Be prepared for something in this next post to challenge you or even irritate you. Pay attention to how you feel as you read because it may hit a nerve for you. It is best to consider why you are irritated at any point in reading this blog so that you can learn something about yourself. Ask yourself why you are irritated. If you experience any negative emotion when reading this blog, breathe into your stomach, observe your feelings and ask yourself why. This information is meant to challenge you and you have a choice about whether you will rise to the challenge or not.
At this point, you may want to consider how much you are actually applying your insights. You have read 18 blog posts so far, each one very dense with important principles and axioms. Some of these axioms are explicitly stated, while others are more implicit, needing to be discerned through active reflection. Learning this information occurs in two distinct and necessary realms: the academic part and the applied part. Reading these blogs and generating insights about the information is the academic portion of your training. While the academic realm is very important, it will do nothing for you until you actually apply your insights that you are really learning.
I have been telling you this all along. Why do you think I keep reminding you of this? Because it is easy to get lost in academia in order to avoid application. Most people need to be reminded. You will know you have reached an elevated state of growth and development in your life when I don’t need to remind you to apply your insights. I won’t need to remind you because you will have already developed the habit of reminding yourself. Great students take what they are learning and apply it. Great students learn to produce great results because they don’t need to be told such a simple and obvious truth. They do not read for intellectual stimulation alone. They read to gain practical insights they can apply right away. Do you want to be a great student? The choice is yours alone to make.
We learn so much more by doing. This, of course, does not invalidate thinking and reflecting. In fact, it is the thinking processes that should make up the majority of our focus. The key is to act this thinking out with words and physical movements all throughout the day. If you are really focusing on this information correctly you won’t be able to help but apply it. Reading about reframing is one thing. Finding a negative thought, reframing it and then acting from this new view is another thing altogether.
It is very easy for one to read with a goal of “finishing the book.” However, what takes something from you is to pause and reflect on the information from time to time, and then act. Without application, you are on track to become someone like the business professor at a university who has never created their own successful business. He can promulgate theories to anyone who will listen but he knows nothing of business in real life because he has never applied his theories so see if they work. Reading this blog and other academic trainings may have given you a lot of theoretical information but if you have not used this information to effect real change in the physical world, do your theories even matter? Without action, many of your ideas may even be wrong and you wouldn’t even know it.
Application is necessary. Remember that wisdom is a function of action. If you have no intention of applying this information to your real life, you may want to consider stopping here. Don’t read these posts anymore. What would be the point? Go read a fiction book. Play with your kids. Do something fun. This isn’t helping you if you aren’t actively generating insights on which you can act. Nothing in your life will change if you don’t apply this information. Be offended all you want but you know what I am saying is true… so why not embrace it? Become someone who applies what you learn. This information works but only if you work it. If these trainings really do resonate with you, you’ve got to take the next step.
Here are some actions to consider from the information in previous posts:
Notice where in your life you are “at effect” and begin to hold in your mind the point of view that you are “at cause” until you see new actions you can take.
Determine where, in your life, you are afraid of failing. Then choose to move forward in the face of your fears.
Actively spend time noticing your unconscious filters and create new filters that empower you.
Investigate your underlying motivations for acting by asking yourself “why?” over and over again while paying attention to how you feel.
Become aware of some of your negative thoughts, tell the truth to yourself about how you feel and then find the most empowering story you can tell that you actually believe.
If you are too close-minded about something and it is impacting you negatively, endeavor to open your mind. If you are too open-minded about something and it is impacting you negatively, endeavor to close your mind.
Sit down with pen and paper and ask yourself where you have been lying to yourself in your life. Begin to tell the truth to yourself by acknowledging these inauthenticities and confronting them.
Create an intention for your day, your week, your month, your year and pay attention to results over time.
Are you putting junk into your mind or body? Make a decision to make the change you know would make a difference.
These are just some examples of ways you could apply this training, but it is not an exhaustive list. Come up with your own insights about what you have read and think of a way you can apply it right now. Then apply your insight.
What are you waiting for?
Successful people don’t wait to get started. If you wait for all the lights to be green before you start driving you will never get anywhere. You must move forward. When you do, you will see the next step after that. If you start now, you will be so much further ahead tomorrow, next week, next month and a year from now. There is never a perfect time to start. You must break the ice. You must get the ball rolling. You must do something even if it is small. Success is just a thousand little choices made one at a time over time.
To become the person you really want to be, you will have to make acting on your insights a regular habit. Make the training contained in this blog real for yourself and your success will be just as real in your life. It won’t happen overnight. Success takes time. However, if you never get started, success is guaranteed never to happen at all. All successful people apply what they learn. Seminar junkies settle for the illusion of success. Reading this blog will give you tools but you have to use them. You don’t have to get it all done at once. In fact, you can’t get it all done at once. Yet, each time you apply your insights is a victory. Each new choice is a win that you can repeat again and again. You can do it but you have to consider the possibility that you are infinitely more capable than you think. You must invite the possibility into your mind that you can create so much more than you can even comprehend right now.
Let these words challenge you. Accept the challenge. Then, once you do, let it become a fun process. Make it a game. See how many times you can actively reflect on this information and then try it out. If you don’t like the way I am talking to you right now, take responsibility for your negative views and change them. You have enough information to do this. Get started now and this blog will become way more enjoyable for you. It will no longer be a reference book. It will transform into an instruction manual; one you can use to master yourself and become the best version of yourself. This game is never over so you might as well accept it and learn to play the game well.