Steve Pavlina Vs. The ThunderCats
October 14th, 2008
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It’s hardly a fair fight.
- There is only one Steve Pavlina, but there are six ThunderCats (counting WilyKat and WilyKit but not Jaga or Snarf).
- Steve doesn’t believe in harming animals or consuming animal products. The ThunderCats are natural predators.
- Steve carries no weapons. The ThunderCats carry a sword, bolas, nunchakus, a staff, and an assortment of devious mystery capsules.
- Steve has a spirit guide who helps him win at blackjack. The ThunderCats have the spirit of Jaga the Wise.
- Steve drives a normal family car (I assume). The ThunderCats have the ThunderTank, Feliner, ThunderClaw, ThunderStrike, and HoverCat.
- Steve is colorblind. The Sword of Omens gives Lion-O sight beyond sight.
- Steve has lucid dreams and astral travel. Tygra can project completely realistic illusions into other people’s minds.
- Steve is a decent marathon runner. Cheetara runs a 30 second mile.
- Steve does weight training. Panthro can lift a tank.
- And so on, and so on.
Do we really need to witness this massacre? Wait, don’t avert your gaze just yet. This isn’t going to be a real fight. We’re just going to compare their principles of personal development.
In Steve’s new book, Personal Development for Smart People: The Conscious Pursuit of Personal Growth, he describes his seven core principles. The three primary principles are truth, love, and power, from which we can derive the secondary principles of oneness, authority, courage, and intelligence. I’ve previously written about this book (before I read it) in my posts Pre-order Personal Development For Smart People and Personal Development For Smart People: Free Sample Chapter, so I’ll try not to repeat myself too much.
The ThunderCats live by the Code of Thundera: truth, honor, loyalty, and justice.
Truth, love, and power vs. truth, honor, loyalty, and justice. Which is better?
Everyone has their own set of principles:
- Virginia Tech’s motto is Ut Prosim (That I May Serve).
- Harvard’s motto is Veritas (Truth).
- Yale’s is Lux Et Veritas (Light and Truth).
- The school in Kindergarten Cop uses the 3 Cs: caring, courtesy, and courage.
(These schools will all fight on the side of the ThunderCats.)
There are endless combinations of principles out there, but which is best? And does it really matter?
What Steve wanted to do with his book was to write about the roots of personal development, instead of writing about the branches like he and everyone else had done before. He wanted to uncover the common pattern behind all successful growth efforts and come up with a set of principles that was universal, complete, irreducible, congruent, and practical.
I was looking for more information about how he came up with these particular principles and decided that they were the principles of personal growth and not just some principles. I have an upcoming interview with him where he’ll shed some light on that. For now, we can at least accept that these can potentially be the fundamental building blocks of personal growth.
Consider the ThunderCats’ principles of truth, honor, loyalty, and justice. How do they differ from Steve’s principles of truth, love, and power?
First of all, they both have truth in common. But then the ThunderCats get a little redundant. Honor, loyalty, and justice are similar to truth, so the Code of Thundera is more complicated than it has to be. Steve only wanted to include the most basic principles, with no overlap between them. I bet a lot of kids would have found truth a lot easier to memorize and understand than truth, honor, loyalty, and justice.
Also, while honor and loyalty touch on love, not all aspects of love are covered. And while justice touches on power, power is largely missing from the code. Therefore, the Code of Thundera can’t serve as a complete set of personal growth principles.
Now let’s go back to those schools I mentioned before:
- Virginia Tech’s Ut Prosim (That I May Serve) touches on love and truth, but misses power.
- Harvard’s Veritas (Truth) is missing love and power.
- Yale’s Lux Et Veritas (Light and Truth) is missing power. I don’t really know what light is, but I guess it’s truth and love.
- The kindergarten’s caring, courtesy, and courage are heavy on love, but a little light on power and completely missing truth.
Does that make these bad mottos? Not at all, and I’m sure Steve doesn’t want everyone to change their motto to truth, love, and power. But we need to realize two things:
1. Any set of principles that omits truth, love, or power (and doesn’t allow them to be derived) is not a complete model for conscious living. But not everything is meant to be, and that’s perfectly fine. I’m sure Harvard doesn’t think that truth is everything, just that it’s what they strive for at that institution. And the ThunderCats embraced power even though it wasn’t in their code, so maybe their code was designed to temper their power (after all, it’s what separates them from the power-hungry Mumm-Ra and the mutants).
2. Any set of principles that conflicts with truth, love, or power conflicts with conscious living. You might not be convinced that truth, love, and power can be used to derive all essential principles, but you probably agree that none of them should be violated. Without truth, you’re living in lies and denial. Without love, you’re alone and empty. Without power, you’re a weak victim. None of this is good.
These are not restrictive principles, and there’s plenty of room for variation. Your truth can be different from my truth. Steve points out that the principles don’t dictate any particular spiritual philosophy, as long as your choice doesn’t conflict with truth, love, or power.
I’m probably in the minority in that I didn’t find his book as enjoyable to read as his blog. I think that’s because he toned down his voice considerably to make the book more universally accepted. To see what I mean, compare his attitude of complete religious tolerance in his book to his highly controversial post 10 Reasons You Should Never Have a Religion. Of course, for that same reason, some people will like the book better.
