Blog Archives
Our Unfinished Selves
The Courage Gap explores fear and courage, walking readers through five steps to help them shift their focus, rewrite the stories they tell themselves, regulate fear, step into discomfort, and learn from the moments when things fall apart. Why was this an important book for you to write?
Because I’ve watched too many capable people—including myself—stay stuck in the space between knowing and doing. This wasn’t because we lacked the ability to take action but because our fear kept us stuck in place, distorting the risk-magnifying the danger of acting, minimizing the cost of staying put, and shrinking our courage to step forward and back ourselves fully.
Over 25 years coaching many diverse people across the world to meet their challenges and navigate change, I’ve heard countless versions of the same story: “I knew what I needed to do, but I couldn’t bring myself to do it.” The woman in the soul-draining job. The parent avoiding a hard conversation. The person with a dream who keeps finding reasons to wait.
What struck me wasn’t that people feel fear—we all do—but how often they mistake its source. They think they’re being prudent when they’re actually protecting their identity in some way, avoiding disapproval, or clinging to what’s familiar because it feels safer and less confronting than making a change.
Finally, I wrote this book because often we end up suffering more over time from not taking the brave action we know we should be taking than by risking what we fear. That suffering shows up in many forms – ongoing tension and hurt in relationships, the quiet ache of unfulfilled potential, roads not taken, words left unsaid. Right now, when everything feels uncertain, that gap has never been wider. This book offers a practical step-by-step path to move through it.
How did you come up with your five-step process for helping people reprogram their patterns of thought and behavior that are self-sabotaging?
By distilling a lot of research and insights from broad spheres as well as watching what actually worked—not just with clients, but in my own life when fear and doubt have grown really loud or when I’ve come to a moment and hesitated for fear of being ‘exposed’ as not wholly worthy of sufficient in some way. The five steps are a synthesis of research, and experience, and observing people who consistently lead brave and meaningful lives.
The people who closed their courage gap followed a pattern: They shifted focus from worst-case scenarios to what becomes impossible if they don’t act. They chose the mindset they would operate from, rewriting their stories—recognizing narratives about risk were often inherited or outdated. They regulated fear instead of waiting for it to disappear (it never does). They braved awkward moments we are wired to steer away from, and stepped into discomfort incrementally through small acts of bravery. And they learned from setbacks, seeing them as information rather than proof they shouldn’t have tried and made some semblance of peace with the fact that they are innately fallible and a ‘work in progress.’ As I wrote in the book, extending grace and compassion inward, forgiving our ‘unfinished selves’ is a foundational act of courage that can be profoundly transformative.
It’s not linear—it’s messy. But the sequence matters because you can’t regulate fear you haven’t acknowledged, and you can’t step into discomfort if you haven’t challenged the story that discomfort equals danger.
How can implementing the ideas in your book help shape better leaders and encourage growth?
The book helps anyone—leaders, parents, people in transition—close the gap between who they are and who they’re capable of becoming.
As I wrote in the book, sharing a story of my childhood on my parents’ farm, “Growth and comfort can’t ride the same horse.” That is, growth doesn’t happen without exertion or discomfort. It happens when you speak up with a shaky voice. When you try something new, knowing you might fail. When you have the difficult conversation instead of letting resentment build.
The book helps people distinguish between real dangers and magnified fears. Your brain evolved to overreact to threats, which kept ancestors alive, but now makes a tough conversation feel as dangerous as a physical threat. It makes starting something new feel riskier than staying in a situation that’s slowly diminishing you.
When you recognize that fear of judgment isn’t actual danger, or that doubt isn’t incompetence, you can take action despite fear rather than waiting for it to disappear.
For anyone leading—a team, a family, their own life—this matters because people become what they’re willing to confront. Those who act despite fear create environments where others feel permission to do the same. That permission to be imperfect while stepping forward? That’s how everyone grows.
What is one thing that you hope readers take away from your book?
That not only can anyone become a braver version of themselves, but that courage isn’t the absence of fear—it’s choosing to act while fear tags along.
Most people wait to feel brave before acting. But courage doesn’t work that way. You don’t eliminate fear; you change your relationship to it. You learn to distinguish between real dangers and magnified fears.
The shift I want readers to make:
When you ask “What’s the risk?” also ask “What’s the cost if I don’t act?”
That reframe—from “What could go wrong?” to “What will definitely go wrong if I don’t?”—unlocks stalled decisions, avoided conversations, deferred dreams.
I want readers to finish with a quiet push toward things they usually avoid. Not because fear disappeared, but because they realize staying stuck hurts more than stepping forward. The courage they think they lack isn’t something you’re born with—it’s something you build, one uncomfortable step at a time.
