“Knowing You” by Dr. Amanda Foo-Ryland

Knowing You: The Difference That Makes The Difference

Dr. Amanda Foo-Ryland
Panoma Press (2022)
ISBN: 978-1784529772
Reviewed by Lily Andrews for Reader Views (01/2023)

You cannot affect what’s going on around you until you start working on what’s going on within you. As George Bernard Shaw famously said, “Progress is impossible without change, and those who cannot work on their mindset cannot change anything.”

“Knowing You: The Difference That Makes The Difference” is a brisk and absorbing read by international keynote speaker, Dr. Amanda Foo-Ryland. It’s a deft invitation to a more elevated form of living. Thoughtful, comprehensive, and encouraging, the text offers applicable approaches to a journey of self-discovery and attaining positive change from within through the change management approach to neurology. Through this, the mind and heart are engaged, and this helps achieve extraordinary personal change that is swift and permanent.

Composed of years of the author’s professional experience, real-life stories including her own, and infusing further research on the subject, the author offers an enchiridion full of uplifting and inspiring prose. The chapters build upon each other as they discuss topics such as having an empowering mindset in all your circumstances, creating, and designing your future, and the power of beliefs and their ability to change or remain permanent among others. As the book progresses, the chapters hit harder as they take on a more practical and tangible tack.

As the book asserts, there will be times when you want to blame other people for your circumstances, blame the environment, and blame the situation itself. That’s okay, but know that while you’re in a blame mentality and thinking life is happening to you, then you are powerless. You’ll stay stuck where you are. The longer you stay there, the more stuck you’ll become. Foo-Ryland’s voice, heartwarming and authentic, stands out from other books in the field. Reading the book from cover to cover without picking up notes may not yield much and treating this book as a compendium of wisdom, soaking up a handful of pages a day, will undeniably impact one’s life.

The text further decodes the power of limiting beliefs by exploring the depth of the well of limiting beliefs, identifying them, citing examples of these, and replacing them with empowerment beliefs. It goes ahead to explain how some of the limiting beliefs become embedded in our minds. For example, a child will take on belief systems from their parents and close network through the language and behavior surrounding them. The writer’s refreshing thoughts and teachings prove not to be just hocus pocus but include tested and practical steps.

Emblazoned with positivity, good cheer, and timely counsel, this tightly packed and concisely penned guide feels like someone has thought extensively about the general challenge you’re facing, and then walks you through steps to help you figure it out—or at least think about it more clearly. “Knowing You: The Difference That Makes The Difference” by Dr. Amanda Foo-Ryland is a five-star invigorating primer that gives a reader a more versatile path going forward.