1 Phoenix Rising
Embracing and Transcending Failure
by Russ Volckmann, PhD

Genre: Self-help
Paperback, 175 pages
Price: $16.95
US Shipping and Handling: $4.00
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1 Phoenix Rising is about facing, loving and giving yourself permission to change your life for the better. It inspires, challenges, encourages and provides opportunities for understanding life and your self. You create new possibilities.

Our literature and movies are filled with stories of people who have failed as the result of forces ourside themselves over which they had no control. They fought back and many succeeded when it seemed hope was lost. Few stories are about people who have created and caused their own failures and returned from the abyss to bring love and be loved in buidling success. This book is provides a pathto achieve that.

Table of Contents

(Chapter Headings)

Chapter 1 Failure: What Is It and What Does It Do?

Chapter 2 The Experience of Failures

Chapter 3 WHO AM I, REALLY?

Chapter 4 Inventory of Potential

Chapter 5 Where Do You REALLY Want to Go? What

Do You REALLY Want to Create?

Chapter 6 Purpose

Chapter 7 Review and Revision

Chapter 8 Guides and Strategy

Chapter 9 Getting to Goals

Chapter 10 Helpful Mechanisms

Chapter 11 Taking Action

Chapter 12 You Are Adequate

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How One Phoenix is Rising

I could hear the pounding of the surf maybe 100 feet or more below me. It was about 10:30 on a cold September night and I was standing near the edge of the cliff at Devil’s Slide on Highway 1 just south of San Francisco. My whole world had fallen apart and I was contemplating taking those last three steps…

Perhaps it is an old story and I won’t bother you with the details. Suffice it to say I felt that I was no longer connected to my profession, my work of over twenty years. And I no longer had a family. I felt ashamed, abandoned, hopeless and for the first time in my life suicide seemed like a viable option.

Maybe it was cowardice, but it didn’t seem like it at the time. I told myself I would come back the next night if I must. First, I was going to give myself another night and day to see if I could find my grounding, to find a shred of hope, a reason to stay alive. I turned away from the darkness, got into my car and drove to a motel in this somewhat isolated community away from the freeways, yet only a half hour from San Francisco.

Clearly, I rejected suicide, but I still had to find a way to put my life back together. And over the years that have followed several key things helped me not only do that, but to transcend what my life had been before in terms of creativity, productivity, connection with others and the capacity to support others as I redeveloped myself.

Two professional friends provided a deep support system and helped me redirect my professional, intellectual and financial life. Business flourished and I began a process of building my coaching skills. Over the years I have not only rebuilt my self-confidence and self-esteem, but I have been challenged to confront myself in more ways than seemed possible. This has led to a developmental path that brings me excitement, fear, joy and potential that lives within me consciously.

1 Phoenix Rising is not a story of that process, but key elements in the process itself. By applying the methods that are laid out in this heartfelt work, I am sharing how I confronted my tragic sense of failure and loss. I was able to reach into myself and embrace those failures, to welcome them to my path of learning and development, knowing they would never truly disappear.

By applying the methods that are laid out in this work so full of hope and promise, I share ideas, drawn from many sources to build a path of affirmation and hope. It is a path on which I have taken responsibility for recreating my life.

Today, my life is thriving. I can and do bless all of the tragedies that brought me to this place, for it is better than I have ever known before. This Phoenix has risen.

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Testimonials

I wanted to tell you that your book is wonderful. For a person that does not feel like a failure (I know this is now a joke) boy, was I able to dig up some good stuff. I read through most of the book and then went back and started with the exercises. I am now at "A Land Of Many Tribes." The first tribe really made an impact…The quotes you chose to put in the book are so meaningful. The Four Agreements I want to live by and the list on pg. 39 I read to [my husband]. Also, [he] will be starting your book (now also our book).

L.L., Los Angeles

A new book with an integrated method for confronting issues that keep us stuck and moving toward what is truly important to us. An effective tool for coaches and for clients whether coaching leaders in business or in life.

I always thought of myself as a winner, not a failure... I've always been afraid of taking a risk...and failing! 1 Phoenix Rising gave me the opportunity to face my fears in an absolutely safe environment and to admit my fragility...To my surprise, what I found was a renewed sense of force and creative drive that is now overriding the fear!

Patsi Krakoff, Psy. D.

The material in 1 Phoenix Rising is genuine and helpful. I've known Russ for sometime and not only can he help you with issues around failure, but if you work through this material, it will help you become more aware of a life worth living big!

Mike Jay

B\Coach Systems