The Chimp Paradox: The Mind Management Programme to Help You Achieve Success, Confidence and Happiness – The Million-Copy Bestseller

I consider myself one of life's high achievers, but despite this I have been conscious that I could achieve more if I could adopt a more helpful mindset. I saw this recommended and bought it to read on holiday. Within 20 pages I immediately found myself relating to the material. A minority of reviewers have criticised this book as being flimsy or flaky in its approach. I couldnt disagree more. On the first day of the holiday I witnessed my wife trying (again) to teach my 7 year old daughter to swim. She has a major fear of the water so at 7 she still cant swim. I saw my wife getting frustrated that my daughter would not even try. At this point I had only read 20 or so pages of the book but it immediately dawned on me that the answer to my daughter learning to swim was psychology not technique. I was witnessing one chimp (my wife's) getting frustrated with another (my daughter's) with destructuve results. When I told my daughter she had a chimp in her head hell bent on self preservation and telling her she couldnt and mustnt swim I immediately had her attention. We worked on 'boxing the chimp'. Within minutes (minutes not hours) her mindset changed and she grew in confidence. Enough to trust me and for her to start focussing on the swimming technique she would need to learn. Within an hour of employing the basic premise of this book my daughter had swum a width of the pool. I bought this book for me but the first person to benefit was my daughter. I was fascinated and astounded by what the two of us had acheived. I have now read the rest of the book and whilst it is highly emotive to say a book can change your life this book is changing my APPROACH to life and I already feel more easy going, positive, relaxed and up for the challenges the future may hold in fact the challenges I hope it holds! I also have a better grasp of what makes people tick which is immensely helpful on so many levels. You may be the easiest going, most positive person on the planet and feel there is no need to read this book. But wouldnt it be good to understand why, and understand others better? Buy the book.

This book is written in such a simple, straightforward style with no jargon or complex psychological terms that it is accessible to all. Rather than attribute those emotions or behaviours in you to your "inner child" or your "Id" or your subconscious the author attributes unwanted or unhelpful thought patterns, emotions or behaviours to your inner "Chimp". Step-by-step he takes you through a journey to better understand your SELF and how to manage psychological issues / relationship problems / stress and how to improve your levels of contentment, happiness and success. There are a LOT of self help,books out there but this one stands out for its simple no nonsense style and practical advice. There's no suggestion of relying on faith/ spirituality / wishful thinking to help address problems you are facing in life. The author simply explains WHY we suffer with psychological problems and HOW to address each problem. I read it because I have a very hectic stressful life and am a born worrier. The book has helped me see how my stress is caused by my not managing the "needs of my chimp" and by trying to look after too many people around me rather than focussing on those who are closest to me and provide me with support - " my troop" as the author calls it. It has also helped me develop a better understanding of "difficult" people I encounter at work and amongst my family and helped my wife and I communicate in a more constructive way about areas where we disagree. By accepting that many communication problems at work and at home arise when the "Chimp" aspect of both parties are not listening to the other and forcing their point of view across you can approach important conversations in a more a more rational manner and improve communication in difficult situations. I also enjoyed Stephen Grosz "The examined mind", Scott Peck " The road Less travelled" and the "Hector" series of books by Francois Delordes Out of all of them, THIS book has been the most helpful,in terms of practical advice about addressing stress and emotional or psychological problems.

This book is written in a plain, accessible style. It tells us that our brain can conveniently be divided into three parts HUMAN, CHIMP, COMPUTER. The chimp is first to react - for instance crossing the road without looking properly - and may give a warning which saves your life. However, the chimp can also make a mountain out of a molehill, sowing seeds for future problems. Someone takes your parking space,for example. Instead of shrugging and maybe moaning to friends, you seek out the parking villain and confront him. Result: nobody wins and nothing is gained, just trouble. The human in the parking scenario would just shrug, the chimp wants to confront someone about it. The computer meanwhile takes in chimp and human reactions and melds them together, to make the personality you become. This books tells us how to contain(not remove) our chimp, making life easier, better and less confrontational. It teaches us to accept situations which cannot be changed - because they've happened - to move on and plan the future. I found the various sections helpful, and soon became aware when my chimp was pushing himself to the front of my thinking. The author helped Chris Hoy to power his way to a cycling gold medal, by helping him contain the chimp and plan various goals to reach on the way to his dream of a gold medal. I just want to get through a day without unnecessary anxiety, and with purpose. If you share those simple aims then this book will help you order your life and bring order to ambition. The added bonus is that the book is an easy read.

