Thriving Not Surviving: The 5 Secret Pathways To Happiness, Success and Fulfilment

By Gina Gardiner

“Thriving Not Surviving” is designed to help you get the very best out of life.

Life offers lots of challenges, detours and seeming dead ends, these can stop you in your tracks, causing you to get stuck in the morass of feeling overwhelmed or they can act as the impetus to achieve a better way of being. That is where “Thriving Not Surviving” is there to help you. It offers you a SAT NAV to help you reach your deepest desires more easily, and gives you lots of examples of where people, just like you, have used the principles and strategies to navigate their way through life’s challenges.

It is important to remember that you remain in the driving seat. It is up to you how fast you go, where you begin your journey and which elements you want to focus on.
The book can help you to learn to challenge your habitual way of being and how to establish different more empowering approaches.

Individually the perspectives, principles, and strategies offer you a powerful tool to enrich and enhance the quality of your life; collectively they are positively transformational!

Each of the 5 Secret Pathways offers you a different route along your journey to achieving a happy, successful and fulfilling life. “Thriving Not Surviving” achieves this by sharing with you the principles and strategies which I have learned through my personal experience and the lessons I have learned from others. They are proven to work and easy to incorporate into your busy life.

Each of the pathways provides you with the route map to navigate a particular theme: self-belief, creating lasting loving relationships, achieving sustained personal and professional success, choice and managing change and finding your true purpose and achieving fulfilment.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Gina Gardiner
• Release date: Sep 30, 2017
• ISBN: 9781370577286

Gina Gardiner

Gina Gardiner is a No 1 International Best Selling Author, Motivational Speaker, Empowerment Coach, Transformational Leadership Trainer NLP Master Practitioner and Coach with well over 30 years experience of helping people achieve happiness and success. She has supported many, many individuals and couples to develop a greater sense of self–worth, the confidence to challenge and change limiting beliefs in order to become more loving towards themselves and others. She is passionate about helping her clients to achieve their full potential – to become genuinely their best self.Gina learned to walk twice as an adult whilst running an award-winning school, for the most part from a wheelchair. The gift of this experience was the development of a unique approach to life and developing leadership. She left Headship in 2004 and since then has worked with countless individuals and couples helping them to learn the lessons from their past in order to achieve happiness and fulfilment.Gina believes that disability is a metaphor for life. She says “If you believe that you lack the time, money, expertise, if you fear you are not you are not good enough, pretty enough, that you are too old, too young, too fat or too short, too poor or too uneducated to achieve your dream the chances are you will fail. The difference between these limiting beliefs and my disability is that I could wheel away in my electric wheelchair. Most people carry their limiting beliefs around with them into every situation and as a result, live a life which is completely limited by those beliefs.Life can be incredibly challenging, relationships, work, finances, health all vie for our attention. We are all pulled this way and that and there are times when it can feel overwhelming. The quality of our thinking makes an enormous difference to the quality of our lives. Being "mindful" and learning to focus on what you can do rather than what you can't will significantly improve the quality of your life.”Gina walks her talk - all the strategies she offers through her books and programmes are based on strategies she has used herself and with many other clients who have achieved great success from using them.Her work is the culmination of personal experience and decades of working with people to help them achieve personal empowerment and fulfilment. Holding the space for her clients, listening not only to what they say but to what is left unsaid, giving them a safe environment where they feel valued is a vital part of her work.Gina has experienced incredible challenges and setbacks and understands just how difficult it is to pick yourself up and start again. She has a wealth of experience of working with children and adults from all walks of life and a real passion to make a positive difference. She cares deeply and has dedicated her life’s work to empowering others.

Book preview

ThriveNotSurvive

Title

Copyright

Dedication

Acknowledgements

About the Author

Introduction (proof completed)

Chapter 1—My Rocky Road to Happiness, Success, and Fulfilment

My Story

Your Biggest Fears Are Likely to Be Unfounded (proof completed)

We Are All Capable of So Much More (proof completed)

Chapter 2—The 7 Underpinning Principles

The 7 Underpinning Principles

Principle 1—Permission

Principle 2—Perspective

Principle 3—Focus

Principle 4—Love (proof completed)

Principle 5—Forgiveness (proof completed)

Principle 6—Gratitude

Principle 7—Playfulness

Chapter 3—The 7 Connecting Themes

Connecting Theme 1—Mindfulness (proof completed)

Connecting Theme 2—The Survival Game (proof completed)

Connecting Theme 3—The Way to Lasting Change (proof completed)

Connecting Theme 4—The Power of Language (proof completed)

