The bestselling author of How to Escape from Prison, prisoner-turned-psychologist Paul Wood on developing the mental strength and fitness to take on all of life's challenges

Getting and staying mentally fit, just like getting and maintaining a high level of physical fitness, involves hard work, effort, and consistency. Our level of mental fitness determines how effectively we can flourish through adversity, realise our potential, and be happier with our lives - regardless of what the universe has in store.

We all know about mental stress (or we think we do). We've definitely all experienced it, and none of us like it. Yet this is not a threat to be avoided. Mental stress is perfectly analogous to physical stress: it is the mind's way of telling us that what we are attempting to perform is challenging our resource. This is a catalyst for growth, and a sign we are pursuing our potential. When we experience stress, we have a choice: we can heed that signal and give up - after all, we're meant to stay in our psychic comfort zone all the time, right? Or we can recognise the discomfort we are feeling is simply nature's way of enabling us to rise to the occasion.

In Mental Fitness you will learn how to:

• Increase your mental fitness, just as you would increase your physical fitness

• Get closer to your potential by working proactively to maintain your mental fitness

• Experience the right level of stress (this is what makes us get fitter)

• Cope effectively for longer before you get fatigued or exhausted (it doesn't mean you don't feel the struggle)

• Pay attention to the indicators of fatigue to avoid burnout and unnecessary misery