For far too many, the dream is dissipated and with it, so is the will to shape our destinies.
Concentration of Power
Controlled focus is like a laser beam.
How can I take immediate control of my life? What can I do today to really make a difference that can help make me shape my destiny?
Take control of our consistent action
Decisions: everything that happens in your life begins with your decision
Set a baseline standard for what you’re accepting in your life
“Tell me a functional family.”
It’s not conditions of your life that determines your destiny; it’s your decision.
Get past your excuses.
Make a “real” decision. Making a true decision means cutting off any other possibility. Making a true decision means committing to achieving a result and cutting yourself off from any other possibility.
“I am not discouraged because every wrong discarded is another step forward.” – Thomas Edison
3 Decisions to Control Our Destiny
- Your decision on what to focus on at each moment of your life
- What things mean to you
- What should I do now?
Cf. Niagara Syndrome
4 Step Process for Achieving Success: The Ultimate Success Formula
- Clearly decide what you want
- Take massive action to make it happen
- Notice what’s working and what’s not working
- Change your approach until it does work
Cf. Mr. Honda
6 Quick Keys to Harness the Power of Decision
- True power of making decisions
Real decision is measured by the fact you’re taking new action - Making a true commitment
Just decide: Never leave the scene of the decision without taking a specific action toward its realization - Make the decisions often
- Learn from your decisions: What’s good about this?
- Stay committed to your decision but stay flexible on your approach
Don’t get stuck on the means to achieving it. It’s the result that you’re after
Cultivate the art of flexibility - Enjoy making decisions
- Everything that we do, we do it out of our need to avoid pain or out of our desire to gain pleasure.
Cf. Procrastination - It’s not actual pain that drives us; it’s our fear that something will lead to pain: We are not driven by reality but by our perceptions of reality
Pain/Pleasure Linkage: Neuro-Associations of Pain & Pleasure
- Changing what we link pain and pleasure to, we can instantly change our behavior
- Anytime you experience a significant amount of pain or pleasure either emotionally or physically, your brain immediately searches for a cause; links up to that association in your nerve system
- False connections: Evaluate any associations in our minds
- Overwrite our experiences and consciously decide what will mean pleasure and what will mean pain
- Anytime when you’re in a peak state whether be positive or negative, be careful what you focus on while in that state: Whatever you notice will be linked neurologically
- Begin to question your false neuro-associations
- Assume the power of change what you link pain and pleasure to
Begin to focus on the possibility of the price you’ll pay if you don’t take action and then it’ll change what you associate to that decision
Focus on the pain of inaction and on the pleasure of taking action now
All personal breakthroughs begin with the change in our beliefs
How do we change our beliefs?
- Get your brain to associate enough massive pain to your old belief
- Associate tremendous pleasure to the idea of adopting a new, empowering belief
Create doubt: the key to beginning to break up your old beliefs
Conviction is a belief that is reinforced by even more powerful references - Find or create a triggering event that pushes over the edge and make it a conviction
- Take action: Each action that you take strengthens your commitment and raises the level of your emotional intensity and conviction
- Take 5 minutes on a piece of paper and brainstorm every belief that you can think of that empowers you
Take equal amount of time and wrist down all the disempowering beliefs that you can think of that have limited you in your past - Circle the three most empowering beliefs; “How does this belief really empower me?” “How does it strengthen my life?”
Circle the two most limiting beliefs; look at their consequences; feel the pain that comes with what they are cheating you out of; decide once and for all you’re no longer willing to pay the price that they are charging you for your life - Link these limiting beliefs to such intense pain that you want to rid yourself of them forever
- Write down the replacements: “What would I now have to believe instead that will empower you?” “What would I have to believe in order to succeed in this situation?” “Who’s already succeeding in this area and what they believe differently than I do?” “What’s necessary to believe in order to succeed in this situation?”
Expiring pain, feel challenged, frustrated & angry? “What would I have to believe in order to feel the way I do right now?”