If readers take even one brave action they’ve been avoiding, that changes something fundamental. Not just for them, but for everyone who would benefit from them showing up more authentically and backing themselves more boldly – toward their bold goals but also in meeting their biggest challenges too. We all have them.
Author Links: GoodReads | Amazon
Fear creates the gap. Courage closes it.
This powerful guide from the bestselling author of You’ve Got This! cuts through the hype to connect the ‘why’ of courage to the ‘how’ of courage. Drawing on cutting-edge research woven together with stories that compel head andheart, The Courage Gap will help you bridge the think/do gap between what you’ve been doing and what you can do; between where you are and where you want to be—in your career, relationships, leadership, and life.
Distilling theory and hard-won wisdom spanning from Margie’s childhood in rural Australia to her decades of living around the world and coaching ‘insecure overachievers’ in Fortune 500 organizations, Margie shares a powerful 5-step roadmap to reprogram the self-protective patterns of thought and behavior that sabotage success to bring your bravest self to your biggest challenges and boldest vision.
At a time when courage seems in short supply, in a culture continually stoking insecurity and anxiety, this book will transform your deepest fears into a catalyst for your highest growth and the greatest good.
Applying the five steps will:
Ignite passion and unlock the potential fear holds dormant
Rewrite the scripts that have kept you stuck, stressed, and living too safely
Reset your ‘nervous’ system and embody courage in critical moments
Transform discomfort as a cue to step forward and expand your bandwidth for bold action
Reset your relationship to failure and make peace with the part of you that wimps out
For leaders, The Courage Gap provides a guide to operationalize and scale the courage mindset across your team and organization to deepen trust, dismantle silos, foster innovation, accelerate learning, and unleash collective courage toward a more secure and rewarding future.
The Art of Thinking Critically with Clarity for Optimal Health: Your Longevity Is Determined by How You Think!
The Art of Thinking Critically with Clarity for Optimal Health focuses on sharpening our thinking when it comes to our health. Author Jerome Puryear takes a practical approach, breaking down complex concepts into simple lessons on weighing choices, sorting through misinformation, and making decisions with both heart and reason. He explores ways biases cloud our judgment, how logic strengthens choices, and the tools like emotional intelligence and metacognition that can shape healthier outcomes. What makes it stick is the way he ties everything back to real life, choosing a doctor, weighing treatment options, or simply trying not to drown in endless health information.
Reading it, I felt both challenged and reassured. I appreciated Puryear’s clarity, never hiding behind jargon. Some parts felt a bit heavy with lists and frameworks, almost like a textbook, but that structure also made it easy to digest.
What really stood out for me was his honesty about how messy decision-making can be. He didn’t promise that critical thinking is a magic fix. Instead, he demonstrates that this is a skill we stumble through and build over time. That gave me a sense of relief. I felt less pressure to “get it right” every time. The sections on misinformation and bias also hit close to home for me. I caught myself thinking of moments where I’d trusted a headline or gone with my gut, only to regret it later.
I’d recommend The Art of Thinking Critically with Clarity for Optimal Health to anyone who feels overwhelmed by health choices or just wants to think more clearly day to day. It’s especially useful for people who prefer having a toolkit they can actually use, not just theory. If you want a guide that balances practical advice with a thoughtful framework, this is an essential read.
The Energetic Investor: Nurturing Mind, Body & Investment Mastery for Lasting Prosperity
The Energetic Investor is Kevin Bambrough’s deeply personal and unconventional guide to mastering wealth, health, and mindset. Blending memoir with self-help and investment strategy, the book is structured into three sections: Discover, Diagnose, and Deploy. It begins with a gripping and emotional account of a traumatic event that catalyzed Bambrough’s transformation. From there, he explores how burnout, biology, trauma, and ingrained behaviors sabotage our ability to thrive, not just financially, but mentally and physically. By treating the body like a complex investment portfolio and focusing on energy management at the cellular level, Bambrough challenges readers to align mind, body, and money for lasting prosperity.
What struck me immediately was how raw and real this book felt. It’s not some cookie-cutter investment guide sprinkled with generic life advice. Bambrough doesn’t hold back—he dives headfirst into his personal struggles with addiction, loss, and burnout. That honesty gives his ideas serious weight. His writing veers from high-intensity financial breakdowns to soul-searching reflections, which makes for an unexpected and powerful rhythm. I appreciated that he didn’t talk down to the reader or sugarcoat the truth. Whether he’s discussing dopamine hijacks by modern marketing or the role of trauma in our financial decisions, he keeps things direct, urgent, and human.