Connecting Theme 5—Taking Ownership (proof completed)

Connecting Theme 6—Strength and Vulnerability (proof completed)

Connecting Theme 7—Faith (proof completed)

Chapter 4—Secret Pathway 1—Belief

Secret Pathway 1—Belief

How Beliefs Are Installed

Survival—Our First Priority

Our Beliefs Become Our Reality. What We Can Achieve Is Determined by Our Beliefs

If You Believe You Can’t, You Won’t. Believe You Can, and You Are Halfway There (proof completed)

Solving the Unsolvable (proof completed)

Prevalent Limiting Beliefs (proof completed)

Sadie

Jade

Peter

Keith

Chapter 5—Secret Pathway 2—Love

Secret Pathway 2—Love (proof completed)

You Are the Common Denominator

Every Relationship You Have with Others Is a Reflection of the Relationship You Have with Yourself

Your Relationship with Yourself

Our Beliefs about How Lovable We Are Have Enormous Power (proof completed)

Loving Yourself

Making Friends with Your Physical Self

Making the Most of Yourself Physically (proof completed)

Loving and Cherishing Your Body (proof completed)

Nourishing Your Body Is About So Much More Than Food (proof completed)

Looking After Yourself Emotionally (proof completed)

Dealing with Negative Emotions (proof completed)

Your Self-Care Practises

Being Your Own Best Friend

If You Find It Difficult (proof completed)

Creating Loving Relationships with Others (proof completed)

Wanting to Change Your Partner

Being a Victim (proof completed)

Chapter 6—Secret Pathway 3—Success

Secret Pathway 3—Success (proof completed)

Create and Share Your Clear Vision for Success (proof completed)

Ready? Then It's Action Time. Here's What to Do (proof completed)

Kiss the Frog (proof completed)

Your Expectations

Crossing the Line of Perturbation (proof completed)

Challenging Your Comfort Zone (proof completed)

Time (proof completed)

Energy (proof completed)

Money (proof completed)

Chapter 7 —Secret Pathway 4—Choice

Secret Pathway 4—Choice (proof completed)

Uncovering Choice in Times of Change and Transition (proof completed)

Pain (proof completed)

Need 1: Certainty (proof completed)

The Certainty-Uncertainty Paradox (proof completed)

Excellence (proof completed)

Need 2: Uncertainty or Variety (proof completed)

Need 3: Significance (proof completed)

Need 4: Love and Connection (proof completed)

Needs 5 & 6: Spiritual Needs of Growth and Contribution (proof completed)

Addiction and the 6 Needs (proof completed)

The Role of Choice in Life’s Transitions (proof completed)

The Happiness Challenge—Why Not Choose to Try It? (proof completed)

Chapter 8—Secret Pathway 5—Purpose and Fulfilment

Secret Pathway 5—Purpose and Fulfilment

Material Wealth (proof completed)

Ego vs. Inner Wisdom (proof completed)

Are You Living Your Dream? (proof completed)

Challenge Yourself

We Are All One! Being of Service (proof completed)

Random Acts of Kindness

Gratitude (proof completed)

Faith

Chapter 9 - This Is Not The End

Chapter 9—This Is Not The End (proof completed)

Guide

Cover

toc

Title

Thriving Not Surviving

The 5 Secret Pathways to Happiness, Success, and Fulfilment

By: Gina Gardiner

#1 International Best Seller  in 20 categories in 4 Countries

For More Information and Book Bonuses Visit: www.thrivetogethertribe.com

Copyright

Thriving Not Surviving

The 5 Secret Portals To Happiness, Success and Fulfilment

Copyright © 2017 by Georgina Gardiner

All rights reserved: No part of this publication may be reproduced, distributed or transmitted in any form or by any means, including photocopying, recording, or other electronic or mechanical methods, without the prior written permission of the publisher, except in the case of brief quotations embodied in critical reviews and certain other noncommercial uses permitted by copyright law. For permission requests, write to the publisher, addressed Attention: Permissions Coordinator, at the address below.

Limit of Liability:

The information contained in this book is for information purposes only and may not apply to your situation. The author, publisher, distributor, and provider supply no warranty about the content or accuracy of content enclosed. Information provided is subjective. Keep this in mind when reviewing this guide.

Although the author and publisher have made every effort to ensure that the information in this book was correct at press time, the author and publisher do not assume and hereby disclaim any liability to any party for any loss, damage, or disruption caused by errors or omissions, whether such errors or omissions result from negligence, accident, or any other cause.