NAC (Neuro-Associative Conditioning)
2 Shifts & Beliefs to Create Long-Term Change Quickly
- We can change right now: Getting ready to change takes time
- We’re responsible for our own change, not anyone else
6 Master Steps of Change
- Decide what you really want & what’s preventing you from having it now
Change the focus: Decide what you do want
Be specific
We link more pain to make the change than staying where you are - Get leverage on yourself
Associate massive pain to not changing now and massive pleasure with experience of changing right now
Changing is not a question of capability; it’s a question of motivation
Ask yourself pain-inducing questions: “What will this cost me if I don’t change?” “What will I miss out of my life if I don’t shift now?” “What’s already costing me mentally, emotionally, physically, financially, spiritually?”
Then, start using pleasure-associating questions: “If I do change, how would that make me feel about myself?’ “What kind of momentum I create if I change this in my life right now?” “How much happier will I be?” - Interrupt the limiting pattern
Think of some of the ways that you can interrupt your own limiting & disruptive patterns: action, word, silly laugh, and disgusting noise
Scramble the sensation that we link to our memory. Cf. Your boss yelling at you.
See that same situation in your mind that was bothering you so much. Picture it as if it’s a movie. Just watch it one time seeing everything that happened. Take that & turn it into a cartoon. Sit up in your chair with a big silly grin on your face and breathe deeply and run the image backwards as fast as you can. (Watch him swallow his words.) Run through the cartoon forward again in fast motion. Change the colors of the image so everybody’s face is rainbow color. Grow big Mickey Mouse ears on his head then big, long Pinocchio nose. Do this at least dozen times back and forth sideways, scrambling image in your mind, create some goofy music that go along with it. - Create a new, empowering alternative
- Condition the new pattern until it’s consistent
The simplest way to condition something is just to rehearse it
Rehearse your new alternative again and again with tremendous emotional intensity
Set yourself up with a schedule to reinforce your new behavior
Set up a series of short-term goals or milestones and as you reach each one immediately reward yourself - Test the new pattern for its ecology and effectiveness
1) Make sure your new belief fits into your core beliefs and values
2) Test these new strategies are firmly installed and working in concert
a) Make certain that the pain is fully associated with the old pattern
b) Notice and make certain that you’ve linked pleasure to the pattern
c) Make sure you have aligned the new pattern with your values, beliefs and rules
d) Make sure the benefits of the old pattern that’ve maintained
e) Make sure the change will be long-term and that your conditioning have been effective
Creation of Your Future, Your Magnificent Obsession
- All goal setting must immediately be followed by the development of a plan and with massive and consistent action toward its fulfillment.
- What stops some people is the unconscious fear of disappointment.
- Persistence: Change approaches as many times as necessary but won’t abandon your ultimate vision
4 areas
Personal Development Goals
- Write down everything that you like to achieve in your life that relate to your personal growth: things you like to learn, limitations that you want to overcome, ways you like to improve your body, your spirituality, your relationship goals (min. 5 minutes)
- Give yourself a timeline for each and every goal: When you want to achieve it by or within: 1 year, 3, 5, 20…
”Goals are dreams with a deadline.” - Choose your single most important one-year goal in this category
- Take 2 minutes now to wrist a paragraph about why you’re absolutely committed to achieving this goal within one year: Why is this compelling to you; what would you gain by achieving it; what would you miss out on if you don’t achieve it
Career, Business, Economical Goals
- How much you want to make in a year or in your lifetime; what career goals do you have; what are your investment goals; what are your money management goals; how much do you want to be able to spend on travel and adventure, on your kids’ education, on your own toys, what professional breakthroughs would you like to make; what kind of impact do you really want to have (min. 5 minutes)
- Give a timeline to every goal (1 minute)
Adventure (Toys) Goals
- What you like to build or create or purchase or find a sheer enjoyment for you (min. 5 minutes)
- Put a timeline on each one of these goals (1 minute)
- Pick the number 1 one-year goal
- Write a paragraph giving all the compelling, irresistible reasons why you want to achieve this goal within a year
Contribution Goals
- How you want to contribute (min. 5 minutes)
- Give each goal the timeline
- Select the top one year goal
- Write a paragraph why you’re absolutely committing to achieving this goal within the next year (2 minutes)
At least twice a day, rehearse and emotionally enjoy the experience of achieving each one of your most highly valued goals. Every time you do this, you need to create more emotional joy as you see, feel, and hear yourself living your dream.