I like how the book is not simply a collection of blog posts, but a brand new framework of personal development that he hadn’t talked about before. This really had to be a book and not a series of blog posts. I also like how he takes several areas of our lives (habits, career, money, health, relationships, spirituality), and treats them all the same, showing how the seven core principles apply to each of them.
I don’t know what effect this will have on my life. He includes a lot of exercises to increase your ability to use the seven principles, and I’ll have to read it again because I skipped over the exercises the first time. I realize that love and oneness are by far my weakest areas, so I’ll have to pay special attention to them. In fact, many people will find oneness to be pretty wacky. Steve’s sense of oneness now has him befriending spiders, while I’m still trying to accept spammers as human beings.
The verdict: Steve would be helpless in combat against the ThunderCats, but his book Personal Development for Smart People would have been highly appreciated on Thundera.
October 14th, 2008 at 8:42 pm
Haha, nice. I didn’t realize Steve and the Thundercats had so much in common. I’m still reading Steve’s book – I doubt my review will be as entertaining as this =)
October 14th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
Wow, my Eyes of Thundera did NOT see a post such as this coming into existence EVER! You deserve to walk amongst great beings for this collection of words. Thanks for making my night!
NunoXEI´s last blog post..Twitter Updates for 2008-10-10
October 14th, 2008 at 10:50 pm
This is hilarious
Nice review although. Very creative.
Avani-Mehta´s last blog post..How To Balance Life Effortlessly
October 14th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Hunter, this post is so beautiful in so many ways.
Michael Martine – Remarkablogger´s last blog post..How to Measure Blog Traffic: Web Analytics
October 15th, 2008 at 1:07 am
Hi Hunter – I can always count on you to do a non traditional book review. You didn’t disappoint me. I’m sure you’ll capture Steve’s attention with your originality.
Barbara Swafford´s last blog post..Blogging – Is It A Cure For Insomnia
October 15th, 2008 at 3:35 am
Thunder cats … one of my favorite cartoons when I was a kid :-0)
I love the way you relate the two….. very creative.
Shamelle- TheEnhanceLife´s last blog post..People-Pleasing: The Price Of Being Too Nice And What To Do About It
October 15th, 2008 at 5:51 am
Any Thundercats reference is cool.
Chad @ sentient money´s last blog post..Bailout 2.0
October 15th, 2008 at 7:28 am
Well worth the read Hunter! I love this comparison as I was a child of the ’80s and the Thundercats were one of my favorite ‘toons. So to have such a great comparison with one of the blogging greats is priceless. Definitely worth a stumble! Eric.
Eric Hamm´s last blog post..Creating Comment Abundance: Writer Dad Style
October 15th, 2008 at 10:30 am
Hi Hunter,
I don’t have a problem with befriending spiders.
I tried to help a baby snake out the other day by pushing it off the cement path ’cause it was going to get squished by a bike and it simply reared up and hissed at me! And then it struck my fingernail.
I had to laugh at the comparison of my alma mater to the others: Michigan State University – Drink beer ’till you drop. I suppose it’s a Dionysian madness going on over there.
I’ve never read Steve Pavlina, but I popped over to his site and he sounds like a very interesting person and well worth a good read.
I do like the analogies you make with the Thunder Cats although I thought that was one of goofiest hero cartoons imaginable. The Power Rangers were pretty good.
PS This sensor thing is not showing my current post. I’ve noticed that about the comment luv heart sensor also.
Ellen Wilson´s last blog post..Work it Like a Turkish Pop Star
October 15th, 2008 at 11:04 am
I am working my way through Steve’s book as we speak. Well not strictly speaking as we speak because I’m typing this, but you know what I mean. It is intriguing to date with some good stuff in there, but I wanted to ask you this pertinent question.
My dog has attacked the book, not once, not twice, but three times! What does this tell us do you think?
Tim Brownson´s last blog post..Change Is Always Possible
October 15th, 2008 at 11:16 am
Brilliant review. I have to agree the blog is far better. I began to feel the book is quite repetitious especially after I had done the wordle at http://geoffjones.com/2008/09/17/truth-love-power/ which highlights the most used words.
btw Love this commenting tool tht finds my last blog post
Geoff´s last blog post..Be careful what you wish for!
October 15th, 2008 at 11:28 am
I think it’s a sign that your dog hates cats.
NunoXEI´s last blog post..Republic Domain 033: Praising Hims
October 15th, 2008 at 11:51 am
Nice review! I just finished the book and have been pondering my upcoming review, but it never occurred to me to make an analogy to a cartoon. I am not so familiar with the world of Thundera (when it came out I was in junior high, so Madonna and the Brat Pack were more my speed), so I guess you “had to be there!” Great job!
Gladys Perez´s last blog post.."How Does Your Passion Fit Into Your Purpose?"
October 15th, 2008 at 12:08 pm
I really enjoyed this review! It’s definitely off the wall, and it makes me wanna buy his book even more. Cheers!
