Let’s skip back a few years to the hotspots and hotpots of West Lancashire.

In 2008, a chap called Mike Nolan noticed something strange on Google:

A new town had appeared just down the road from where he worked.

In his own words…

I grew up in the area and spotted on the map one day that it said 'Argleton'.  But it's just a farmer's field close to the village hall and playing fields. I think a footpath goes across the field, but that's all.

Turns out not only was Google showing a new town, but the town had started to take on a life of its own.

Job centres began to list Argleton in their online directories.  Letting agents did the same.  Daily weather forecasts for Argleton began to pop up online too.

All a bit strange when the "town" was just a field a few miles from Aintree!

It took a couple of years, but in 2010 all the Argleton references in Google began to disappear.  The bug in the online system corrected itself.

All that’s left of Argleton today are a few Google Maps reviews, including this gem from a guy called Miles a couple of weeks ago:

Went here to visit a nice field when I found two very geeky men ranting about maps. 

Would not recommend.

Thanks for the info Miles.

Anyway, let me ask you this:

Imagine it’s 2009. You’ve spotted Argleton in Google Maps and you’ve decided to buy a house in the town.  So you hop in your car and set Google Maps for Argleton. 

When you arrive, all you can see is a field.

How would you try to solve this problem?

Maybe you’d use Google Maps to find the address of the Argleton letting agent?  Perhaps you’d try Google Street View to get a visual sense of the town? Or maybe you’d use Google Earth to see a satellite view of the area?

All reasonable strategies.

But my guess is this:

Whatever you do on Google to find Argleton, you’re going to fail.

Not just because Argleton doesn’t exist…

But because you’re trying to solve the problem using the same tool that created the problem.

You see that right?

If you asked a local for directions or searched on Yahoo instead, you might stumble on the fact that Argleton doesn’t exist.

But you’ll never find that answer on Google because Google created the imaginary town in the first place!

Now here’s the nub:

Solving real-life problems works in exactly the same way.

Only this time, Google’s not the source of our problems.

The source of our problems is our own minds.  It's our minds which innocently create problems which we then use our minds to try to solve.

Perhaps this sounds strange.  

But what I’m claiming is that a lot of problems are a lot less set in stone than we tend to think they are.  And when we shift attention from trying to solve a problem to noticing how our minds are creating that problem in the first place, the problems become a lot easier to solve.

Some problems might not even look like problems any more.

As it happens, this is one of the main differences between traditional coaching and the coaching I offer.

Traditional coaching helps people find thought based solutions to their thought created problems.  But this is no different to using Google to find a house in a Google created ghost town.  It’s also a recipe for MORE stress & frustration, not less.

But my coaching, which is based on the Inside-Out Understanding, takes a completely different approach.

We don’t look at the problem at all.

Instead, we look at the source of the problem.

I don’t mean sources like the time you weren’t picked for the netball team or the day your best friend said you smelled.

I simply mean your mind.

Cue my new offer:

A 90 minute Peace of Mind Laser Coaching Session for £200.

The session can be taken whenever you want, but the offer is only available for claiming until 7pm GMT this Friday 23rd August.

After the 90 minute session, if you feel like you haven’t connected with a deeper sense of calm and peace of mind, I’ll give you a second session for free.

Seeing how our minds create our problems really is a game-changer.  It’s the path to freeing up fixations on the past, worries about the future and trying to solve thought created problems in the here & now.

It’s also the path to psychological freedom and peace of mind.

If you’re interested in a Peace of Mind coaching session or you’d like to find out more, reply to this email with “Peace of Mind” and we’ll take it from there.

That’s all for today.

 - Tom