Self Improvement: Believe And Achieve

How would you feel about the proposition that you can achieve anything – absolutely anything – that you believe in? Well, that’s what you’re actually doing at present – you’re living the life that you believe you’re meant to live. Psychology explains that we perceive only what we expect to perceive and experience only what we expect to experience. Unfortunately, because of our socialisation into a normal world and upbringing by normal parents, our expectations are normal and these normal expectations are simply no way near of where we could set our sights.

Psychology also tells us that our lives are dictated by our subconscious mind’s view of the world. We learn our ideas of how the world works, who we are, what our strengths and weaknesses, our own self image during our childhood years. Our perceptions, which over time gradually become deeply held beliefs are stored in the deep recesses of our subconscious and, in as adults, when faced with a situation where we have to act, our actions will be governed not be what is actually happening but by what we think is happening, based on our subconscious beliefs. In this way, normal people are cannot see opportunity when it stares them in the eye, because it’s not something that they are expecting.

The result of all this is that our subconscious perceptions, learned during our formative years, end up becoming our beliefs. These create our expectations and our behaviour and, as a result, our beliefs create our lives. Basically, you achieve what you believe. In fact, we live down to our expectations.

New beliefs are what’s needed – you’ve got to believe that you can achieve the things that your heart desires. You have to be able to make a big enough impression on your subconscious mind to ensure that it can focus on what you want to achieve to the extent that it believes that it is part and parcel of and a logical step up from your current life. Believing is not wishing hoping and wanting, believing is seeing, feeling, hearing smelling and tasting. Your only interface with the outside world is your five senses. They are what you used to develop your views of yourself and life in general during your early years. As adults, we pay little attention to those senses, preferring to use what we learned during our childhood to make sense of today – and, in the process, make nonsense of it!

You must explain to your subconscious mind what it would be like to achieve your goal. It has to see it, feel it, hear it, smell it and taste it as if you already have it. You can make a life-changing impression on your subconscious mind by handwriting the experience of the outcome, as if you’re there already, using all five senses, writing in the present tense. But – and this is a ’health warning’ – be careful what you wish for, because a focused mind will set about bringing about what it believes to be the life that you live – don’t forget, that’s what its’ doing already.

back! You might want to subscribe to my RSS feed to automatically receive all my blog updates. Thanks for visiting

Changing Your Life – To Be Different, You’ve Got To Be Brave

How many good ideas have you had that you just never did anything about? Have you ever noticed that some really successful people have achieved their success because they followed up on some really simple idea – the kind of thing that you say to yourself “I could have thought of that!”?

In fact, we all are inspired now and then – it’s just that normal people will laugh it off as some flight of fancy. And that’s what makes normal people normal – and the few that actually do something about their good ideas are abnormal – abnormally successful, exceptional people.

So, next time you catch yourself wishing that your life were different – and if recent surveys in relation to just how much people don’t like their jobs are anything to go by, wishing your life were different is a regular occurance – realize this: for your life to change, you have to take action yourself. It is you who’s got to do something a little different, a little brave and a little courageous. Not a lot – a little will suffice for starters.

However, you’ll say to yourself that you’re not the type who could set up a successful business or develop an innovative idea. You’ll say to yourself that you’re not the type who takes a risk – you’re not the kind of person that would ever appear on the front of Success Magazine. But it’s only this defective thinking inside your own head that’s keeping you off the front pages of big magazines. It’s simply the pathetic little voice inside your own head that’s blocking your way.

Is your life not bad enough for you to do something about it? Are you not uncomfortable enough to get up off your normal ass and start living instead of trudging along? Are you fearful that other people will sneer at your ideas or the idea of you being successful? Don’t waste your energy worrying what others are thinking about you – they’re not – they really don’t care.

It’s up to you to lead your life – otherwise you’re just going through the motions. It’s up to you to take action – otherwise you’ll lie on your deathbed wondering “what was that all about?” You’re the one who has to do something – and that something has to be done immediately. There’s no point in waiting for a miracle – you’ve got to get the ball rolling yourself.

So, today, do something different, do something brave – even if it’s only shaving with the hand with which you don’t habitually shave! Once you do even something insignificant differently, you’re setting your mind up to do many things differently. And until you do some things differently, nothing different will happen.

Self Improvement: You Could Be Fooling Yourself

With the exponential growth in sales of self help books and the proliferation of personal development websites, don’t you think that you would by now have witnessed an important change in human consciousness – a demonstrable improvement in the human condition? Not only is there little sign of improvement, all the evidence points to the opposite – increased levels of worry and anxiety as the economy nosedived having been hijacked by a small number of people obsessed with their own greed; an increase in violence and anti-social behaviour and the ongoing inappropriate behaviour of people who should know better on the international stage of so-called diplomacy and politics.

So, what are all those people who are indulging in self-help books doing? Actually, in the course of my work I meet or speak with quite a few of them and, undoubtedly, whilst some are taking major leaps forward in their lives, there are many who, as in every other facet of their lives, are going through the motions, hoodwinking themselves into thinking that their attitude, mental state, behaviour and lives are changing for the better.

