What You Can Expect To Learn

Part 1: Embracing Change helps you assess your present position and introduces the idea of change as something to welcome.

Part 2: Healing the Past will show you how to manage your memories in a more useful way, especially if there are events in your past which you would like to have different feelings about, or which you would prefer to banish from your mind altogether.

Part 3: Creating An Empowering Self-Image is about using your inner resources to build a strong foundation for real self-confidence. The way you think about yourself is at the root of all your behaviour: here you will learn how to grow strong roots.

Part 4: Freedom From Stress will show you how to notice the symptoms of stress and plan them out of your life. It will also help you to defuse potential conflicts before they get out of hand, and become more flexible in every aspect of your behaviour.

Part 5: Effective Communication is about getting on with other people. You will learn how to quickly develop and maintain rapport with almost anyone, and to gauge the effect you have on others using verbal and non-verbal feedback.

Part 6: Dealing With The Present effectively is the key to success and happiness. We will look at how to make decisions in line with your most important values, and how to attune yourself more closely to your intuition.. Learn how to live each day as it comes and keep moving in the right direction.

Part 7: Creating an Inspiring Future will show you how to develop and use your innate power of visualization to make your best dreams come true.

How To Use This Book

I suggest that you skim through it quickly – just to satisfy your curiosity – then start at the beginning and complete each exercise before moving on to the next. That way it will all make sense and you won’t be left wondering how each part relates to the whole picture.

And that is only a suggestion.

There are seven parts, each with four exercises, so at the rate of one exercise per day you can finish the book within a month. You may prefer to take it more slowly than this – maybe one part per week – and that is what I would recommend if you are working with a group of people. However long it takes to finish the book, please bear in mind that the process of change and growth is continuous throughout life and this is only a new starting point. You may want to refer to your notes later on and update them.

For many people, the best time of day to learn is first thing in the morning: your mind is uncluttered by chores and responsibilities and you are less likely to be distracted by family, phone calls or visitors.

If you are just not a morning person, and the idea of getting up an hour earlier is really too awful to contemplate, you have two choices:

a. decide that this is an aspect of your life which needs changing, and do it anyway, or –

b. set aside some time later in the day

The quality of the changes you experience will be in direct proportion to the quality of your desire for change.

Or to put it another way: if you are serious about changing your life, then you must demonstrate this serious intent to yourself. And while your intent must be serious, I hope the process will be enjoyable.

One way to demonstrate your intent is to prove to yourself that you can easily learn one new habit. Because if you can learn one, you can learn others. And learning new habits is a very effective way of changing your life.

Simply reading this book probably won’t do much for you beyond filling a gap in time, but as you work through the exercises with awareness and an open mind, you may notice things changing around you and within you in quite unexpected ways. Later you may also become aware of profound, creative, long-term changes which you may hardly be able to imagine right now.

Most important of all, you will feel more in control of your own life, more able to make decisions, and more able to clearly see what you really want to have, be and do.