Shine

Rediscovering Your Energy, Happiness and Purpose

Andy Cope, Gavin Oattes

• Publisher: Capstone
• Year: 2018
• Print ISBN: 9780857087652
• eBook ISBN: 9780857087614
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Personal Development
• Subtopic: Small Business

Start living the life you've always wanted

It could be that you've figured everything out on your own and have ended up acing your career, meeting and marrying your perfect partner, producing three wonderful kids, owning a holiday home in Mustique and having a drop-dead gorgeous life. In which case, we applaud you.

If, on the other hand, you need the cheat codes, then this book will give you a nudge.

Redefining the genre of 'self-help comedy,' Shine is a book about the brevity of life. It contains adult themes of mortality, change, exhaustion and unrelenting pressure. Thankfully, the bleakness is done with humour and the solutions are entertaining, do-able and uplifting.

Shine is the literary equivalent of 'ctrl/alt/delete.' All you have to do is read the book, keep an open mind, and apply the learning. You will experience a personal re-boot with new mental software installed, upgrading you to 'best possible self.' It's a very simple process that also happens to be 'not very easy.' Because, of course, if being your best self was easy, everybody would be doing it.

The average lifespan is 4000 weeks. Look around and you'll see too many people having a 'near life experience.' They're alive, but not living.

Truth time: life's a short and precious gift that's hurtling by in a blur. If you want to make a dent in the universe, it's time to wake up.

We figure that if you're going to rise, you may as well shine.

Laugh and learn while you:

• Rediscover your ability to ping out of bed every single day with fire in your belly and a smile on your face.
• Identify what really matters in your life and how to stop stressing about the stuff that doesn't.
• Remember how to focus on all that makes you happy and cut the nonsense that worries you for no reason.
• Give up your low-level grumbling and experience the joy that comes when you focus on achieving all that you've ever wanted.
• Find out just how easy it is boost your energy and increase your motivation.
• Discover how to break free from 'ordinary' and embrace a life of 'extraordinary.'
• Figure out how to channel your inner Mary Poppins.

Chapter 1
THIIIIIS MUCH EXCITED

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What’s it to be? Same old shit, or crazy new shit?

Welcome to the crazy new variety, in which Chapter 1 is introduced by a 5-year-old and we grapple with the concept of ‘normal’ and ‘shine o’clock’.

Then it’s adults only. We go all 50 Shades, with an explanation about why there’s less sex in the city. We check out Andy’s unremarkable breasts and his super-keen sense of smell before sloshing around in Thailand.

Then there’s this book, that book, bad books and a very good book (with a towel) which explains what SHINE is all about. Kind of.

And if giving you less to think about isn’t enough, we throw in what we’re calling a ‘Bilbo Bagginsism’ before challenging you with the ultimate question: ‘are you a wild salmon or stickleback kind of person?’

After toasting your good self we turn to births, marriages and deaths and invite you to hang around at your own funeral. Even in ghostly form you have choices – you could be death-eatery (dark and foreboding), poltergeisty (knocking on doors and shifting the vases) or Casper-like (floaty and friendly). We favour the latter. In a bizarre chapter ending, we offer up the ultimate challenge – to light up your own funeral.

Shine baby, shine!

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Shine o’clock

Gav will never forget his son’s first day at school, which was, bizarrely, a Friday. It was a two-hour taster visit and then he’d start his first full day the following week. Fair dos.

‘You’ll turn out ordinary if you’re not careful.’

Ann Brashares

I woke up on the Monday of that week to discover Kian stood beside me at 6am dressed in full school uniform. I reminded him that his first day was, in fact, Friday. ‘I know,’ he replied firmly, ‘I’m practising.’

He also practised Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, standing at the foot of my bed, ship-shape and inspection ready at 6am. He forgot on the actual Friday because he was exhausted by his unbroken run of early mornings, but that’s not the point.

I woke him on Friday and he leaped out of bed, threw his uniform on and came sprinting into our room. Ali and I smiled weary, early-morning-parenting smiles. I told Kian that I’d never seen him this excited before in his entire life.

He agreed wholeheartedly: ‘That’s because I’ve never been this excited in my entire life.’ There was a brief pause before he delivered the best bit: ‘And I’ve been alive for five years!’ His eyes grew wider and he rose to his tiptoes in glee. ‘In fact, Dad, I’ll show you how excited I am. I am THIIIIIS MUCH EXCITED!’