The book jumps across biology, psychology, economics, and life philosophy without much handholding. At times, it feels like drinking from a firehose of insight, anecdotes, and science-backed strategies. But oddly enough, I liked that. It kept me on my toes. The passion behind his words is undeniable. He’s not just giving advice, he’s living the transformation he preaches. His investment insights, especially his contrarian thinking and analysis of herd behavior, are gold for any investor who’s tired of shallow market noise. But it’s the blend of personal healing and financial intelligence that makes this book stand out.
The Energetic Investor isn’t for the faint of heart or someone looking for a tidy ten-step plan to get rich. It’s for those who are ready to do some soul-digging and gut-checking. If you’re a driven professional, a burned-out entrepreneur, or someone chasing success but feeling stuck, this book might just knock the wind out of you—and then teach you how to breathe again.
Pages: 236 | ASIN : B0F6D3T26Z
A Global Icon
Edward de Bono: Love Laterally is a biography that paints a vivid and layered portrait of the man who coined and championed the concept of lateral thinking. What inspired you to tell Edward de Bono’s story?
It is a zeitgeist story. It was a timely and important story to tell. We need to teach our children how to think not what to think in schools – and this book explains why and how. It’s more than a biography. Edward de Bono led the world of thinking for over half a century, encouraging people to think about their thinking. His ideas and views are even more relevant now than they were in the 1960s when he started to write the first of his sixty-six books. He resisted autobiography and biography because he didn’t want to get in the way of his ideas. He did not want to become the focus of attention, and journalists frustrated him, as he believed they (largely) focus on human angles, gimmicks, and attack, and often quoted him out of context. This is a shame as his ideas, as many of those I interviewed over the seven years, worked in real-world scenarios and made a lot of people very rich, both in their professional and personal lives.
He lived life to the full and was a global icon before it became relatively easy to be so, thanks to the internet. He dominated the world of ‘thinking’ and encouraged people to think about their thinking for over half a century. And he left behind him some very strong feelings. I knew him for the last ten years of his life, and I felt his passion for introducing lateral thinking lessons into schools was even more timely now that it was when he first suggested the idea back in the sixties. That is why I launched the book at the House of Lords, in front of distinguished guests, including Lord Bilimoria, Sir Anthony Seldon, Lord Woolley, Huw Levinson, Baroness Helena Kennedy as well as others interested in the thinking process, including Dr Alison Wood of Cambridge University and founder of Changemakers, Karen Chetwynd CEO Montessori Global, Nicola Tyler, who worked with Edward for years, advertising guru Dave Trott, and Dr Tara Swart who has written about the thinking process in her best-selling book as well.
What were some ideas that were important for you to share in this book?
Edward resisted a biography and autobiography as he didn’t want to get in the way of his ideas. He was a charismatic man, who was able to hold the attention of schoolchildren, and CEOs, politicians, and creatives alike. He achieved so much in his life, his bibliography is a chapter in its own right, but when I asked him how he wished to be remembered he replied ‘as a writer, and for doing good’. As Baroness Helena Kennedy states in the excellent foreword, he was a visionary, who’s ideas have yet to be fully appreciated.
Did you find anything in your research of this story that surprised you?
So many things. Some trivial, others more significant.
For example, I didn’t know during the sixties, he was at one point the most travelled person (by air) on the planet (with BA at least) and that you are told by BA when you have clocked up enough air miles.
There were also so many people from diverse backgrounds I didn’t realise who had been influenced by his ideas. Fashion icon, Sir Paul Smith, is a huge fan, and so is author and illustrator Shaun Tan, as are the Eurythmics (who thanked him on the cover of their Sweet Dreams album), and I only discovered this in the process of researching the book.
I also noted how many reports differed in the number of books he had written. Edward himself wasn’t sure, but I referred to his family and they said ‘sixty-six’.
What is one thing that you hope readers take away from Edward de Bono: Love Laterally?
I would like them to buy one of his books – perhaps a couple – which will make them think about their thinking. Everyone has a favourite that relates to their way of thinking, or the people they work with. Mine was the 1990 ‘I am Right You are Wrong’ which clearly identifies why critical thinking, argument, confrontation, and ego, get in the way of identifying solutions and lead to and encourage conflict, while lateral thinking encourages connection, collaboration, and communication as a way to identify solutions. Edward explains how and makes it fun and playful.
Author Links: GoodReads | Instagram | X (Twitter) | Facebook | Sarah Tucker | Website | Amazon
Adored by advertising agencies, misunderstood by the media, and mistrusted by academia, De Bono became a household name dominating the field of creative thinking for half a century.
With contributions from de Bono’s former wife, Josephine de Bono, Sir Tony Blair and many others who knew de Bono – plus rare photographs from his family.
