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Take Note: Real Life Lessons

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Following on from her Sunday Times bestseller, I Wish I Knew This Earlier, Toni Tone is back again – and this time, filled with advice that goes beyond our dating and romantic lives.

‘In my opinion, change as a form of evolution is wonderful, because nobody should stay exactly the same forever. If you’re not evolving or growing, what are you doing? Embrace personal change if it means the you of today is better than you of yesterday.’

Do you wish you had more confidence in yourself?

Are your friendships changing as you get older and you’re not sure how manage it?

Is your career unfulfilling or taking over your life?

These are the kinds of issues that Toni Tone explores in her brand-new book, Take Real Life Lessons. Threading in her own experiences, and in particular, what she took away from her twenties, Toni provides genuine and insightful advice on a whole array of topics.

Everything from ageing to making (and ending) friendships, to reinventing yourself and challenging your comfort zone, to ignoring ‘deadlines’ and going at your own pace – Take Note has all of the ingredients you’ll need to reach your fullest potential, in one handy, accessible place.

146 pages, Kindle Edition

Published November 10, 2022

27 people are currently reading
424 people want to read

About the author

Toni Tone

27 books31 followers

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5 stars
46 (20%)
4 stars
90 (40%)
3 stars
70 (31%)
2 stars
12 (5%)
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2 (<1%)
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews
Profile Image for mana.
313 reviews11 followers
February 9, 2023
a solid 3,5 stars.

beautiful reminders that aren’t hard to understand. i listened to the audiobook, but right after 4 minutes in i purchased the book as well, very excited to read the physical copy!
26 reviews
February 11, 2024
Toni Tone has shared some unique experiences and more depth in friendships and social situations than I have from any book so far. Would recommend.
Profile Image for &#x1f336; peppersocks &#x1f9e6;.
1,522 reviews24 followers
February 22, 2023
Reflections and lessons learned:
“Things don’t often happen for you when you want them to..”

Self love; proving; approval; responsibility; social expectations versus societal versus interpreted; perceived timelines; plans; ageing… so much covered again in this book with wise words and advice. Not as personal of course as that would be repetitive, but still very good
Profile Image for Jo The Black Bookworm .
114 reviews9 followers
December 27, 2022
“If you’re not evolving or growing, what are you doing?”

Following the success of “I wish I knew this earlier: Lessons on Love”, Sunday Times bestselling author, @tonitone is back a year later with another mini guide: “Take Note: Real Life Lessons”. This guide, in my opinion, is well suited to the complexities of growing up, and living during a time that is very much driven by comparison. A time in which we and our crafts are treated as commodities within social spaces. Authenticity is something that appears frivolous in the modern day, but yet many of us base our standards off of the perceptions presented to us on social media. Life advice is definitely something that can add comfort to many right now.

Take Note is split into 3 sections; Confidence & Identity; Friendships; and Making the Most Out of your Career. With practical advice & anecdotes from Toni’s own life experiences, readers are given the tools to enable them to make better choices, to take accountability and to support those who may also be struggling.

I picked up “Take Note” last week when I was having a really tough week at work. It had been absolute chaos, from start to finish. Once the work week had ended, a calm took hold of me “I made it”, but I knew the following week could not be a replication of the former. Section 3 “Making the most out of your career”, was lingering in my memory on Sunday night, “Overworking yourself is not a measure of success - nobody wins medals for burnout”.

An area that I believe we all neglect is friendship. We know that our friendships are important, we know that we love our friends, but do we honestly know how to maintain and nurture our friendships? Friendships for many are seen as a given, but what do we do when friendships are not working? Toni highlights a range of topics within “Friendships”, such as growing apart from friends, and being mindful of the company you keep. I would definitely like to hear more on friendship from Toni, as I do think there was room to elaborate further on this topic.

Much like its predecessor, “Take Note” is tiny, 147 pages to be precise, but it is filled with lots of gens that will be relatable to all.

⭐️⭐️⭐️⭐️
Profile Image for Edith Naava.
36 reviews
Read
April 14, 2023
Take Note - Toni Tone
The beauty about @t0nit0ne is that she will speak your heart, mind, and soul "effortlessly".
I have been reading this beautiful book by her and to say that I am inspired is an understatement...

The book is written in sections of
✨Confidence
✨Friendships
✨ Making the Most Out of Your Career

Personally, these are 3 areas I struggle with especially Friendships & Careers but with this beautiful information from @t0nit0ne, I have a starting point.