Please picture a five-year-old with his arms stretched so wide his hands are almost clasped behind his back, shoulder blades touching. If you’re struggling, imagine an angler who’d caught a very big fish but was also prone to gross exaggeration, and you’re in the right ball park.

You can probably remember being five. Pretty much everything’s exciting at that age, so to be beyond ‘normal’ excitement and to have ventured into ‘THIIIIIS much excited’ – we’re in ‘unmitigated joy’ territory.

That morning, my wife and I had a wonderful discussion about how, in that moment, there were thousands of young kids all waking up feeling the same – buzzing, pumped and ready to go. Raring to throw themselves into the next step of life’s adventure.

We continued to talk about how amazing it is that some people remain like that throughout life. Every single springy step of the journey – the infectious energy, the buzz, the SHINE. And then we had a really weird discussion about how some people never feel like that again. Their wee piece of magic dwindles, it fizzles and vanishes. It’s like your rice krispies that you poured milk on and forgot. An hour later, their snap, crackle and pop is just a mushy mess.

Could it be that some people peak at five?

There is, of course, a downside to taking the next step in your adventure. Fear. Worry. Stress. Anxiety. You are excited and yet it’s tinged with what might go wrong. It might not work. You know the oft-trotted mantra of ‘failure is not an option’ is bullshit. Failure is an actual thing. You know because you’ve experienced it.

But when you’re four or five – even though you’re a little scared – you’re THIIIIIS much excited.

BRING. IT. ON!

So, what about you? Did you wake up this morning feeling THIIIIIS much excited? Or are you the angler that caught the stickleback of joy?

How often do you wake up on a Monday morning pumped, buzzing and raring to go? Are you waking up every single day energized, happy, driven and frothing with passion? We’re not talking about some days or most days, we mean EVERY SINGLE DAY!

If your answer is ‘No’ then there’s a word for people like you: normal.

It’s absolutely normal. It’s normal not to wake up every day genuinely pumped full of energy, buzzing, raring to go.

In work it’s normal too. It’s normal for an organization NOT to have all its people waking up every morning fit to burst with excitement at the prospect of going to work and banging out world-class customer service. If you skip into work ‘frothing with passion’, someone’s going to be making you a doctor’s appointment.

Think about this for a moment.

It’s normal. You’re normal.

It is now the norm NOT to have people waking up energized, buzzing and raring to go to work. To go do the things they have chosen to do, every single day.

I’m going to say it once more.

It’s normal. And it doesn’t sit well with me. So here are a couple of rhetoricals to get your juices flowing.

Firstly, what good is having a belly if there’s no fire in it?

And secondly, do you want ‘normal’?

I’m willing to put money on it that every single person reading this book absolutely categorically does NOT want normal.

I’m willing to wager that you are, in fact, looking for, working for, hoping for, striving for, dreaming about something absolutely extraordinary. Something exciting, engaging, purposeful, colourful – even a little bit scary. Something that makes a difference.

Something that makes you feel THIIIIIS much excited.

‘Great minds think alike, but are usually a bit mad.’

Hannibal, ‘A-Team’

Can you imagine what would happen if you woke up every single day with the same fire in your belly for the day ahead that you had when you were five?

It would be extraordinary. Abnormal even.

But can you imagine what you’d achieve? And how you’d feel? And the impact you’d have on the normal?

It’s a mix of frightening and enlightening, but in the most beautiful way you could ever imagine.

Moreover, it’s a mindset. A choice. It costs nothing.

So raise your glass and let’s propose a toast:

‘To the abnormal. To the happiness outliers. To those who dare. To those who are THIIIIIS much excited.

To YOU.

It’s time to shine.’

Less sex in the city?

‘Some birds aren’t meant to be caged. Their feathers are just too bright.’

Arnold Bennett, ‘Shawshank Redemption’

So, why d...

Table of contents

• Cover
• Title Page
• Copyright
• Dedication
• Chapter 1 THIIIIIS Much Excited
• Chapter 2 A Race to The Bottom?
• Chapter 3 A Spoonful of Sugar
• Chapter 4 That Wee Piece of Magic
• Chapter 5 Triplets Will Almost Certainly Change Your Life
• Chapter 6 Shining on The Inside
• Chapter 7 The SHINE Top 10
• Chapter 8 Carry on Thinking
• Chapter 9 Unravelling String Theory
• Chapter 10 A New Beginning
• About the authors
• Index
• EULA