Disclaimer : 

Gina Gardiner presents the entire content of this program for educational purposes only. The information provided by Gina or any guests are not intended to diagnose or prescribe medical or psychological conditions nor to claim to prevent, treat, mitigate or to cure such conditions. The information contained in the program is not intended to replace a one-on-one relationship with a doctor or mental health professional.

All examples in this book are just that—examples. They are not intended to represent or guarantee that everyone will achieve the same results. You understand that each individual’s success will be determined by their desire, dedication, background, effort, and motivation to work. There is no guarantee that you will duplicate any of the results stated here.

The typical result one can expect to achieve is nothing. The typical person never gets to the end of this book. The typical person fails to implement anything. Thus, they change nothing. Zero. That’s because typical people do nothing, and therefore, they achieve nothing. Be atypical. Do something. Implement something. If it doesn’t work, make a change, and implement that. Try again. Try harder. Persist. And reap the rewards.

The names in all the case studies included in this book have been changed to protect the identity of the people involved.

LinkedIn:   https://www.linkedin.com/in/ginagardinerassociates

Facebook:  https://www.facebook.com/genuinelyyouprograms/

Facebook Group:  https://www.facebook.com/groups/genuinelyyou/

Website:   www.genuinely-you.com

Tribe Website: www.thrivetogethertribe.com

Email: [e-mail]

1st Edition 2017 Version 1.20

2nd Edition 2020 Version 1.00

First Published in 2017 for Georgina Gardiner by Evolve Global Publishing

PO Box 327 Stanhope Gardens NSW 2768 

[e-mail]  www.evolveglobalpublishing.com

Book Layout: © 2017 Evolve Global Publishing

ISBN: 978-1-64136-361-7 (Paperback-Ingram )   

ISBN: 978-1-64136-362-4 (Hardcover-Ingram)  

ISBN-13: 978-1977855084  (Createspace)  

ISBN-10: 1977855083 (Createspace)  

ISBN: 9781370577286 (Smashwords)  

ASIN: B074BPBLD3 (Amazon Kindle)   

This book is available on  Barnes & Noble, Kobo, Apple iBooks (digital), and Google Books (digital).

Dedication

I would like to dedicate this book to Jamie, my nephew who despite battling with a rare medical condition all his life has defied all the odds and has just reached the age of 41.

Acknowledgements

I would like to take this opportunity to thank everyone who has supported me over the years, particularly my sister Paulie and her husband Dave, Aunty Jill and my many, many friends who keep me going. My thanks and love to you all.

I am forever grateful to my clients for allowing me into their lives. It is a real privilege; one I appreciate hugely. Watching them step into their true power gives me great pleasure and satisfaction. I am incredibly humbled at the honour they give me by inviting me to be part of their journey.

A special thank you to John North who has provided exceptional support, encouragement and technical know-how in getting the book published and setting up the platform for Genuinely You and The Thrive Together Tribe, especially as my lack of technical ability has required much hand holding! My thanks to James and Nancy for their help too.

My ongoing thanks to my team particularly Sarah and Vicky who support me on a day to day basis – I couldn’t do it without you!

About the Author

Gina Gardiner is a number one international best-selling Author, Motivational Speaker, Empowerment Coach, and Transformational Leadership Trainer, NLP Master Practitioner and Coach, with well over 30 years' experience in helping people achieve happiness and success.

She has supported many individuals and couples to develop a greater sense of self-worth and the confidence to challenge and change limiting beliefs in order to become more loving towards themselves and others. She is passionate about helping her clients to achieve their full potential—to become their genuine best selves.

Gina, herself, learned to walk twice as an adult whilst running an award-winning school, for the most part from a wheelchair. The gift of this experience was her development of a unique approach to life and leadership development. She left headship in 2004, and since then has worked with countless individuals and couples, helping them to learn the lessons from their past, in order to achieve happiness and fulfilment.

Gina believes that disability is a metaphor for life. She tells people:

If you believe that you lack the time, money, or expertise, or if you fear you are not good enough or pretty enough, or that you are too old, too young, too fat, too short, too poor, or too uneducated to achieve your dream, then chances are —you will fail.

The difference between those who hold these limiting beliefs and my disability is that whilst those who have a deeply held  belief, take that belief with them in everything they do, every second of every day, in every situation, I could choose to deal with my lack of mobility by wheeling away in my electric wheelchair. Thus, I allow my wheelchair to serve me, not limit me. Most people carry their limiting beliefs around with them into every situation and, as a result, live a life which is completely limited by those beliefs.

Life can be incredibly challenging: relationships, work, finances, and health all vie for our attention. We are all pulled this way and that way, and there are times when it can feel overwhelming. The quality of our thinking makes an enormous difference to the quality of our lives. Being mindful and learning to focus on what you can do rather than what you can't, will significantly improve the quality of your life.

