THE 180 EFFECT: The modern day “The Alchemist” — Christopher Ray Coleman
The Alchemist by Paulo Coelho is one of those books that’s a staple in every self-help/personal development libraries. If you’re a business owner, coach/mentor, entrepreneur, or sales professional; you’ve probably been advised to read this book or have used excerpts from this book in your teachings.
It was originally published in 1988 and was written in Portuguese before being widely translated due to being an international bestseller. It has 12,321 reviews on Amazon(72% of those being 5-star reviews). And the book even has an entire Wikipedia page dedicated to it. Wikipedia may not be a credible source but for a non-fiction book to have one solely dedicated to it does say a lot.
The novel follows the journey of a shepherd boy named Santiago. He believes a dream he is constantly having is a prophetic one, which leads him to consult a fortune teller in a nearby town. This fortune teller informs him that the dream means there is a treasure to be discovered in the Egyptian pyramids. Long story short he embarks on this journey to find said treasure. Along the journey, he encounters some extreme levels of adversity including being robbed several times. Finally meets an Alchemist; who is someone that purifies, perfects, and matures certain materials. It’s basically an extreme hybrid between a philosopher and a holistic doctor. Alchemist stems from the term Alchemy; which is an ancient branch of philosophy. The story ends with Santiago getting robbed one last time and the leader of the group of thieves sharing with him that the treasure he searched for is in the old church in which he initially had his prophetic dream.(deep…I know!)
Despite there being many aspects and layers to the novel, it’s more self-help with its main theme being; “when you really want something to happen, the whole universe will conspire so that your wish comes true”. In so many ways that concept correlates to my book “The 180 Effect” and the journey I go through that I chronicle within it.
Something else that resonated with me about “The Alchemist” was the writing and “selling” of the book.
Paulo Coelho wrote the novel in only two weeks in 1987. And when asked about how he was able to write at such a high pace his reply was the story was “already written in his soul.”
I wrote the first edition of “The 180 Effect” in 2016; a week after my 26th birthday. And every time someone asks me how I was able to do it I always answer with; “It was already written because I lived it. It just poured out of me like a cut vein.”
Coelho also had an interesting occurrence with the selling of his book. a Brazilian company originally published his book and even though it “sold well”; the rights to the book were sold back to Coelho after one year. This left Paulo Coelho so distraught that he needed to take a 40-day excursion to the Mojave Desert to “heal” himself. And once he returned he was so convinced that the book was so good that he started selling it door to door. And now the novel is what it is today.
My book “The 180 Effect” didn’t do well at all when I first published it. Apart from a couple of family members and friends supporting it; people didn’t buy into the concept of it yet. I self-published it because of the fact that the story I chronicle is me growing a sales organization for a marketing/advertising firm after being homeless. So I knew how to sell and market the book. But it didn’t quite transpire the way I expected it to.
In April 2018, I published the second edition of my book making it more appealing to the eye and cleaning up a typo or two….ok a ton of typos!!! By doing this I was able to make “The 180 Effect” a 2X Bestseller on Amazon in 2 different categories and made it to #2 in a third category.
This did wonders for my book giving it the buzz it needed to reach more people. It gave me more attention and credibility. And it also fueled my primary business as a corporate wellness consulting being that my story elaborates on my business being able to grow once I started a nutrition program and become my first corporate client.
Now the aim is to take my book to the next level and achieve national and international acclaim while impacting millions of lives in the process. “The Alchemist” narrative was about a dream. Well “The 180 Effect” includes real-life experiences that I overcame.
The overall theme is; “you’re one decision away from turning over a new leaf or taking things to the next level in your life.” One decision to change my life drastically sent me on a path to experience massive growing pains, groom universal business skills, then reach a level of greatness; the three phases of The 180 Effect concept.
HuffPost stated in a study that the average book sells less than 3,000 copies in its lifetime. Well, my goal is to sell 3,000 autographed copies of my book this month alone! This is a goal I once thought I could never do, one many people think I can’t do, and achieving this will put me on pace for some really special things with my book.
Now I don’t know if you ever had a dream that woke you up early in the morning and kept you up at night, but this is that goal for me. With all the negative alternatives there are in the world today my waking and sleeping goal is to sell enough books to allow my book to reach the level of “The Alchemist”!
It this is something you’d like to support me in accomplishing Click Here to find out more info about my book and order your autographed copy.
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And comment below one takeaway you got from this article that stood out or resonated with you.
Your #HealthIsWealthGuy,
Christopher Ray Coleman
