Kerri Pottharst – The Business Of Being An Athlete

Synopsis from www.thebusinessofbeinganathlete.com

Do you want to compete successfully on the world stage so you can enjoy a lucrative career in sport?

Whether you are just starting out, or you have already won accolades and want to take it to the next level. Gold Medal Olympian Kerri Pottharst shows you can achieve greatness, both on and off the field.

In The Business of Being an Athlete Kerri draws from more than 25 years’ experience and reveals how the right attitude, the right tools, and the right approach took her from being a part time athlete to becoming a multi award winning champion, a hot property for sponsorship, and a successful entrepreneur.

In this compelling, step by step guide, you will learn how to:

Develop a gold medal mindset and create an unshakeable self belief

Sharpen your focus to create effective goal setting strategies

Surround yourself with an A Team

Use the most effective nutrition, hydration, travel and recovery techniques

Prioritise and schedule and  for maximum success

Attract sponsorship and build your media profile to develop your brand

Develop other revenue streams

Create online presence using websites and social media

Become a successful motivational speaker

Create balance whilst setting yourself up for life

Filled with brilliant strategies, as well as insights from other world class athletes, The Business of Being an Athlete is a must have guide for any determined athlete.

Chris’ Review

This is the sort of book that I wish was around when I was younger. Having played basketball at reasonable high level for many years I was always fundraising and paying for my sporting and travel expenses. What I like about this book is that it covers all the important aspects of being an athlete from looking after your body with training and nutrition, to the mindset and mental toughness needed to compete and the financial aspect of sport for those looking to make a career of it.

Kerri weaves here own story into the book of how she started as an indoor volleyball player and suffered a career ending injury only to discover a new lease of life on the sand. She firstly won a bronze medal in 1996 before hiring a success coach with her playing partner Natalie Cook to assist in believing that they were already gold medalists.

A great book for young athletes and parents of young athletes no matter what level of sporting success you are after in your life. The principles of personal development as always are transferable to many areas of life.

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Chris Bellesini, January 19th 2012 | Tags: ,
Posted in Book Reviews

Steve Jobs – Walter Isaacson

Steve Jobs – Walter Isaacson

Synopsis from www.borders.com.au

Based on more than 40 interviews with Steve Jobs conducted over 2 years as well as interviews with more than 100 family members, friends, adversaries, competitors, and colleagues. The author Walter Isaacson has written a riveting story of the roller coaster life and searingly intense personality of a creative entrepreneur, whose passion for perfection and ferocious drive revolutionized 6 industries: Personal Computers, Animated Movies, Music, Phones, Tablet Computing, and Digital Publishing.

At a time when America is seeking ways to sustain its innovative edge, and when societies around the world are trying to build digital-age economies, Steve Jobs stands as the ultimate icon of inventiveness and applied imagination. He knew that the best way to create value in the 21st century was to connect creativity with technology. He built a company where leaps of the imagination were combined with remarkable feats of engineering.

Although Steve Jobs co-operated with this book, he asked for no control over what was written nor even the right to read it before it was published. Nothing was off-limits. He encouraged the people he knew to speak honestly. And Jobs speaks candidly, sometimes brutally so, about the people he worked with and competed against.

His friends, foes, and colleagues provide an unvarnished view of the passions, perfectionism, obsessions, artistry, devilry, and compulsion for control, that shaped his approach to business and the innovative products that resulted. Jobs could drive those around him to fury and despair. But his personality and products were interrelated, just as Apple’s hardware and software tended to be, as if part of an integrated system.

His tale is instructive and cautionary, filled with lessons about innovation, character, leadership, and values.

Chris’ Review

 Yes I read alot but when you give me a book that is more than 250 pages long if you can’t hold my attention I will most likely put it aside and finish it later. Often sports book are filled with every game and detail of a career which for the big fan is great but fo rthe average fan a bit much. So when I picked up the life story of Steve Jobs and saw it was 600 pages long I wondered if being just an average fan if I would stay interested until the end.

Considering I have spent every spare moment going back to read the book it passes with flying colours. It is amazing to learn of the vision that Steve Jobs had way back in the 1980′s. His mind was ahead of his time and he just needed technology to catch up. What is also great about this book is that there is nothing held back. Steve Jobs knew that he was difficult, harsh and unfair on many people but reading the book makes me think that had he had been any diffirent Apple would not exist today and our technology would be nowhere near as advanced as it is.

