Armed with a cup of tea and a rusk, I stumbled to the PC to start the inevitable trawl through the morning’s social media posts before jumping through a shower to face the day.
As I cobbled together some birthday wishes on Facebook, the simplistic cover of a book in a post caught my eye, and my keyboard was nearly doused with a mouthful of tea. I clicked to expand the list of photos and suddenly my past neuroses were there to taunt me.
Turns out these are fictional “self-help” books created by Johan Deckmann and are absolutely spot on with idiosyncrasies in life. With a wry smile, I carried on scrolling through the list and knew I just had to share them with some crAzy people!
So as it happens, Johan Deckmann is a psychotherapist and artist who created the fictional “self-help” books which face some of life’s biggest absurdities head on and are a truth whose effect is strangely similar to therapy. So many of the titles clamour to be heard and can resonate with practically anyone. The books are actual physical objects but are glued shut, so the reader is invited to use the title and imagine their content. I know my reaction, and I’m sure others had the same, was one of “Hey that’s me! I do that too! But why?”
Some of the gems that stood out were:
- How to lie to yourself and feel disappointed every time you let yourself down
- How to gain instant success by lowering your standards
- How to live your life based on other people’s definitions of who you are
- How to become the dream employee by neglecting every personal need
- How to keep laughing but each year a little less
- How to keep it all inside and just keep keeping it all inside
- How to turn your public argument into performance art
- How to use silent treatment in a street fight
- How to kill your dreams with doubt rather than risking failure
- How to be so far behind it feel like you are first
Crazy right? I bet you were reading those and nodding your head. Most of us are guilty of these thoughts or actions, but the sad thing is so often we are content to just let it stay that way. Why do we allow these nagging doubts, fears and insecurities to slowly erode our core day by day? This is NOT the dress rehearsal! This is life!
The answer is very simple: A Life Coach. What? I hear you say… I don’t need therapy! No need to get worked up! A life coach is there to help flip a switch, to work with healthy, successful people who may have just hit a wall and become stuck in the way they see things or react. Their approach is solution-based and empowers clients with tools to help realise their aspirations, whether career or personal. A life coach listens; not just to the words but to the spaces between the words. They hold you accountable and keep you on the path to your goals. They help you identify the self-sabotaging voices and are consistently there to guide you in closing the gap from where you are to where you want to be.
Just as it happens…
crAzy always wins prides itself on offering solutions to problems, so we have the expertise of both Tania and Dylan to help you with your coaching needs. They can be contacted on tania@crazyalwayswins.com or dylan@crazyalwayswins.com. Go and check out their impressive credentials on our website.
So there you have it. You can either see your foibles brazenly mocking you from the front cover of a fictional “self-help” book or take the plunge and sign up with a life coach. I know I did…
