Over 20 years, I have learned and seen time and time again that reading the right type of books can fuel a new attitude and a new impetus in people. Some books can trigger a whole new chapter of personal development, goal achievement and business success. This is the short story of how a single booked changed my life.

My first insight into the power of positive thinking and mindset came when I was just 19 years old. I worked in a self-employed environment for a national broker, cold calling, and selling life insurance, savings plans and pensions.

This role gave me a tough business baptism and education. However, I now realise, it was brilliant foundation and the best virtual ‘university’ I could have attended for the life I was about to develop.

I will always be grateful to one of the successful broker I met all those years ago. He   introduced me to the book ‘Think and Grow Rich’ by Napoleon Hill. 

It is no exaggeration to say that this is the book that literally changed my life. The reason for this is it “kick started” my journey of personal development and gave me a thirst for learning and knowledge that has not be quenched to this very day.

Napoleon Hill’s book provided an example that opened up a new world of learning for me – a world that I was previously unaware of. The book helped to crystallize the unquestionable realisation that becoming successful was more about how I thought, how I organized my mind, how I talked to myself than my academic qualifications or what type of personal background I came from. This book created a life defining moment, a paradigm shift in my life. I woke up the concept that we can become what we think – as man thinketh , so he becometh.

By the time I had finished reading this book, I was convinced about the power of positive thinking and the importance of goals. I immediately started to actively set goals rather than just having dreams in my head. I started writing down the specific things I wanted to achieve; the sort of car I wanted to drive, the lifestyle I wanted etc. My goal setting methods were pretty crude back then. I scribbled on scraps of paper, nothing very visual.

Today my goal setting boards are much more dynamic. I’m a big follower of Brian Mayne and his goal mapping methodology. It’s the most powerful method that I’ve come across, although it did take me a while to get into it. Dream books/vision boards are powerful; images are a great way to stimulate the brain.

Since that time I’ve become a huge advocate of personal development, in large part learning from people who have mastered the things that I wanted to master. Fundamental to this is having a willingness to change; people struggle when they are not prepared to change; your world changes when you do.

I believe the biggest challenge in managing our mindset starts in honestly evaluating one’s current mindset. Many of us are just not conscious of our actual thoughts. We see ourselves in a particular light, we may consider ourselves extremely positive, and yet our words and conversations might be negative and destructive. We may indulge in gossip and running others down. If that’s the majority of your daily dialogue, trust me, even if you claim to be positive, you are not. It all starts from a point of awareness. Become more aware of your thoughts, words, and actions. Work hard to change them to being more positive than negative. Set yourself the task of wherever possible leaving the people you are interacting with feeling positive, feeling better having spoken with you. Ask yourself the question ‘do I light up a room when I enter it or when I leave it?’ Become conscious of how your environment influences you and limit any negative input. It’s said we are the average of the five people we spend the most time of our time with. Who are those people in your life, and is that ok? Do they lift you up or bring you down? Read more positive, uplifting material, news programmes and newspapers are not generally filled with good news. If I only eat junk food each day, my body will turn to junk, it’s the same with the mind and brain, feed yourself nourishing information. My top nourishing reads would be Napoleon Hill’s Think & Grow rich as mentioned earlier, ‘Feel the Fear and Do it Anyway’ by Susan Jeffers, anything by Anthony Robbins and Dr Tom Barrett, particularly his book “Dare to Dream and Work to Win’.

Find some mindset heroes; mine include, Tony Robbins, Richard Branson and from history, Winston Churchill. I have huge respect for those who dream and have the courage to follow those dreams without giving up.

Finally, it’s important to remember that we are always ‘work in progress’ especially when we are taking ‘the road less travelled’ wanting to fulfill our potential in every area of our lives, not settling for the norm or for mediocrity. Don’t settle for average. The average of anything is being in the middle. Be at the top. To get there will take a lifetime of personal development, of change, and of growing day by day. I ask myself at the end of every week, how many times have I felt uncomfortable, or nervous in the last week? If the answer is none, then I probably didn’t test myself enough.

What challenges do you face? What do you do to manage your mindset? I’d love to hear from you.