The book is more about just Steve Jobs, his life is intertwined into so many great companies including Apple, Pixar, Disney and Microsoft and the music industry and so whilst reading you are not just reading a biography about one man but how he played a part in so many parts of our everyday life.

What makes the book even more interesting is that Steve Jobs gave permission for anything and everything to be printed. Nothing is sugar coated and various friends and rivals have their say on a man who would get emotion, manipulate and more often than not get his way. From the day he was born and then adopted out Steve Jobs was a very complex man and now that he is gone I wonder if anyone in the next forty years will have an impact on the world such as he did in the last forty.

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Chris Bellesini, December 21st 2011 | Tags: ,
Posted in Book Reviews

Think & Grow Rich – Napoleon Hill

Have You Claimed Your FREE Copy Of  Think & Grow Rich Yet? CLICK HERE!!

Synopsis from www.wikipedia.com

Think and Grow Rich is a motivational personal development and self-help book written by Napoleon Hill. It was inspired by a suggestion from Scottish-American businessman Andrew Carnegie. While the title implies that this book deals only with achieving monetary wealth, the author explains that the philosophy taught in the book can be used to help individuals succeed in all lines of work, and to do or be almost anything they want in this world.

For instance, Jim Murray (sportswriter) wrote that Think and Grow Rich was credited for Ken Norton’s boxing upset of Muhammad Ali in 1973. The Reverend Charles Stanley writes “I began to apply the principles of (Think and Grow Rich) to my endeavors as a pastor, and I discovered they worked!” The book was first published in 1937 during the Great Depression. At the time of Hill’s death in 1970, Think and Grow Rich had sold 20 million copies. It remains the biggest seller of Napoleon Hill’s books – a perennial best-seller after 70 years (BusinessWeek Magazine’s Best-Seller List ranked Think and Grow Rich as the sixth best-selling paperback business book 70 years after it was first published). Think and Grow Rich is listed in John C. Maxwell’s A Lifetime “Must Read” Books List.

CHRIS’ REVIEW

It is hard to argue with the fact that this book is responsible for more millionaires than any other book as it was written by interviewing the 504 richest people in the world at the time. It has also in the top ten all time most sold books. Written in 1937, naturally some of the language is old fashioned but the message is at true today as ever. Most people who read this book read it again as it certainly has a lot of messages that will appeal at different times in your life. The interesting thing about the book is that it does not talk about money but instead the mindset.

Rather than rambling on, the best way to discover for yourself is to order your Free copy for yourself. CLICK HERE to find out how!

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Chris Bellesini, December 12th 2011 | Posted in Book Reviews

The Happiest Refugee – Anh Do

The Happiest Refugee – Anh Do

Synopsis from www.borders.com.au

Anh Do nearly didn’t make it to Australia. His entire family came close to losing their lives on the sea as they escaped from war torn Vietnam in an overcrowded boat. But nothing, not murderous pirates, nor the imminent threat of death by hunger, disease or dehydration as they drifted for days, could quench their desire to make a better life in the country they had dreamed about.

Life in Australia was hard, an endless succession of back breaking work, crowded rooms, ruthless landlords and make do everything. Things got harder when his father left home when Anh was 13, and his mother struggled to support the family on her own. His mother’s sacrifice was an inspiration to Anh.

Another inspiration was the comedian Anh met when he was about to sign on for a 60 hour a week corporate job. Anh asked how many hours he worked. Four, came the answer, and that was it. He was going to be a comedian!

The Happiest Refugee tells the uplifting and inspiring life story, of one of our favourite personalities. Tragedy, humour, heartache and unswerving determination, a big life with big dreams. Anh’s story will move and amuse all who read it.

CHRIS’ REVIEW

Wow what a page turner. I read this book last Summer in less than two days and everyone else I know who has read it has done so in even less time. For those who know the comedian Anh Do from our television screens the first thing that comes across his his beaming cheeky smile. It all stems from an amazing attitude and what is even more interesting is that he had every reason to think that life was hard but instead he and his family took their past and turned it into reasons to be grateful.

I didn’t expect to be reading a such a real life adventure when I picked up this book as most books written by comedians are full of more humour and less story. Anh Do instead writes this story as it happened and with his cheeky style the humour in the book comes naturally and usually during the toughest times when he has the ability to keep smiling.

The latest print run of this book has a some well deserved stamps on the cover to indicate some of the awards that it has won to date. The book is an autobiography but certainly not one of a normal life, it is one of adventure and determination to make a great life in Australia.

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Chris Bellesini, December 3rd 2011 | Tags: , ,
Posted in Book Reviews
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