What stood out for me mostly is "Be your own cheerleader"

She says that as Women, we downplay our achievements and tend to keep them private and this swings into our businesses causing more harm than good.
We sit around and wait for other people to praise us or our businesses!

She asks "How are people supposed to reward you for your work, or offer you more work, if they don't even know where your skills lie..."

This made me look into how (in the case of a business) we run businesses in private and keep them private because we don't want to brag among our peers or family... and then we get angry when our closest friends and family don't patronize us!!
Profile Image for Megan Tran.
271 reviews
February 29, 2024
I love switching things up with a self-help book every now and then.

I, too, was the type to have one best friend in high school but still possessed the versatility to float around with different circles. Things I also still do today. And I also had a skater girl phase, until I realized that skating wasn’t for me because I’m scared of getting physically hurt.
Those were just a couple similarities that resonated with me from the book. Others, you’ll find in quote form below.


Quote(s) I Loved
•”change as a form of evolution is wonderful, because nobody should stay exactly the same forever. If you’re not evolving or growing, what are you doing?
•”The problem is caring about other people’s opinion of you more than your own opinion of you.”
•”The life you are currently living is the foundation for tomorrow.”
•”Everyone is not you.”
•”Do I want to create the life I want or do I want to live the life handed to me?”

I feel extremely motivated now to go after what I want for my future. Sometimes you just need that little reminder and I feel like I truly found it in this book.
Profile Image for Tracey.
25 reviews
July 2, 2024
A quick and easy read. I finished this in a day. I’d give it 3.5 stars. This book felt like a conversation with a big sister; it had some great personal life lessons from Toni Tone for readers to learn from. I would recommend this to people who are trying to find their footing in adulthood and advocate for themselves, especially those in their early twenties.

I live by many of the life lessons in this book, these were my favourite take aways:

“…Don’t invalidate your needs to make other people happy, or de-prioritise your needs and put other people first in a way that jeopardies your own happiness… By all means, consider other people, but also consider yourself.”

“Ask for what you want. If you go through life only accepting what people give you, you’ll be dissatisfied because many people will give you less than you deserve. Don’t talk yourself into accepting the bare minimum because you’re too nervous to ask. Go for it!”

I look forward to reading Toni Tone’s debut book on Love Lessons.
Profile Image for Inas.
325 reviews
January 2, 2023
love this! very bite-sized, short, and sweet. this book feels like something i can reread multiple times bc it's full of actionable and easy-to-remember key takeaways that you can implement immediately in your daily life.
2 reviews
July 3, 2024
10/10 recommend. Felt like I was having a beautiful conversation with a close friend. Less revolutionary and more tough love. She touched on things you already know deep down but don’t mind hearing another perspective on.
Profile Image for Chiedza.
98 reviews2 followers
November 12, 2025
A short nice read. Would’ve enjoyed more in depth practical explanations of her lived experience of the things she talked about. Felt a bit too general in parts but I understand sharing too much might’ve been too exposing. I did however still find a few gems in this read.
2 reviews
November 15, 2022
Loved this book!! Really helped me feel like I had a better sense of direction after reading.
3 reviews
November 21, 2022
amazing life lessons as always

I took my time reading this book and did not regret it. It’s definitely a book filled with Knowledge and purpose.
Profile Image for Ramoa.
3 reviews
October 20, 2025
I loved the lessons and advices here. It's an amazing book!
Profile Image for ellise.
180 reviews1 follower
June 16, 2023
inspirational , moving, life changing, amazing
Profile Image for Meg&#x1f4bf;&#x1f42f;&#x1f352;&#x1fad2;.
39 reviews1 follower
May 22, 2024
⭐️⭐️⭐️ ‘Is it too good to be true or are you too traumatised by the past to accept the present for what it is?’
A deeply personal and expanding take which diversifies the self-help genre. I read the entirety of this book in a day and saved multiple of the excerpts in my phone. An interesting read for any women in their late teens-middle aged.
Profile Image for Gette.
109 reviews
July 21, 2024
There’s nothing revolutionary here but it’s a good reminder of “notes” to remember as we navigate friendships, career, and personal life.

In the audiobook, the author/reader kept mispronouncing “debt”. Otherwise, the reading was clear and well-paced.

Rating system:
5 - Absolutely loved it!
4 - Enjoyed it / Interesting read
3 - Good / It was okay
2 - Could be better / Wasn’t that interesting
1 - Why did this even get published?
Displaying 1 - 23 of 23 reviews

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