helps me stay focused

It took me some months to complete this book. Not because it is tedious or badly written but because the concepts take time to absorb and begin to make sense. Peters' credentials, his work with British Cycling, are flawless. The language used is clearly designed to be understood by the vast majority of people. The concepts are, however, hardcore science and very powerful. Watch out for self-help junkies commenting negatively - if they can quote a string of other books they deem better then clearly nothing so far is working for them. This book will work for most people willing to listen and implement the lessons. Take your time. If you're going to change your life you won't do it by reading a book in 24 hours. It will take months, maybe a year or two. Understand each idea totally before moving to the next. Each idea on its own is relatively easy to grasp but there are loads of them and stitching them all together in a useful way takes time and patience. I found some of the metaphors confusing at times. Humans and chimps fine. Then add computers, gremlins, goblins, autopilots and it's starting to get mixed up. And then add stones of life, planets, moons, and at one point cogs, and you wonder if there may have been a more consistent method of presenting the ideas. Don't make the mistake of dismissing the messages because you don't like how they are delivered though. See through the metaphorical irritations. At the start of the book I had a highly paid but stressful job 200 miles from home, living out of a suitcase 4 days a week. Irritable, irritated, and irritating to others. Today, as I finish it, I've changed jobs, pay cut but still comfortably paid, a short commute from home. Changed the car, and have gone on holiday for the first time in 2 years. I felt my life changing as soon as I made decisions to solve everything making me stressed and unhappy, as soon as I started managing that chimp inside me and learning to recognise and deal with other chimps around me. I must've changed to others too. Not only did I walk the interview for my new job but my old colleagues, with the single exception of the boss (complete with out of control misplaced ego / chimp) who was recipient of some honest feedback, all said how they would genuinely miss me with an affection I hadn't realised existed. At home and with friends I'm more relaxed and sociable, less introverted and more confident than I can ever recall since very young childhood. Next task... start the book again from the beginning as I'm sure I've missed things or not really understood them first time. I expect my journey to take a year or so but others may take more or less time. A friend also reading the book is going slower than me. It is good to have someone else working through the book though as you can talk chimp things through without appearing a nutcase. Don't rush this - it's like doing a university course over a couple of terms not a weekend read. No-one can guarantee success but I wish those who give it a genuine go the very best of luck, though you make your own luck really and this book shows you how. Off for some sangria overlooking the blue ocean now. Thanks Dr Steve Peters.

