How do we cultivate our character? What can we do, which choices can we make, to ensure that we create lives full of value and morality?

In his wise, wonderful book, Life's Greatest Lessons, Hal Urban presents twenty principles that serve as a foundation for building a life of which you can be proud. The lessons he shares are as deeply rooted in common sense as they are in compassion. The topics, gathered from Hal's experiences as a parent and an award-winning teacher of both children and adults, span a wide range of readily understood concepts, including attitudes about money, understanding the real meaning of success, and the importance of having fun.

Whether you are searching for a long-overdue starting point for becoming the person you always hoped to be or seek another source of inspiration to affirm your choice to lead a praiseworthy life, Hal Urban's message of fundamental goodness will satisfy that need.

Classic in its simplicity and enduring in its appeal, Life's Greatest Lessons helps us all rediscover that the desire to live a good life is timeless.

Urban, a psychology Ph.D. specializing in "peak performance," draws on his own life experiences, wisdom imparted by his mentors and basketball coaches, observations of high school and college students, and the writings of other self-help gurus like Stephen Covey and M. Scott Peck to compile this catechism of conventional truisms. According to Urban, life’s great lessons are exactly what you always dreaded they’d be (they’re also his chapter titles): life is hard and not always fair; there’s no substitute for hard work; you have to give up something to get something. Although slightly disdainful of the hug-happy self-esteem movement, Urban does insist that we all have a potential to live up to. Fortunately, since "attitude is far more important than intelligence, education, special talent, or luck," with enough positive thinking success is virtually assured—as long as we buckle down, set goals and stick with them, manage our time efficiently and find Jesus Christ or some other kind of spiritual content to nourish our lives. Urban is an ex-high school teacher, a self-admitted former "growth junkie" and a leader of the "character education" movement, and is thus awash in good lessons; his prose, though, tends toward the bland and platitudinous, which may make the lessons hard for some to swallow.

Hal Urban was a high school teacher for many years and also taught at the University of San Francisco. He is a well-known leader in the Character Education movement and is in constant demand as a speaker at national conferences and school and community events. He raised three sons as a single father, and now lives in Redwood City, California, with his wife, Cathy.

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