In my work as a mindfulness and high-performance coach, I have noticed a considerable increase in the rate of burnout over the past few years. I'm passionate about making a difference because burnout is continually on the rise globally, with the unrelenting pace of the modern world and the 2020 pandemic having made a significant impact.

Putting together a toolkit of preventative strategies to manage stress, build resilience and maintain wellbeing is far better than experiencing full burnout and then seeking the road to recovery. Regardless of whether you have experienced a partial or full burnout, are just feeling a bit tired and unmotivated, or if you are someone who is looking to make some improvements towards a more meaningful life, this book will give you the tools and techniques to reclaim balance and prevent the onset of burnout.

Over the years I have run many seminars, workshops and programs focusing on mindfulness concepts and various other techniques for preventing or overcoming burnout as well as helping high performers operate at their best. I am always touched and astounded by the feedback I receive weeks, months or even years later from participants sharing their stories on how the concepts and practices have helped them through difficult times, or saved their marriage, or even helped people negotiate serious illnesses.

When I hear individual stories from people I meet who have attended my workshops, I am reminded of why I love the work I do. It is these encounters that inspired me to write this book to help as many people as possible — including you.

My hope is that within these pages you will find inspirational stories, interesting concepts and some mindful practices and practical tips that you can easily implement to prevent burnout, find balance and live a healthy, meaningful life. My deepest aspiration is that you will adopt some of the simple techniques and incorporate them into your lifestyle to create a positive compounding effect, improve your overall wellbeing and find balance.

Furthermore, with the prevalence of burnout rising globally, I felt an innate need to support people through these challenging times. During the height of the 2020 pandemic, I supported more than 75 000 people globally through my corporate seminars and workshops, but I wanted to help further. I concluded that I not only wanted to write this book to support more people, but I needed to write it.

As the title suggests, this book will help you beat burnout and find balance in your life, but it will do much more than that. It will give you practical, implementable tools and techniques to prevent burnout, manage it or recover from it. You do not need to be experiencing burnout to benefit from this book. Each chapter also shares a valuable life lesson to help you operate at your best every day and to live your best life.

The book's three main takeaways, which I hope you will adopt, are:

• the importance of self-awareness, self-regulation and self-care to prevent burnout
• how to manage stress and overwhelm while thriving as a high performer
• the benefit of living more mindfully and meaningfully.

I'd like to explain that this book does not outline in great detail what burnout is or its historical context; nor is it an in-depth analysis on mindfulness and the clinical research associated with it. There are many books that do this well. I prefer to spend time focusing on tangible ways of preventing burnout and introducing mindfulness into your daily life to find balance. It is one thing to learn about these concepts theoretically; it is another to actually practise them so you can feel the benefits for yourself.

Many of the stories I share on these pages are based on my personal experience and the lessons that I learned from cycling, trekking and travelling around the world on my mountain bike. I also capture some valuable lessons from other people I have worked with professionally over more than 25 years of working as a mindfulness and high-performance coach, including CEOs, corporate executives, medical surgeons, athletes and many other inspirational people from some of the world's leading companies. I interviewed close to 200 people from all walks of life while doing research for this book, and their unique insights and perspectives have been a valuable contribution.

Most of all, I want to share with you some of the techniques that I have tried and tested with many of my clients with positive results. The techniques are simple and easy to implement in your life so you can feel the benefits immediately. Some of these fundamental concepts and practices may already be familiar to you and this could be a gentle reminder that you need to take action.

How to use this book

Ideally, you should read this book chronologically, chapter by chapter, as each chapter has a particular underlying theme. I share stories, concepts, anecdotes, case studies and a life lesson in each chapter as well as short, practical mindful practices at the end of each chapter. The lessons and practices build on each other to give you a complete toolkit of self-coaching techniques and tips to help you navigate life with purpose and passion. For example, it makes sense to develop self-awareness (chapter 1) before self-regulation (chapter 4). But how you use the book also depends on your personal needs. You may choose to bounce through different chapters, depending on what you are looking for at the time.

The book contains some fantastic techniques and practices that can support you on your journey to living a mindful and meaningful life, but I do not propose that you adopt every single practice all at once. It is more beneficial if you grab one or two techniques that appeal to you personally and continue to practise them daily to experience the compounding benefits. My big goal is to simplify the complex and make the techniques easy to implement in your life, with very little effort, to create long-term, sustainable, healthy habits.

What I'd love is for you to pick up this book, learn a few techniques and implement them into your daily life so you, and everybody around you, can benefit. There is space for you to write on the pages, or you can download the worksheets and resources from www.melocalarco.com.

And what I'd love even more is to maybe one day bump into you on the street and listen while you share your story of how you benefitted from this book. ☺

With love and gratitude

Melo Calarco