Book Review of Leverage Meditation by Teddy Ortega

I was given a complimentary copy of the book, Leverage Meditation: Redefine Your Life’s Purpose, by the author Teddy Ortega. I absolutely recommend this book to someone looking to improve their self-direction and visioning of themselves. This is not your standard How-To meditation book focusing on sitting comfortably on a cushion and emptying your mind while focusing on your breathing. Those books and audiobooks I absolutely fail at. This book instead gives the reader focused ideas to think about and meditate upon to improve their life. The different leveraging strategies are concisely and simply explained, but will take meditative practice to incorporate into one’s daily life. However, for someone like me, who cannot stop thinking to meditate, this is a perfect tool.  

In the forward, the author ponders that if we can create computers that run reliably and with consistent results, how possible is it to do the same with our own minds, habits, decisions and actions? It should be as easy as the simple concept of leveraging our thoughts and habits just as we use leverage to our advantage to lift heavy objects with little effort. Shouldn’t we be able to find the right leverage to propel ourselves forward with little effort instead of the same old plodding forward? We need the extra boost to our mental metabolism. He also explains that there can be both positive leverage and negative leverage. It’s not a new concept to surround ourselves with positive supporting people and avoid the toxic negativity, but Mr. Ortega has an excellent Leverage Matrix graphic in Chapter II and explains this well.

Leverage Meditation is full of analogies, to explain the basic concepts that Mr. Ortega wants to share. He shares stories from his own life as well, as if sharing with a friend. By including such a  range of analogies, there is certainly some empathy for every reader whether you better understand movie directors or lasers. Ultimately we must all learn from our mistakes, solve our problems, and thus move past a reactive stage. Once we do that, our leveraging becomes easier and we can move to success more easily. For example, Mr. Ortega creates fantastic analogies for the reader, first having us consider ourselves our own movie director. Simplistically this is just to envision what we want to have happen. The next step though is to find the leverage to achieve this. This then moves on to compare us to software designers as we reprogram our brains. It makes sense to want to put forth the least effort to achieve the greatest results. We need to reprogram ourselves then to use the best leverage and meet our goals. However, the best software, or the best director is null and void if they aren’t actually used. 

This book does often refer to trusting in a Supreme Being. The author does speak a little of their own belief system, but that is never overt in this book and the reader can easily apply their own religion to the advice. However, it may be a little over the top to someone who does not believe in a supreme being influencing or controlling their life. The reader may want to skim through these sections, which are obvious, and focus on the leverage advice that does pertain to them. The book is completely set up to use as a whole or to just take what you need. I do really like how the author introduces each of his ideas of leverage separately. He uses concrete analogies that the reader can relate to. Then he suggests how to use the new strategy, the new leverage in conjunction with the previous strategies. 

On the other hand, the Compass Lever could be appreciated by everyone. Most people have had the experience of putting forth their best effort only to find that their effort not only hasn’t succeeded, but has taken them away from their goal. In this case, it sounds simple enough to use a Compass Lever to get back on track in the right direction This sounds much more achievable than having to backtrack and reevaluate before working just as hard again. The latter can be very discouraging while the former sounds much more doable. Sometimes, our greatest strength is our mental preparedness for a task.  

I do recommend reading and using Leverage Meditation by Teddy Ortega for anyone looking to become more confident and more successful in a calm and achievable way. I would like this book to be found in every public library, school library, and every yoga studio. There is no violence or mature content, even in the personal stories used as examples. This book is written with higher level language, so I am not sure it would be fully understood for anyone with only an elementary reading level. For someone in high school or above, the writing is clear and fluid. One can be completely immersed in the idea, but no chapter is so long that one loses the details of the lesson. This book is applicable to a wide audience, give it a try!

For more information, check out the author’s page.

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