"Live in your own power;
learn the Art of Being Yourself; and make every day count."

Phil Evans

I currently live in Newcastle, Australia.
Despite the diversity that I have experienced during my life's journey, I have come to realise that I learn as much from my grandchildren these days as from any other source.  Interesting little people!

I believe that we are all on our own personal journey, and we are totally responsible for our own successes and failures during this journey  through life.  It wasn't until I learned that I had to 'own my own stuff', and stop blaming anyone or anything else for where I was at in life, that I became capable of taking responsibility for who I was .... and where I was!

Over the past 10 years I have learnt to regularly challenge myself with often confronting questions.  Things like, "Did I have the stuff that true leaders are made of"?  "Could all of this self-realisation, and my simple desire to teach by example, help me to become an effective leader"?  The answers would come in time.

All the bumps and pitfalls had taught me something as I was experiencing them.  All valuable lessons about life!  At the age of 45 I started to find my true passion .... I was meant to be a teacher; a mentor; a leader.

Hmmmm, what do I do with all of these challenging realisations?

One of the first things I realised was that I had NEVER been myself!  No, I had never just been me!  I was living some kind of fantasy life that was empty and shallow, because I was doing everything for everybody else.  My own realisations have led me to being capable of playing a positive influencial role in the lives of many people since around 1995.

Yes, because I had walked the path of confusion and anger for many years, I could now take my experiences with Alcoholism, Long-term Depression, and living on the edge of emotional suicide every day, and do something positive with them!

Sure, business and career successes had been there throughout this life of confusion, but the inner personal feelings of being of absolutely no value at all, were overwhelming!

I started studying and working with sub-conscious belief systems and their patterns, and the 'gift' of understanding them is now the core of what Phil Evans, and my business People Stuff, is all about.

In business and in personal affairs, we are so very capable of sabotaging our own success, if we have any of these negative 'thieves of success' running rampant in our lives!  They are our greatest enemies, and all too often we don't even know they're there, let alone have the ability to identify them.  Identifying them is the key to unlocking the door to consistent (and sustainable) success!

I have learned to drive my own bus, and to stop sitting in the back seat of someone else's bus that was so out of control.  It took time and courage to move from the back seat of someone else's bus and to gradually have my focus on being in the driver's seat myself.  Eventually, we all have the ability to claim the driver's seat as our own!  And we also have the ability to choose who rides on our bus with us.  Who joins us on our journey now becomes a choice, and not an obligation dependent on someone else's beliefs any more.  Who gets to stay on our bus is also now a choice.

This is self empowerment!  It is part of the Art of Being YOU!

Whether in business, or in our personal journeys, if we are not being true to ourselves, then we are totally lost!

People Stuff helps people to learn to drive their own bus; to then find a road map that suits their passion; and to follow it.  It's about picking a destination and heading in that direction without being focused on the destination only, but on the journey that takes us there!  Whether we get there or not is almost irrelevant, because we have now learned to enjoy each day as we put our passion and daily purpose into action.

I believe that the success of all of my recent personal and business activities in working with people who ached for the feeling of 'being in their own power', has been due to embracing this concept, and sharing it with as many people as possible.  No, it's not about being arrogant, it's about being confident at being yourself!  This is one critical aspect of this principle, and can be best desribed by this quote of mine ....

"Being in your own power is the ability to just be yourself, without fear of criticism, with confidence rather than arrogance."

Now we're getting closer to being the leader capable of great things, and capable of empowering and mentoring others by being a great example to those who are watching and waiting, keen to learn more from this strong light that shines in their lives.  True leadership is leading by virtue of 'who we are' rather than by demanding that people simply follow our directions.

I do believe that I have earned my degree from the University of Hard Knocks for a very good reason, even though it was hard to understand that process while it was happening.  Yes, it's not always easy to be peaceful and understanding when we're learning through adversity, but hindsight is a wonderful thing and the ability to look back and acknowledge the lessons that were being delivered at the time, is indeed a gift!

Street-Smart people certainly have a position in our leadership parade; without them we cannot learn the reality of life that just can't be found in books; it has to be lived!

Some life experiences prior to forming People Stuff in 2001:

**Petro-Chemical Plant Supervisor.  (I was Construction and Commissioning Supervisor of a new cutting-edge Petrochemical Plant, and was responsible for the running of the Plant once construction was completed.   I also trained the first 40 Operators to run this ultra-modern Plant; the first fully computer-controlled Petro-Chemical Plant in Australia; possibly the world).

Yes, that was in the 1970's .... and I was only a pup.

I then went on to have the following experiences .... 

*Explosives Plant Supervisor.    
*Power Station Foreman - Liddell, Hunter Valley.
*Operations Supervisor – High-Pressure Industrial Blasting.  
*Regional Manager – High-Pressure Industrial Blasting.
*Real Estate and Property Consultant.
*NSW Marketing Manager – Timber Products Industry.
*Contracted Case Manager – Employment Service Industry.
*Sales and Marketing Manager – Dale Carnegie Training.
*Marketing Manager – Technology Industry.

Contact at: phil@peoplestuff.com.au
Website: www.peoplestuff.com.au

You can also email him at phil.evans@rattle-the-cage.com