TheAndySan
http://www.theandysan.com
TheAndySan´s last blog post..Drawing Out Success
October 15th, 2008 at 12:47 pm
Hi Hunter – great comparison. I have only glanced through the book so far. But I was planning to do the exercises. Please don’t tell me I’ll need to befriend a spider, because I’m terrified of them.
October 15th, 2008 at 1:19 pm
[...] has attacked the book, not once, not twice, but three times! What does this tell us do you think? [Source] Our duty as funny people is to make up humourous captions explaining why the dog attacked the [...]
October 15th, 2008 at 2:21 pm
Hi Hunter. When I first started reading this I thought the ThunderCats were a football team
Now I know better. I’m looking forward to your interview with Steve.
As for Steve’s spider friend, I have a love-hate relationship with spiders. While camping, I suffered a spider bite a couple of years ago. It became so infected that I had to have antiobiotic intravenous treatments 2 times a day at the hosp emerg for 3 days. Needless to say I watch out for them. But, I can’t kill them. I wouldn’t let them stay in my apartment though cause they make me nervous. I evict them by means of a tupperware container WITH a lid on it.
Davina´s last blog post..Blog Action: Pass The Change, Be The Change
October 15th, 2008 at 2:23 pm
I agree that the ThunderCats could destroy Steve (after all, he is grossly outnumbered), but I totally think Steve could use binary thinking and root cause analysis to completely obliterate The Tick and Arthur.
Maria | Never the Same River Twice´s last blog post..Changes That Stick: Contemplation and Procrastination
October 15th, 2008 at 2:41 pm
[...] But after reading Steve’s own sales page and some reviews (at Wisebread, Skills Toolbox and Hunter Nutall) I have changed my [...]
October 15th, 2008 at 3:13 pm
If I haven’t had such a fantastic read yesterday evening with my own copy of Steve’s book (pre-ordered it as soon as this was possible by amazon) I’d most likely order it today after having read your most unconventional book review ever.
Love it and love the book…
Greetings,
Philipp
Philipp Knoll´s last blog post..How to add your avatar or gravatar to blogs or forums
October 15th, 2008 at 6:37 pm
I loved the thundercats as a kid. This was one of the most entertaining reviews yet!
Keep up the highly creative work, Hunter.
Nathalie Lussier from Billionaire Woman´s last blog post..Travel: A Journey to Expanding Horizons
October 16th, 2008 at 7:14 am
Great post! I’m definitely with you on enjoying the blog more than the book. I too feel like he toned it down for the book. It’s still an excellent read and it helps to see personal development in the perspective Steve offers in the book. Really funny post.
October 16th, 2008 at 9:29 am
Everyone, thanks for the comments. Don’t get used to book reviews like this though! There was just something that made this comparison inevitable.
Tim’s comment has now started a caption contest in Steve’s forum: Dog eats Steve’s book – now we write funny captions about it
October 16th, 2008 at 9:31 am
Actually, Steve is not as disadvantaged as we might think:
Thundercats have a hissy fit if they go near water. Steve is adaptable and can swim.
Thundercats don’t get along with dogs. Steve likes all animals. He might even own one.
Thundercats cough up hair-balls. Steve doesn’t lick himself.
Thundercats need a litter box to do their business. Steve can go everwhere.
Thundercats shed all over the furniture. Steve is a hairless house-ape. He has little (if any) fur.
Thundercats come running when they hear the electric can opener. Steve knows patience and can wait for his meal.
Friar´s last blog post..Travels with the Bear: Peak Bagging in Upstate New York.
October 16th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Thunder Thunder Thuder Thunder Cats! Weeeeee weeeee! (I’m chuckling away to myself here and my boyfriend thinks I’ve gone mad!)
Great cartoon, thanks for the memory. Very creative angle, still reading my one.
In love, light and abundance x x x
Lola Fayemi / Nourishment for your spiritual awakening´s last blog post..Does more money always mean more choices?
October 16th, 2008 at 10:40 pm
@ Friar, yesterday I was watching an episode on YouTube where Tygra swims underwater to look for an entrance to castle Plun-Darr. In the comments, people were asking since when is Tygra not afraid of water! Apparently the different writers didn’t sync up with each other.
@ Lola, I’m glad it brought on chuckles, but I believe the saying is “Thundercats Ho!” not “Thundercats Weeeee Weeeee!”
October 17th, 2008 at 3:15 am
Hunter,
You are quite eccletic! From serious to play, inspiration to business…you can speak well on most subjects. Hey, want to run for Pres?
Harmony´s last blog post..When A Good Seed Goes BAD
October 17th, 2008 at 1:39 pm
@ Harmony, you’re the second person to ask me that! I wish I could, but I’m no Sarah Palin.
October 27th, 2008 at 5:16 pm
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November 25th, 2008 at 3:24 am
[...] six weeks early, which kept him very busy with promoting it and giving interviews, not to mention fighting the Thundercats and drinking a gallon of juice every day. But true to his word, he made time to give the interview. [...]
April 2nd, 2010 at 3:13 pm
Just got hands on the book. Must say that your review made me do so. And yes the website is filled with wealth of information. Exhaustive, nice and creative review is all i can say