Stuart and Frank reveal secrets to success
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A BOOK offering to help its readers discover the secrets of success seems to be living up to its name with local readers.
"The Story of Stuart and Frank: How You Can Achieve The Results You Really Want" by Daviot resident Paul S. Browning has proved a local hit after the initial 10 copies ordered by the Inverness branch of Waterstone’s were quickly snapped up.
"They have flown off the shelf," Browning declared.
"Waterstone’s has been selling an average of one a day with no promotion."
The initial response to the book has persuaded Inverness store manager Terry Cleaver not only to order in more copies, but to arrange a public appearance by Browning and his wife Diane on Thursday where, with the help of a model brain and the lifesize cutouts of Stuart and Frank, Browning will give a 15 minute presentation on what affects our behaviour and happiness and how people can change.
It is to the brightly illustrated figures of Stuart and Frank — S for success and F for failure — that Browning attributes some of the book’s appeal. To illustrate the points in the book, the cartoon characters are followed from womb to grave showing how their attitude and behaviour has positive and negative outcomes.
A former microbiologist, Browning moved to the Isle of Skye in 2004 after selling the successful business he had built up in the English Midlands and began studying the principals which could help an individual achieve success and happiness in both their working and private lives.
"It’s based on strong principles and we’re happy to say that because they are not of our making," he said.
"We’ve researched this book back hundreds of years, in fact even going back to Biblical times because a lot of this is based on the Golden Rule (do as you would be done by), though it’s not in any way religious."
The Brownings believe so strongly in the message of the book that they are selling up and moving from the Highlands back to their native Midlands in order to devote their energies and finances to promoting it more fully and eventually hope to set up a Stuart and Frank Academy of Excellence, perhaps back on Skye.
"Unfortunately we see a lot of bad attitudes around, but the book explains how people can change," he said,
"The book was written using real people as examples and there is a lot of me and my life story in the book as well. It’s not just about money, but about building relationships as well.
"If you like, it’s a book about making the world a better place. Being successful is not difficult if we are prepared to change our thinking and our behaviour."
The couple have already held a workshop for inmates in Inverness Prison based on the principles to be found in the book and have written to justice secretary Kenneth Clarke, applying for permission to run more structured courses in prisons in England and Wales.
"We want this book to be available in prisons and to every child in school," Browning
declared.
"We want to introduce this not only to the Scottish Prison Service, but the UK Prison Service because we believe crime is a behavioural problem and in order to tap into a person’s behaviour you have to know where behaviour is rooted in a human being. Scientists and philosophers agree that behaviour is rooted in the subconscious mind.
"Governments are not succeeding in changing behaviour because they are not getting to the subconscious mind."
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"The Story of Stuart and Frank: How You Can Achieve the Results You Really Want" by Paul S. Browning is published by Stuart & Frank, priced £14.99.
Paul and Diane Browning will be talking about the book and the techniques it features at Waterstone’s bookshop, Eastgate, Inverness on Thursday between 5pm and 6pm.