It’s all too easy to pursue a course of personal development and slip into a routine not dissimilar to all your other routines – habitual, repetitive, automatic and ultimately mindless. The minute anything becomes routine, it becomes useless to you in creating a better life. And, so, I encounter many people who have convinced themselves that they are cultivating their mindfulness – but who have ended up doing something else mindlessly! I’ve met plenty of people who meditate, who tell me that they’ve never felt as calm and focused in their lives – but, if they were to stand back and take a look, they would find that their lives are disintegrating around them.

If you have started the journey of self improvement you should immediately see positive results in your everyday life. If you see no benefits, no tangible results in terms of both personal effectiveness and the downstream benefits in your professional, personal and financial life, you are conning yourself. And the longer you fool yourself the more dangerous it becomes – because you will begin to convince yourself that your life is changing for the better when, in fact, you are becoming further divorced from reality.

There are very useful and practical personal development resources out there – but they are tools that have you have to put to the appropriate use. They must be used during the minute to minute rough and tumble of your day – not just whilst you’re contorted in the lotus position at six o’clock in the morning! Mindfulness – and all that flows from it – is something that has to be practiced within the day – not in preparation for it. Until you bring what you’ve learned in your personal development courses and self-help books into the very moment to moment behaviour of your everyday life not only will things not improve, they’ll get worse.

Stressed Or Challenged? : Riding Life’s Big Waves

I recently received an invoice from my lawyer – for what exactly I’m not sure, as what he’d done for me didn’t really match the bill! He said he was sending out invoices to various clients to “keep the wolf from the door in these challenging times”.

These are, indeed, challenging times. We face unprecedented economic circumstances currently, we’re regularly faced with the ups and downs of normal everyday relationships and we are frequently confronted by the trials and tribulations of business and work. However the only real challenge we face is the challenge within. “How am I to react in the face of so much negative stuff coming at me?” as one client put it to me during a recent ‘phone conversation. “It’s damned difficult to stay focused in the midst of all that’s going on around me” said another. “How in God’s name am I meant to stay focused when my personal life is falling to pieces around me?” another client once asked.

These challenges are nothing more than life’s “big waves”. Life is like the Volvo Round-the-World yacht race. If you’re taking part, you know that there are going to be plenty of big waves so you prepare in advance and ensure that you’re adequately equipped to handle them. Consequently, you ride those big waves. So it is with life’s ups and downs. You know for a fact, because you see it everywhere, that life is full of these big waves. So, just like the yachtsman, you need to be prepared and ensure that you’re appropriately equipped to ride those waves. However, I’m not talking about being prepared in some vague sense – I’m not simply talking about being on your guard. I’m talking about practical personal development – about cultivating the kind of clarity of mind and mental focus that will enable you take real action in the face of what life throws at you – rather than crawling back into the normal shell of snap reactive behaviour that compounds the mess that we think we’re in.

And, bearing in mind that life is lived moment to moment, you’re going to have to be up to the task, moment to moment. That means that, before you set sail every morning, you need to focus your mind in the here and now – not focused on the day ahead, the day ahead will present itself one moment at a time. So, for example, whilst you’re drinking your breakfast coffee, that’s what you’re doing – inhaling the aroma, tasting the bitterness, feeling the heat of the cup in your hand, looking at the steam curl off the liquid’s surface, feeling the warm liquid run down your throat, listening to the sound as you swallow.

You need to turn yourself on each morning. Otherwise, you will have decided to participate in life’s yacht race in a rubber dinghy. If you get drowned, it’ll be your own fault.

Personal Growth: It’s Down To You

One of my friends recently offered one of his favourite self-help books to me – it was the latest in a growing list of recommended reading. In discussing it with him, I enquired as to how he was progressing putting into practice what he was learning from all his reading. It emerged from our conversation that, actually, he was a life-long student of living life to the full but was likely to never actually try it. He informed me that a mate of his had suggested to him that he “stop reading the bloody books and starting doing it!”

Bookshop shelves groan with personal development books. It’s big business – probably the fastest growing sector of the publishing market. Also, personal development websites abound – offering all kinds of inducements to buy their package which will change your life in five minutes!

But none of these books or programs will change your life. They may well point you in the right direction, provide you with an understanding that was missing your range of knowledge or experience or give you practical tips on how to get more out of life, change your life, transform yourself or whatever. No doubt, there is some very good stuff out there – and some innovative and practical personal development online help – but it will be no use to you until you put it into practice for yourself and keep putting it into practice.

It’s up to you to change your life. Only you can grasp control of the awesome inner power that is simply bursting for you to unleash it. The intriguing fact is that much of the advice provided by books and websites requires precious little work of you, requires that you only make very minor alterations to the way in which you use your mind. Unfortunatley though, having been in this business for over fourteen years, I have seen far too many people unwilling to take five minutes every day to make the other twenty three hours and fifty five minutes so much better.

And this leads me to the main point – one that I’ve already alluded to – you have to keep practicing what you learn. No book, program or package will change your life in five minutes. You won’t change your life in five minutes. But five minutes each and every day is an entirely different matter – if you take or make the time to ensure that your mind is up to speed each morning then your life is going to change beyond all recognition. Psychology proves in no uncertain terms that normal people perceive only what they expect to perceive and experience only what they expect to experience – that the normal life is dictated by the sadly blind normal mind. Open your mind every morning, change your expectations and your life will change. But, at the end of the day, it’s entirely up to you – no one else is going to do it for you.

Next Page »