Edward de Bono: Love Laterally
Sarah Tucker’s Edward de Bono: Love Laterally paints a vivid and layered portrait of Edward de Bono, the man who coined and championed the concept of lateral thinking. Tucker delves into de Bono’s life with warmth, wit, and curiosity, offering a narrative that oscillates between his intellectual brilliance and personal quirks. From his early days in Malta to his global influence as a thinker and educator, the book captures the essence of a man who reshaped the way we approach creativity and problem-solving.
What struck me most was Tucker’s ability to weave anecdotes that showcased de Bono’s humor and humanity. One instance that stood out was when, as a young student, de Bono circumvented bullying by inventing a secret passageway at his boarding school, demonstrating his knack for innovative problem-solving even as a child. These moments are sprinkled throughout the book, making de Bono relatable, even to readers who might not be familiar with his academic legacy.
Tucker doesn’t shy away from exploring de Bono’s professional controversies. The criticism he faced for his theories lacking empirical support is discussed with nuance. Yet, the narrative also highlights the testimonies of countless professionals who credited de Bono’s methods for their success. The juxtaposition of detractors calling his work “pseudoscience” against admirers who saw him as transformative makes for a fascinating read. It’s clear Tucker admires her subject, but she’s also unafraid to question his more outlandish ideas, like his proposal to become the “King of Australia,” which borders on self-parody.
What I loved most were the glimpses into his creative philosophy. De Bono’s belief that education should encourage collaboration rather than competition resonated with me. His Six Thinking Hats methodology, which encourages diverse perspectives in problem-solving, exemplifies this ethos. Yet, Tucker’s coverage of de Bono’s struggles with institutional recognition and his complicated relationships with academia left me pondering the systemic rigidity that stifles innovation.
Edward de Bono: Love Laterally is a compelling read for anyone intrigued by creativity, psychology, or education. Tucker’s conversational tone and her ability to balance respect for de Bono with critical observation make this biography accessible and engaging. I’d recommend it to readers who appreciate stories of unconventional thinkers or those seeking inspiration to approach problems differently.
Pages: 256 | ISBN : 1913641465
Slow Burn Entrepreneur: Succeed on Your Own Terms with the RELAX Method
Michael Weber’s Slow Burn Entrepreneur offers a refreshing take on entrepreneurship, blending personal experiences with actionable insights. Unlike the fast-paced, burnout-inducing startup culture that dominates much of the entrepreneurial narrative, Weber introduces the concept of the “slow burn entrepreneur.” His approach emphasizes sustainable growth, balance, and long-term planning—principles that will resonate with both new entrepreneurs and seasoned business owners. He champions self-discipline, reflection, and maintaining a steady pace as realistic strategies for achieving success in today’s demanding business environment. Throughout the book, Weber communicates his ideas with clarity and precision, making complex concepts feel both approachable and relevant.
Weber’s writing is conversational and accessible, a style that keeps the reader engaged while delivering valuable lessons. He injects warmth and relatability into his business advice, weaving in vivid storytelling that brings the book to life. The imagery of deserted airports and tranquil beach sunsets adds a human touch, making the book more than just a guide; it’s a journey. His down-to-earth tone invites readers to connect with his experiences, from his early entrepreneurial struggles to the heights of his success. The result is a candid, reflective narrative that feels more like a seasoned mentor offering advice than a conventional business text. Anecdotes like his family’s time in Nicaragua during the pandemic add depth, showing the personal side of entrepreneurship. This balance between emotional resonance and practical advice makes the book accessible to a broad audience, free from jargon and over-complicated language. One of the book’s standout qualities is how Weber presents his ideas. He contrasts two distinct entrepreneurial archetypes: the fast-living, risk-taking entrepreneur prone to burnout and the patient, relationship-oriented business leader. This powerful comparison underscores the core philosophy of his “slow burn” approach. By sharing both his successes and failures, Weber invites readers to learn from his experiences in a way that feels authentic and relatable. His ability to simplify complex entrepreneurial concepts into digestible, practical steps sets this book apart. This book is not for those seeking quick wins or high-risk strategies. For readers looking for rapid scaling techniques, Weber’s measured, methodical approach may seem too cautious. Slow Burn Entrepreneur is a book that requires time to fully appreciate both the insights and the anecdotes.
Slow Burn Entrepreneur is a must-read for anyone interested in a thoughtful, realistic approach to building a business. Weber’s mix of personal storytelling, clear guidance, and practical advice offers a compelling and eye-opening perspective that challenges the traditional entrepreneurial mindset.
Pages: 178 | ASIN : B0DCY7BPB1
LITERARY TITAN 