Be Useful

Arnold Schwarzenegger’s Be Useful: Seven Tools for Life is his most personal and practical book yet—a reflection on a lifetime of transformation, discipline, and service. The title comes from his father’s most memorable piece of advice: “Be useful.” This simple statement shaped every chapter of Schwarzenegger’s extraordinary life—from a poor boy in rural Austria to a seven-time Mr. Olympia, a Hollywood superstar, and the governor of California.

For Schwarzenegger, “being useful” means more than working hard—it means dedicating your talents to improve the world around you. It means combining vision, discipline, and compassion. He believes success without service is hollow, and ambition without contribution is incomplete. Each of the book’s seven tools distills a lesson he learned through experience, reinforced by specific stories from bodybuilding gyms, movie sets, and the political arena.

1. Have a Clear Vision

Schwarzenegger argues that every accomplishment begins with a clear and vivid vision. “You can’t climb a mountain,” he says, “if you don’t see the peak.”

He recounts growing up in the small Austrian village of Thal, where opportunity seemed nonexistent. His house had no plumbing, heating, or phone. Yet one day, as a teenager, he saw a photo of Hercules actor and bodybuilder Steve Reeves in a magazine. That image lit a fire. “I wanted to be him. I wanted to be strong, famous, and live in America.”

From that day, Schwarzenegger built his life around this vision. He kept a scrapbook of bodybuilders, trained daily in a makeshift gym, and pasted pictures of California beaches on his walls. He even told his skeptical parents, “I’m going to be the best bodybuilder in the world, and then I’ll go to America.” His father laughed. His mother cried. But Arnold never wavered.

He visualized his success in detail—walking onto the Mr. Olympia stage, hearing the crowd cheer, signing autographs in the U.S. He describes visualization as mental rehearsal: “If you can picture it vividly, your body will find a way to make it happen.”

Later in life, he used this same visualization to pivot careers—from bodybuilding to acting, then politics. “I didn’t see limits,” he writes. “I saw the next mountain to climb.”

He encourages readers to write down their vision, not just dream it. “A dream without a deadline,” he says, “is just a fantasy.”

2. Never Think Small

Schwarzenegger’s second tool— Never think small —urges readers to aim higher than logic or fear allows. Mediocrity, he says, is a mindset, not a fate.

When he moved to America in 1968 at age 21, he barely spoke English, had $20 in his pocket, and no job. But he wasn’t intimidated. “I saw Los Angeles and thought, this is where my dreams live.”

He began training at Gold’s Gym in Venice Beach, often arriving before dawn and leaving at sunset. He studied acting at night, investing the little money he earned from construction jobs. He told everyone he’d be a movie star, even when he could barely pronounce the word “star.”

People laughed at him constantly. Studio executives told him, “You’ll never make it in Hollywood. You’re ...