Relentlessly useful.

Stop waiting for Monday. Start with a rake you can name.