Gina walks her talk—all the strategies she offers through her books and programmes are based on strategies she has used personally and with her many clients, who have achieved great success from using them. Her work is the culmination of personal experience and decades of working with people to help them achieve personal empowerment and fulfilment.

Gina has experienced incredible challenges and setbacks and understands just how difficult it is to pick yourself up and start again. Holding the space for her clients, listening not only to what they say, but to what is left unsaid, and giving them a safe environment where they feel heard and valued is a vital part of her work.

She has a wealth of experience in working with children and adults from all walks of life, and a real passion to make a positive difference. She cares deeply and has dedicated her life’s work to empowering others.

Introduction - Reclaiming Your Self-Worth

If only I were smarter, then I would be happy.

If only I were prettier, then I would be satisfied.

If only I had more money, then I would be free from stress.

If only I were thinner, then I would be ready to chase that dream.

If only I were taller, then I would be more involved and outgoing.

Have you ever found yourself thinking along those lines?

Lack of self-worth is a modern-day epidemic. Because our need to belong, to be valued, and to be seen and heard by others—the most basic and ancient of human needs—are missing in many people’s lives today. Many of us are suffering from loneliness, depression, and a general feeling of malaise. This low self-worth and malaise have caused many of us to believe that something is missing from our lives. This, in turn, can lead us on an endless search for happiness, success, and fulfilment. 

For some, the search can be as elusive as the search for the Holy Grail, and just as frustrating. Alcohol, food, drugs, sex, shopping, endless relationships which fall apart, hours and hours perusing the Internet, and working too long and too hard, are examples of common ways people conduct their search for fulfilment. While these excesses may give momentary satisfaction, they fail to provide a real solution.

As an empowerment coach, motivational speaker, and bestselling author, for nigh on forty years, I have had the opportunity to work with thousands of people from a wide variety of backgrounds, guiding them on their journeys to purpose and fulfilment. I have helped them to develop a greater sense of self-worth and the confidence to challenge and change limiting beliefs in order to become more loving towards themselves and others. I help each person to achieve their full potential—to become their genuine best self. And that's what I'm providing you within this book: step-by-step guidance so that you can achieve your full potential to become your genuine best self.

Thriving Not Surviving is designed to help you get the very best out of life. This life is not a rehearsal; it is the real deal. Each of us has to navigate the journey of our life; most try to manage without the benefit of maps, SAT NAVS, travel books, or personal guides. The result is that it is all too easy to find yourself stuck in a dreary environment where everything feels like a struggle.  

Loneliness, frustration, stress, and anxiety, feeling unworthy or unloved, allowing past problems to limit the possibilities of the present and the future, lack of direction and purpose, failed relationships, unfulfilled dreams, feeling low and depressed, fearing failure or success are frequent every-day existences for many people.   

Life offers lots of challenges, detours, and seeming dead ends. These can stop you in your tracks, causing you to get stuck in the morass of feeling overwhelmed, or they can act as the impetus to a better way of being. That is where Thriving Not Surviving can help you; it offers a SAT NAV, so you can achieve your deepest desires more easily. Plus, you'll read lots of examples of people just like you, that have used the principles and strategies to navigate their way through life’s challenges.  

It is important to remember that you remain in the driving seat. It is up to you how fast you go, where you begin your journey, and which elements you want to focus on. 

Thriving Not Surviving contains three distinct interconnected sections. Together they provide all the principles, strategies, and tools for a truly happy, successful, and fulfilling life.  

Section 1: The 7 Underpinning Principles

These 7 principles will provide the strong infrastructure you'll learn to develop, on which sit the 5 Secret Pathways that we'll explore in the book's final section.

Here are those 7 foundations:

Permission

Perspective

Focus

Love

Forgiveness

Gratitude

Playfulness

If any of these are missing, it is impossible to sustain ongoing success in any area of your life; so we're going to make sure you've established all 7 with solidity.

Section 2: The 7 Connecting Themes

These themes infiltrate the very fabric of our lives, yet most people have no idea of their power to help or hinder:

Mindfulness

The Survival Game

The Way to Lasting Change (Unfamiliar/Familiar)

The Power of Language

Taking Ownership

Strength and Vulnerability

Having Faith

Section 3: The 5 Secret Pathways

Each of these 5 Secret Pathways offers you a different route on the journey to a happy, successful, and fulfilling life:

Belief

Love

Success

Choice

Purpose and Fulfilment

Thriving Not Surviving gives you the opportunity to learn how you can journey along each of the 5 pathways with ease and grace, and so enhance the quality of your relationships, your choices, and your life.

