"The Elephant And The Twig"
By Geoff Thompson

Young elephants are trained by being tied to an unmovable object, like a tree. The elephant tries to break away, until it eventually gives up. When the elephant grows to be an adult, it can be tied to a twig - because it won't try to escape.

So it is with the thoughts and beliefs that keep us playing it small. These thoughts, normally ingrained in us when we were little, had once a lot of power over us; now that they don't anymore we don't even try to challenge them, as we're under the impression that we cannot escape them.

In "The elephant and the twig" Geoff Thompson presents fourteen rules to "break the twigs" and to train ourselves to think positively, so as to escape mediocrity and achieve success.

What I like the most about this book is that it the author himself had to break many twigs to become the successful person he is. Among others, he had to overcome beliefs that kept him working a nightmarish job and that told him he could never be a writer.

The author brings us fourteen principles that helped him in becoming successful. Some of my favourite principles are:

• "We are all dying so now is the time to act". How many of us have a lot of "somedays" kept somewhere... "Someday I'll travel to Japan"; "Someday I'll write a book"; "Someday I'll start painting". Well... that "someday" never arrives, and we don't get to do the precise things that would bring us the most satisfaction.

  Now is the time to act - not someday. You can start today taking if just a small step towards what you would like to achieve. The author talks from the heart - he actually had to hide away in toilets to be able to start writing.

• "You are what you think". The thoughts that you think about yourself over and over again become your beliefs. As the author tells, countless thoughts of "I can't" kept him stuck, until he decided to switch to positive thoughts.

  As he proposes: "From when you wake in the morning until you go to bed at night, tell yourself in your internal dialogue that you are the creator and that you can create - and handle - anything. Do this until it becomes a habit to think only positive thoughts."

• "The secret of necessity and growth". The author explains that one of the secrets of success is to be proactive rather than reactive - to seek one's own growth.

  He puts several examples on how to go about creating the situations that give us the opportunity to grow and exceed ourselves.

"The elephant and the twig" is written in plain English, and it speaks to you as if having a friendly conversation.

This book will be specially useful to you if you find yourself stuck in a situation in which you don't want to be, and know where you do want to be. The fourteen principles outlined in this book can then help you to move forward starting from scratch.

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