The cult of Arianna: Kaveree Bamzai reviews Thrive

This is Arianna," says the voice with 19 different accents at the other end of the phone line. That's Arianna Huffington, full-time journalist, sometime politician, lifetime entrepreneur, all-time life enthusiast, calling from her Brentwood home to promote her new book, Thrive. It's miles away from the shocking opening line of Thrive, which finds her on the morning of April 6, 2007, "lying on the floor of my home office in a pool of blood". Turns out she was burnt out, exhausted from the 24x7 grind of launching and running The Huffington Post, which transformed her into one of the few people in America who have influence in its three critical capitals, Los Angeles, New York and Washington, D.C., straddling with ease the low-high culture which has made her an international brand.

It wasn't always this way. Arianna, now 64, is a study in self-improvement, going from a scholarship at Cambridge to a longtime partnership with one of Britain's most influential journalists Bernard Levin to a marriage with US Republican Congressman Michael Huffington to a singular career as successful businesswoman who has elevated social networking to an art form. With a $315 million buyout of The Huffington Post by AOL, it's no wonder the mother of two millennial daughters felt the need to write a how-to book.

It's a crowded market for sure. We have coped with Facebook COO Sheryl Sandberg who's told us to lean in; there's Anne-Marie Slaughter who's told us to tell the men in our lives to lean in; there's Amy Chua who's basically told us to bet big on the genetic pool. And then theres always Gwyneth Paltrow who informs us almost daily how she copes with the trauma of being a global celebrity with a multi-million-dollar pay cheque.

Arianna-she is one of those worldwide celebrities whom you just have to address by their first names-has found her perfect formula for the perfect life, and while it's by no means original, it is pragmatic. Her third metric of success goes beyond money and power and focuses on four pillars: Well-being, wisdom, wonder and giving (of ourselves, prompted by empathy and compassion). It's a mix of new-age populism and smartly mined personal anecdotes, packaged with misleading headlines that are meant to make you smile. How to Sleep Your Way to the Top is, of course, about the importance of rest. When Your Inner Voice Speaks, Shut Up and Listen is about the power of the hunch. And Evicting the Obnoxious Roommate in our Heads is to learn to be less self-critical. Does she worry about the competition, you ask her. Nah, she says, quoting Mikhail Baryshnikov who said he only wanted to dance better than himself.

It's easier to follow all that advice about digital detoxification and curing the problem of time famine when you're rich and successful, but there are parts of the book which are for the everywoman. Nothing is as powerful as the description of her mother's last day. She knows she is dying, but she has an impromptu picnic at her home with her daughters and grandchildren, where she eats shellfish, drinks a glass of red wine and says goodbye. Live each day as if it is your last, writes Arianna, and indeed you really do feel like living up to your best eulogy.

Incidents such as this make you go beyond the cereal box quality of the advice and reach out for its wisdom. It's all right to live your career like a spiral, she writes; take time off for meditation every day; connect with yourself. Arianna is a good learner and readily admits she learnt much from India, her next stop for media expansion which she will revisit later in the year. She came here first as a 17-year-old to study comparative religion at Visva-Bharati, which took her to Varanasi where she found peace and wisdom in the middle of a bustling marketplace and realised that "you can be in the world but not of the world". Padmasree Warrior, chief technology officer at Cisco, taught her the power of meditation to reboot the brain and soul, and a visit three months ago to Dharamsala to meet the Dalai Lama showed her the dangers of addiction.

Gratitude is a powerful emotion, she says, and indeed, you realise how little of it is in our lives. Onward, upward and inward. That's Arianna's rallying cry, and instead of dismissing it as high-priced hokum, you feel inspired enough to want to pump up the volume and dance around with it, waving your hands about, as proud members of Arianna's cult. The first women's revolution was led by the Suffragettes, the second by Betty Friedan and Gloria Steinem. The third revolution, of the Third Metric, will be led by women, Arianna writes. Who are we to argue?

Follow the writer on Twitter @kavereeb