I can remember reading a book on coaching about 3 or 4 years ago and being highly indignant over the authors use of other peoples ideas. To be honest I was outraged that this person had taken some of the really cool ideas developed by some of the luminaries of the field like Stephen Covey, Tony Robbins and Napoleon Hill and reintroduced them as her own without reference to where they came from.

Of course she didn’t lift anything verbatim and it was her interpretation of things but nevertheless I wasn’t happy for a period of time and quite rightly too!

Just recently I have been reading a lot and listening to more audio books. Pretty much everything I buy is either related to life coaching or self-development in some way shape or form and I have slowly become aware that there is little genuinely new material. For sure there are new presentations and new ways of introducing older material to the latest generation but in my opinion less than 5% is genuinely original. In fact I have no idea where that figure of 5% even came from, maybe it’s even less.

This really hit home when I was talking with a client about The Secret. Now I enjoyed The Secret, I think it sends a great message to people that they are in control of their own destiny and I have recommended it to many people. However, it’s not new (it doesn’t try to suggest it is by the way) and is really a mish mash of ideas and beliefs such as modern presentations of classis wisdom like that of Wayne Dyer to the 1920’s and books like Think & Grow Rich and hundreds of years before that with some of the far eastern philosophies.

So as I ask myself now what is wrong with doing that, I cannot come up with any answer other than, nothing. It now makes perfect sense to take an ok idea and to fine-tune it to make it better, or to pick up some ancient seldom-viewed material and re-write it for mass consumption. It’s simply common sense and there are no losers

In retrospect I am not sure where my head was at other than to think I was jealous because somebody had the idea before I did.

Coming Soon: ‘Shut The Duck Up” Better Questions To A Better Life

This book is an outrageous concoction of great peoples ideas rewritten to look like original work in a flagrant attempt to make the author rich and famous.