Weaving is a metaphor for understanding life and how we fit into the world, our universe, and beyond. We know from archaeologists that the art of weaving has been carried out for over 20,000 years. To hold the threads of fabric together requires the taut structure of the warp thread entwined by the weft, which is built layer by layer revealing the patterns and design. In Thriving Not Surviving, the 7 Underpinning Principles act as the warp threads of the tapestry of life, the strong threads providing the strong base framework. The 7 Connecting Themes act as the weft threads; they wind through every aspect of your life. Most people are completely unaware of their power in working with both their warp and weft threads. The 5 Secret Pathways explore life’s greatest challenges, adding colour, texture, design, and images to each of our tapestries. Individually, each underpinning principle, connecting theme, and secret pathway offers a powerful tool to enrich and enhance the quality of your life; collectively, they are positively transformational.

Even the spaces between the fibres have significance. When we experience a lack, a loss, where there is a hole in the fabric of our lives, we have the opportunity to learn and grow, to develop wisdom, resilience, and persistence. Just like the fabric takes on strength from the spaces, the gaps give us the opportunity to take a step back, to take stock and see things differently. Thriving Not Surviving offers you the opportunity to do just that.

It is important to recognise that engaging with all the components together, that is, the principles, themes, and pathways will give you the very best chance to achieve lasting happiness, success, and fulfilment. Embracing one or two of the components will make a positive difference, but just as many threads come together, to make a beautiful and rich tapestry, the principles, themes and pathways combine to thoroughly enrich your life and deepen your experiences, perspectives, and attitudes in the most empowering and beneficial of ways.

It is entirely up to you how happy, successful, and fulfilling your life will be. However, most people are completely unaware of the powerful impact they make, through their daily patterns of thought, speech, and action, on their own lives and on the lives of others. Furthermore, because people have no awareness of their own significance, they are powerless to change those aspects which are having a negative impact on the quality of their lives.

Thriving Not Surviving presents the principles and strategies that I have learned through my personal experience and the lessons I have learned from my clients, from other well-respected and erudite self-help leaders and through studying a variety of highly successful people and undertaking a great deal of research. All of the principles and strategies I present to you have been tried, tested, and proven to work. You will find you can readily incorporate the book's exercises and activities into your daily life.

Thriving Not Surviving provides the knowledge to help you identify where changes will help you create an even better quality of life for yourself and the people you care about, and you'll receive strategies to implement and sustain those changes.

In It—Together! Your Place in the Thrive Together Tribe

If you want the kind of lasting transformation we ’ re exploring in this book, it is important to have someone in your corner to help you: witnessing your intentions, providing the right sort of support, holding you accountable, and celebrating your successes with you. Because the impact of having such a support group is instrumental in helping create and maintain a lasting change. I created just such a support group called the Thrive Together Tribe. It is an online membership group, which offers a positive peer group, ongoing support, access to a bank of further information, and strategies to help you on your journey. Being part of the Thrive Together Tribe means you will have a huge body of supporters who believe in the power of YOU even when you are struggling to believe it yourself.

Being seen, heard, and validated are central pillars of the Thrive Together Tribe. There will always be someone on hand to offer a listening ear, support, and advice, or to simply hold the space for you. The Thrive Together Tribe will help you maintain your focus, so you can achieve your goals. It provides an opportunity to communicate with others who are going through the same challenges as you and those who have successfully moved beyond them.

Thrive Together Tribe members are grappling with the very big-life issues, hopes, and goals that we explore in Thriving Not Surviving because living their most fulfilled life as their genuine best self is the aim of the tribe.

Please go to www.thrivetogethertribe.com to learn more about the Thrive Together Tribe and to join us. We ’ re holding a spot for you!

I'll be referencing the Thrive Together Tribe regularly throughout the book to remind you of this supportive community that invites you to join. Now, let's proceed on our Thriving Not Surviving journey, so you can take your first big step toward developing a greater sense of self-worth and confidence.

In chapter 1, I share a little of my own journey, so you can appreciate that I have had plenty of opportunities to put these principles to the test. I know from personal experience that incorporating the 7 Underpinning Principles, being mindful of the 7 Interconnecting Themes, and using the strategies within the 5 Secret Pathways has not only changed my life hugely for the better but also that of the many clients I’ve worked with. I hope it will do the same for you.

My Story

You may say, 'It’s all right for you, you haven’t got my problems', and of course that's true, but I have faced my own demons and challenges and