James Smith - Not a Life Coach: Push Your Boundaries, Unlock Your Potential, Redefine Your Life

Extracts from Outliers by Malcolm Gladwell. Copyright 2008 published by Little, Brown and Company 2008, Allen Lane 2008, Penguin Books 2009. Reproduced by permission of Penguin Books Ltd.

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First published by HarperCollinsPublishers 2020

FIRST EDITION

Text James Smith 2020

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Source ISBN: 9780008404840

Ebook Edition November 2020 ISBN: 9780008404826

Version: 2020-10-22

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If someone had asked me when I was twenty-one to write a book that could change lives, I wouldnt have considered myself able to change even one persons life for the better, or offer any advice of true value. But here we are, ten years on, and Ive found myself doing exactly that and doing it as a career. In a relatively short space of time, I have gained valuable perspective, experience and evidence that go beyond assumption and are void of unconscious bias, all to provide you with the opportunity to change the way you think. Lets put it this way: for the last decade, often without even realizing it, Ive been preparing for this very moment, for you to pick up this book and read this very page.

In my first book, I delved into how to fix insecurities, physical issues and imbalance from the neck down; here, I look at all that exists from the neck up. I know what you are probably thinking right now: who the hell am I to give you advice? What puts me in a position of authority on these topics? I ask myself the same question most days, to be honest, and have thought to myself while writing each and every chapter: why should people listen to me?

Im not trying to be an expert on life. I am not your leader, and Im not asking you to follow me. I am not, nor can I be, irrefutably correct on every opinion I have. I am, like you and like everyone you know, only human.

The popular Greek proverb states that old men plant trees whose shade they know they shall never sit in. When it comes to the art of true stoicism and many long-held discussions of philosophy, I often sit back and wonder whether its all just a trail of people leaving advice they wish their younger selves could hear.

I wasted years of my life frustrated, deflated, disheartened and annoyed in the wrong job, chasing the wrong goals, eventually becoming the personal trainer that I wish had been there for me when I needed him. Now, I hope that I can be the coach I wish had been there when I was sleepwalking through my own life, held back by believing my own potential was limited.

Only you can take the reins of your own life and choose to make a change, but I can be the one to give you the tools to do so. This book is quite simply the book I wish had been there for me at crucial turning points of my life.

If you stop to look around and think about it, you will see there is an invisible blueprint to life that the majority of the world is following, and I cant help but think its leaving so many people unfulfilled, unhappy and dissatisfied. Many seek and accomplish financial freedom, but its to no avail when there is no sense of purpose. This book, I hope, will provoke necessary change; it will begin from the turn of the next page, but it wont finish with the turn of the last.

Where youll be standing, who with, what youll be doing and what youll achieve are all going to be based on what you read and what you dont, who you keep in your life and those you let go. In the words of the author Charlie Tremendous Jones: You will be the same person in five years as you are today except for the people you meet and the books you read.

To leave chapters of this book unread will increase the chances that you will leave chapters of your life unlived and, without being unlocked, your potential could be limited, your growth stunted and your self-worth and everyday happiness could suffer.

This is not an ornament for your window ledge it is not just a book you plan to read, a collation of motivating quotes or parables to live by; this is a lens through which to view the world, so that you can clearly see your underlying potential in the context of a spectrum that you couldnt see clearly before.

I am not your life coach. I am here with one sole purpose: to change your life