Really good read , it’s helped me a lot

2/6/2012 I started listening to the audio version while driving, and my overall conclusion is this: Dr Peters's has a lot of experience in dealing with sports people and prison inmates; what they tend to have in common is youth and elevated testosterone and, arguably, a preference for action over thought. This is a book, presented in simple terms, which focuses on subduing your unhelpful instincts with reason, and so might be a lot of use to people falling into those rough categories. Had Dr Peters worked with geriatric vole-fanciers, he'd probably have written a very different book. So for me, (though not a geriatric vole-fancier), it's not very useful. For you it may be. Have a look at a few of the preview pages and that will probably help you more than any review in making your decision. 18/2/2012 I have decided to re-write this review completely but leave my original review and the update in place. I wrote the very first review of this book on the Amazon site, having pre-ordered the book before publication and not knowing what to expect. Enough time has passed that I can see this book in context, which I was unable to do before. It is, as it claims to be, a mind management model. The real strength of this system, as I see it, is in real-time emotional management; when an unwanted emotion comes up, you have the opportunity to regard it at the time as an invitation which can be refused, rather than a command which must be obeyed. Most other systems require you to deal with your emotions after the fact. I would agree with the other reviewers that Dr Peters has done an excellent job in cramming various aspects of human experience and brain functioning into his chimp model. Having read the book once in a few hours and got nothing from it, I have gone over it again with a pen in my hand and did better. One of the main difficulties for me is in his choice of metaphors. He has taken a chimpanzee to represent our instinctual/emotional side, and a human to represent our rational side, then he turns to mythology to use gremlins for emotional patterns that can be shifted, and goblins for emotional patterns that are apparently immovable. He swings over to astronomy to represent various areas of life as planets, with moons around them to stabilise them, and then perhaps to religion with the Stone of Life (a kind of Ten Commandments containing our values and beliefs), and then to technology and information systems with an Autopilot and a Computer. For me this is horribly confusing and slows everything down much more than if he'd just stated everything literally. I don't really have any argument with the content, just the presentation of it. Clearly, for other people this may not be an issue at all. Have a look at the sample pages and decide for yourself. I have also purchased the audio version of the book (even though I dislike Audible and their restricted book formats) and actually find that easier going, and would give it 4 stars. Dr Peters has a good voice and having him reading it makes it impossible to skim over the bits where my eyes would glaze over from reading the words Chimp and Human over and over again. I would suggest that it's also worth a look at 'Maximum Willpower' by Kelly McGonnigal, which is actually largely to do with the care and feeding of the Human, or else 'Willpower' by Roy Baumeister, who did much of the original research in examining willpower: when we are tired or hungry or otherwise out of balance our rational side tends to disappear. ORIGINAL REVIEW I have to say I was disappointed by this book. People like Sir Chris Hoy, Victoria Pendleton and Dave Brailsford of the extremely successful British cycling team rate the author very highly and the first two go so far as to say that they wouldn't have won their gold medals without him. Brailsford even calls him a genius. Well and good; however, the book itself is a model of the human condition. A highly qualified psychiatrist takes various aspects of neurology and translates them into a simplified model of human existence, stating that we have a human, chimp and computer inside us, the chimp corresponding to the emotional part of us which is geared towards self-preservation, the human being the rational part, and the computer corresponding to memory and what he calls autopilot. Our problem is to manage the chimp as we cannot defeat it. This is conflated with analogies of planets and moons (have a look at the chapter headings). In a nutshell: we must use reason to outsmart and control passion, in order to achieve our aims and make life bearable. As I read the over 300 pages, I kept waiting for the punchline, the flash of insight that would make this all fall into place. What I finally realised was that it is just a model with a few simple recommendations as to how to do this. Perhaps with individual attention from the author this translates into an incisive analysis for elite sportspeople which enables them to perform at their very best and control their demons; for me it became irritating having to keep all the stuff about chimps and moons in my head, without being particularly useful. I don't have an inner chimp which is separate from my 'human'. I have emotions and a rational side, and there are strong connections between them (cerebral cortex and limbic system) in the brain. Emotions can be very well managed with techniques like EFT and PSTEC for those who have the determination to do so, and I would recommend either of those techniques over any solutions mentioned in the book, given the choice. A much more practical guide for most people would be '10 Minute Toughness' by Jason Selk. I've just seen that he's written another book called 'Executive Toughness' for business people and general use rather than sportspeople; no doubt the principles are the same and it's probably well worth reading. In short, if you've never done any self-development whatsoever, The Chimp Paradox might conceivably be useful, and others might get more out of this book than I did. I'm giving it the benefit of the doubt and have awarded it a massive 3 stars, although my disappointed inner chimp would like to give it 1 star. Oops, there I go, maybe I do have an inner chimp after all! And if you're fond of chimps, and seeing the word chimp several times on every chimping page might excite your very own inner chimp, then take your chimp money and buy this chimp book immediately. You'll be chimpingly glad you did. UPDATE 28/1/2012 I was so annoyed with this book that I left it at a relative's, and then brought it back again a few weeks ago, as I was trying to understand how I got so little out of it. Seeing a comment on my review last night, I came back to this page to find that 5-star reviews had sprung up around it like a troop of baby chimps, some of them written by very big and successful baboons indeed. This morning, I took another look at the book and realised that perhaps I'd read it too quickly. I had been expecting some explicit techniques and that is not really what the book is about. It is more a set of principles to be applied across a vast swathe of areas of life. One of them jumped out at me, which was about doing your best rather than trying to win. In other words, 'control the controllables', the things you can control, which is a mantra of sports psychology and a useful principle in life in general. The problem for me is that, although Peters has created this parallel chimpiverse in order to simplify human existence into manageable form, I need to translate it back into terms which mean something to me in order to make it useable. Your experience may be different. A slightly wicked part of me suspected that this book was produced just before the 2012 Olympics in order to mislead foreign cycling teams into passing around bananas and picking fleas off each other in a mistaken attempt to improve their performances. Having said that, it wouldn't surprise me one bit if the chimp metaphor had spread like wildfire throughout the cycling world, what with hooting chimp bike horns, furry chimp toestraps and banana-shaped bicycle pumps. Anyway, I'm going to keep this book at 3 stars, not because of the content, which presumably works, but because of the presentation, which makes reading it a bit like wading through a book in a foreign language which I don't understand very well. As a handbook and clarification for people who have already had the system presented to them and have adopted it wholesale, no doubt it's excellent (possibly the real reason for the publication date). I've decided to try to read it again and see if I can get any more out of it, which is only fair. I would, however, be interested to know whether others have shared my confusion and had the occasional desire to hurl it at the wall. The new Jason Selk book is indeed superb for the general public, incidentally, and to that I would add The Winners Bible by Kerry Spackman.

Funny, but useful.

Great Book! A must!! Really good to understand why we react the way we do; either good or bad. In my top 5!

Very good read! Very useful! And an easy book to follow. Totally enjoyable.

Must read book on mind management and understanding human psychology

There is a reason this book is a best seller, it deals with a very complex subject, a subject that has a major impact on the lives of everyone, and it make it something you can understand and work with. This is not an easy book, it has a lot. to say and takes some sustained effort fro you in working through it. This is not one of those change your life in five minutes books, but it can change your life. Based on long experience the author has found a way to describe neurobiological brain functions in a way you can grasp and work with. From the first chapter on you will start to understand why you and the people you know act the way you do. You will also learn what you can do to change that, and improve things. I have read a lot of books that detail brain science, explaining many of the things dealt with in this book in detailed ways, but rarely have I come across a book that makes this information available to the masses. Well here it is. Don't miss out on this opportunity

Clara y sencilla explicación del funcionamiento racional e irracional de nuestro cerebro, útil para tomar conciencia de ciertos comportamientos. También muy buena la versión infantil.