Why Clever People do Dumb Things! - book cover

Great Change Maker

Book title ‘Why Clever People do Dumb Things’
Author: Lindsay Spencer-Matthews / http://www.greatchangemaker.com.au.
Lindsay is the guy who helps those who are struggling on the inside, but smiling on the outside, to achieve a richer, fuller, and more meaningful life.
Lindsay does this by presenting at conferences, key note speaking events, seminars and one on one mentoring. His goal is to change the way you think about the way you think. You will learn to use your brain differently with simple but powerful techniques and frameworks.
Delivered in a friendly, humorous, and relaxed style, Lindsay’s seminars, workshops, and keynote presentations help you transform the way you think about yourself, and everyone else. The techniques and frameworks Lindsay uses are effective, simple, and easy to implement.
A registered Psychologist since 1994, Lindsay has helped thousands of people transform their lives. Driven by a desire to help more than the 300 clients he could see each year, Lindsay wrote “Why Clever People Do Dumb Things” in 2014 and is now delivering keynote talks, seminars and workshops. A passionate and gifted public speaker, Lindsay now reaches a far wider audience, whilst still seeing some private clients.
Lindsay has a rare blend of talents and experience to empower an audience and get the message to ‘live’ for them. Twenty years in the business world before becoming a Psychologist; wide experience in public speaking and entertainment; a dry sense of humour; and the ability not to take himself too seriously; combine to enable audiences to take actionable changes back with them to their work and private lives.
Having returned to practice after entering early self-funded retirement, Lindsay found himself becoming increasingly frustrated with the limitations of 1 on 1 private practice. He knew his skill as a speaker could help touch many more lives.
Lindsay’s life has included heartbreak, tragedy, illness, self-doubt, and failure. He knows what it is like to be hurting inside and smiling on the outside. He brings these experiences, and his skills and training as a Psychologist, to his speaking events.
Lindsay’s approach has resulted in some great success for audiences and clients. His private clients report a doubling of their wellbeing in an average of under six sessions. Feedback as a speaker consistently shows that his message gets across in powerful and life changing ways.
Lindsay is an author and registered Psychologist who commands the respect and referrals of a wide range of medical professionals and business people. He is proud to have helped people from all walks of life to become more confident, improve their relationships, and positively influence their careers. Lindsay helps develop new and powerful ways of thinking to transform your personal and business lives.
Main target audience:
Busy executives and business owners aged between 30 and 55 – primarily males (but females too). They are outwardly successful but inside they are struggling.
The following characteristics describe how they may feel (although they are very unlikely to admit to any of these feelings or inadequacies!)
• they are confused because they seemingly have it all – the successful business, loving relationships; the nice car but they still feel dissatisfied.
• they are frustrated because they are used to being in control of what happens in their life and business but now feel that they don’t know what they should do.
• essentially, deep down they are unhappy in business because they are getting more feelings of conflict rather than satisfaction; and in their personal life they feed disconnected with the people that they love.
• the book outlines the reasons they may feel like this and also outlines a powerful process to change the way they think about the way they think so that they can get back in alignment with their values.
• this helps them work back towards having a rich, full and meaningful business and personal life.

book cover:
• Front;
• spine;
• back;
• plus a bookmark and postcard

Personality of brand:
Confident; challenging; practical; slightly humorous;
Story behind the title:
The title “Why Clever People do Dumb Things” explains the way the human brain works. It gives people the opportunity to change the way they think about the way they think. The title is a reflection of how we all tend to have those ‘doh’ moments in life and what we can do about them. It proposes that most ordinary people act as if they have two brains, one that can think and reason, but is lazy, and the other which controls through habit and emotion, but is stupid. The stupid brain (the Auto Pilot) is the brain which is really in control. It is capable of brilliant things, but it is also capable of dumb things – it will do anything that it is taught to do regardless of whether those things work or not. As long as it does things that work the other brain stays asleep. It is when the Auto Pilot screws up that the other brain, the Clever Brain, wakes up and goes into damage control. The Auto Pilot’s control is the reason “Why Clever People Do Dumb Things”!
Brief Synopsis:
Life is challenging. Many self-help books propose singular, positive-thinking strategies which may offer temporary relief or even euphoria, but can come crashing to the ground when difficulties arise. This book is different. Based on a 40 year career and 63 years of life, Lindsay has formulated insights that offer practical and realistic solutions to life’s problems. Including:
- How to be happy even when you have no control over the situation
- How changing your approach to situations can be easier than you think
- This book explores a new process for enriching your life by rethinking how you think
- Why this strategy is proven to work based on 300 clinical case studies
Secondary purpose of book:
- to stimulate demand for keynote speaking; seminars; and mentoring to be provided by Lindsay.
- Get organisations interested in buying book for staff and individual development

Attached: photos author (Lindsay)