I know a lot of people around me, and around my age, are not excited for things like they used to be. We’ve been let down too often by subpar games, half-assed books, unnecessary cash-grab reboots of franchises we grew up adoring… I hate to say that I’ve been burned by the same issues.

Of course, I also love the fact that I still approach new things with childlike wonder and pure excitement! Especially if those new things are something I’ve loved all my life, or I truly think it will help me or people around me. With learning and growing being in both of those categories, it’s no surprise that the thing I’m excited about coming out within the next month is a new book by Steve Kamb, “How to Try Again”, a book for literally anyone having trouble making changes that last. Before we get into the weeds on my thoughts and excitement, let’s talk about getting the book.

There is a pre-order going on RIGHT NOW! The book is set for release June 16th of 2026 (June 18th for UK & international), so if you’re reading this before then go order a copy! (Steve sent out several links in his newsletter, but to make things easier, I’m just linking straight to the book on his website. There are links there to pre-order from.) (Disclaimer: I get absolutely nothing for my hyping this book, except for the feeling of peace that I might get this book in front of someone it might really help.)

Check it out here: HowToTryAgain.com

If you do pre-order, make sure to read further down the page, as there are some bonuses for those who pre-order!

Steve has been working on this book for a while, three and a half years. (I tell you, knowing it took Steve that long and a ton of drafts to get to a published state helps with my anxiety about how long my current projects are taking to get to a state I feel happy with.) I’ve been getting his newsletters for a long time now. If you’ve read anything on my site before, there’s a good chance you’re one of the couple thousand people that have read my review of Nerd Fitness. This fella happens to be the founder, and pretty awesome in my eyes! He’s been putting out newsletters and helping people for 17 years now.

Over a decade ago now, I found Nerd Fitness and signed up for the newsletters, and there’s been a ton I’ve learned and grown from over the years. Heck, my “Monologued Dialogue” series spawned from a prompt I got during a Nerd Fitness thing around when I founded the blog! I never would have worked up the courage to start this without Steve and what he started, and I wouldn’t be chasing my dream of becoming a published author either.

Now, of course, this is not a review of the book. It isn’t out yet! I do plan, once it’s out and I’ve read it and absorbed it, to do a review and look at how it changes any ways of thinking I have, if it does. Here are a few things, however, that I have been feeling lately about my attempts to change various things, which I hope something in the book will give me a new outlook on:

1. When I try to make a change and it doesn’t stick, I feel absolutely miserable and like a failure. I feel like I’m not meant to grow in that direction. (This happens every time I try to set a schedule for writing posts on here, rather than doing it haphazardly when I get ideas or something happens that I want to write about)
2. When I try to make changes, I either don’t change enough and am basically still doing the same thing, or I try to change everything at once. I already know this isn’t the way to do this from Nerd Fitness, but nothing has yet helped me change my thoughts around implementing change enough to help me make this stick.
3. When I fail something, I feel like there’s no point in trying again. I already failed, why would I think it would go better the next time? I also know this is incorrect. After all, we only grow by implementing what we have learned from previous failures. The difficulty, for me, lies in the fact that I simply didn’t fail as a kid unless I didn’t try. (Or sports, I was never an amazing athelete. Granted… I really didn’t try, either. So maybe I would’ve been? There’s no telling now.) While there were skills I took a little longer to pick up, if I wanted to learn it, I still absorbed it like a sponge. Occassionally a mostly full sponge so it would be slow, but a sponge nonetheless. Now? If I don’t pick up the skill with that level of speed and ease, I just give up. It’s something I’ve started to write about several times, but always ends up feeling like a pity party or like I’m bragging about how I was as a kid. I’m learning to accept that I was definitely a gifted kid, I wasn’t challenged enough, and I am paying the price for not trying to at least challenge myself. Now that I’m older, I’m realizing I can challenge myself, but I am also seeing that, with rare exceptions (like things that explicitly intend for you to fail the first time (I may have a slight Rouge-like addiction)), I will simply give up after failing once and not try that method or idea or skill again. I hope that, while I am slowly processing this on my own, something in the book will help cement it for me.

I, of course, don’t know for sure what the book will say or how. I do know, however, that Steve’s first book, “Level Up Your Life”, was amazing and gave me important insights that helped me change the way I saw certain things. I also know that, given I pre-ordered immediately after I got the email (Did I mention being excited for this?) I will be getting a couple chapters early and get to join a live call/talk with Steve in a few days. I’m not one to act like a major super fan or anything (Is there a gender-neutral form of “fangirl” or “fanboy” for this instance? I’m writing this without my morning caffeine and can’t think of one) but I am extremely super ultra excited. This will make two big names that I’ve watched or read for a large portion of my life that I get to interact with in some way directly this year. Out of the two, though, Steve Kamb (both of them are Steve, I just realized, and that is a huge coincidence) is the one most likely to help me improve my life. (The other is a ghost hunter, so there’s that.)

Anyway, I just wanted to help hype the book, and to get this out in front of more eyes. This book may help you, or someone you know. Everyone works to change habits and things they do. Some people can do it no problem. Me, and likely several of you who read this? Not so much. If you struggle with making changes in your habits and your life, maybe check out the book and see if it helps you shift your perspective on things, or approach things in a more manageable way.

If you’re excited, like I am, feel free to drop a comment in the chat! And if you haven’t heard of Steve before and want weekly emails that might help you rethink the way you approach your goals and the world around you, consider signing up for his newsletter, accessible through the link above. Thanks for reading, see you next time! (Hopefully sooner than it has been, I’m working on posting more regularly.)