I have known stress in my time, but the single most valuable thing I learned was how to meditate, in 1989; and I cannot find any record of the names of the people who taught and supported me. If you are reading this, thank you.

I would like to acknowledge all that I learned from my Aikido teachers and colleagues, and particularly Senseis David Currie and Alan Mars of the British Ki Aikido Association, and Sensei Andy Shakeshaft of the Ki Federation of Great Britain.

I also learned a lot about stress from working in a high-stress environment, so thank you to all my bosses, managers and clients, from my years at CSL Group and Deloitte – I’d best not name the ones who gave me the most to practise on!

I would like to thank Abigail Pavitt for showing me the impact of one simple action: removing my watch; and Cryss Mennaceur for giving me the opportunity to develop my thinking about stress into a successful keynote presentation, which gave this book its structure and much of its material.

Finally, one woman is most important of all: thank you, Felicity, for teaching me about happiness.