Mind Over Grind: How to BreakFree When Work Hijacks Your Life
Guy Winch
Simon & Schuster  (February 2026)

“We have met the enemy and he is us.”   Pogo the Possum

Long ago when I joined the working world (delivering newspapers, caddying, then bagging groceries and stocking shelves, and then in high school delivering flowers to funeral parlors and hospitals), I assumed that most human limits are self-imposed. I agreed with Henry Ford: “Whether you think you can or think you can’t, you’re probably right.” And whenever I began to develop bold and glorious ambitions, Thomas Edison’s insight reminded me, “Vision without execution is hallucination.”

In Mind Over Grind, Guy Winch provides an abundance of valuable information, insights, and counsel that can help almost anyone to achieve these important learning objectives. Each is prefaced by HOW or  HOW TO:

o Good Stress Goes Bad
o Stop the nightly intrusion of work thoughts
o Avoid using harmful coping mechanisms
o Stress makes us repeat our mistakes
o Recoverfrom the workday
o Knowxwhen you’vevhad too much of a “bad thing”

o Avoid foot-in-mouth disease
o How your job impacts your relationships
o Set boundaries with work
o Recalibrate your moral compass
o Know if  it’s time to leave
o Make vacations, holidays, and other time-offs restorative

It is important to recognize and understand that pressure and stress may seem essentially the same but they are not.  Pressure can usually be managed but stress rarely. Unchecked and out of control, stress can eventually be destructive. Bridges fall apart, balloons explode, nervous systems collapse, etc. In contrast, think of steam power and its countless benefits: self-propelled carts, vehicles, boats, trains, barges, etc. as well as heat-generation systems in residences, factories, office buildings, and commercial locations. etc.

In the business world, you either manage stress or it manages you. There is always pressure in a workplace culture (e.g. fixed office hours, production and delivery deadlines). Extreme stress can eventually cause emotional breakdowns. People often say they feel “ground down” by it.

Guy Winch understands allthis, of course, and wrote this book in ordertonshare whathebhaslearned about how to break free when your work has hijacked — or threatens to hijack — your life. If you are in that situation, I urge you to obtain a copy of Mind Over Grind and read — then re-read it ASAP.

It is also a must-read book for executives who have direct reports entrusted to their care, as well as for those clergy, officials, teachers, and coaches who have direct and frequent contact with school students and athletes.

Thank you, Guy Winch, for your gift of knowledge and wisdom, gained from wide and deep experience in a world that has become more volatile, more uncertain, more complex, and more ambiguous than at any prior time that I can recall.

* * *

Here are two suggestions while you are reading Mind Over Grind: First, highlight key passages. Also,  perhaps in a lined notebook kept near-at-hand,  record your comments, questions, and action steps (preferably with deadlines). Pay special attention to all charts as well as to all words, phrases, and sentences that Winch has italicised for emphasis.

These two simple tactics — highlighting and documenting — will expedite frequent reviews of key material later.