Train Your Brain For Success

by Roger Seip

  Rank ‘em.

  Last step here: Decide on what order they belong in. It's rare that you'll ever have to choose between your core values, but maybe not as rare as you might think. Here's an example:

  One of the things that has allowed my company, Freedom Personal Development, to flourish is that before we decided what we wanted to sell and how we wanted to sell it, we got extremely clear on our organization's core values. We literally locked ourselves in a room for three days straight and lobbied, argued and discussed until we came out with our original set of five core values: Integrity, Joy, Freedom, Excellence, and Profitability, in that order. The reason we needed to determine the ranking is that we knew we'd have decisions to make where any decision would cause us to favor one core value over another. Integrity versus profitability is common in any business, and ours is no exception. Would we have the opportunity to cut corners and maybe underdeliver sometimes to squeeze a little more profit out of a client or a workshop? Of course we would have those opportunities. Having a clear and published set of core values that guide our decisions gives us a standard of accountability that makes it very obvious which way to go. Having them ranked makes us much more likely to actually live out those values in the moment of truth.

  It works the same way in your life. In your moments of truth which way do you go? Sadly, when confronted with the realities of life many people end up going in a direction they really would not prefer. A survey was taken of parents about what they considered most important in their choice of breakfast foods for their kids—specifically, breakfast cereal. Overwhelmingly, the answer from the survey was “nutrition.” If you look at the top 10 selling breakfast cereals however, let's just say that you don't see the value of nutrition represented anywhere near as strongly as the survey answers should indicate. When confronted with reality, what people say versus what they do is important, and the two are often very different. My observation is that much of this stems from the fact that most people have never really thought through what's most important to them. They've never given themselves the compass that clearly identified, defined, and ordered core values provide. This saying versus doing discrepancy causes a tremendous amount of turbulence and commotion in your subconscious, which drains energy and undermines self-esteem to a degree that is difficult to overstate. Fortunately, much of this turbulence will be remedied if you'll simply walk through the exercise I've just described. Will it take some time? Yes. Is it worth it? Unquestionably.

  What Do I Do with the Results?

  The final step with your core values is to put your ranked definitions into one place, and then place them in one or more locations where you will be able to see them. Start off by getting them off your scratch paper and placing them here:

  Core Value #1: _____

  Definition:

  Core Value #2: _____

  Definition:

  Core Value #3: _____

  Definition:

  Core Value #4: _____

  Definition:

  Core Value #5: _____

  Definition:

  Core Value #6: _____

  Definition:

  Core Value #7: _____

  Definition:

  Once you've got them all together I strongly recommend making several copies and making them part of your daily life. I wanted to include my own personal document here for the sake of example. You shouldn't copy these (unless they really do work for you); I just thought it might be helpful for you to see a completed example that works really well. I was recently coaching a group of clients through this process of identifying, defining, and ranking their personal core values and realized that I hadn't mindfully done this for myself in several years. Core values can change as priorities and life situations change over a period of many years, so I re-did mine in 2011 and it came out like this:

  My Core Values

  Integrity

  Doing what's right and doing what's necessary, even when I don't feel like it and even when nobody is looking. Living with integrity requires discipline and breeds peace of mind.

  Joy

  Making the choice to be positive, enthusiastic, and upbeat with a humorous perspective, whether circumstances warrant it or not.

  Excellence

  Continuously improving the effectiveness of my performance, and by extension the quality of my life. Living a life of excellence is the key to being an inspiration.

  Abundance

  The knowing that there is way more of everything than we need, in every area of life. Focusing on abundance produces gratitude and makes me magnetically attractive.

  Freedom

  The capacity to exercise choice. The better steward I am of my freedom, the more my freedom grows, and the better life gets!

  This document lives on the desktop of my computer, and I review it daily during my Power Hour (you'll learn about it in the section on Aggressive Mental Care). I also have a printed copy that lives in my office, one in my car, and one in my Quarterly Goals notebook. I've seen people place copies on their refrigerator, on the ceiling above their bed, on a vision board as an anchor, and so on. There are innumerable places that would be appropriate to make your core values visible—you pick yours and let them saturate your vision and your mind. You'll notice yourself making different and better decisions. When you make decisions that don't honor your core values, you at least become aware of the discrepancy. This moves you to do it differently next time. Over time, you literally train your subconscious to favor the choices that embody your core values over those that don't. It's a profound change, and I encourage you to enjoy it.

  Reinforcement and Bonuses: This chapter has been Memory Optimized™ for your benefit. For your brief lesson and some great bonuses, visit www.planetfreedom.com/trainyourbrain with the access code in the About the Author section. Enjoy!

  Chapter 14

  The Basics of You Part 2: Purpose and Vision

  Be, Do, Have

  The most fundamental model of how we create results in our world is called Be, Do, Have. It means that the person you are—your character and your thinking—lays the foundation and gives the flavor to all the things you do. What you do then is the direct creator of your results: the have. This is the seed of a lot of well-known personal development quotes such as these:

  If you think you can or you think you can't—either way you're right. It's the thinking that makes it so.

  —Henry Ford

  What the mind of man can conceive and believe, it can achieve.

  —Napoleon Hill

  And numerous others. There are so many ways of understanding and learning from this model that it's probably an entire book unto itself. The primary lesson to get here is that the clearer and more aligned you are between your Be and your Do, the easier and more naturally you will Have the results you are looking for.

  A Structured Way of Answering the Other Big Question: What Do I Want to Do?

  Chapter 13 helped you address the big question, “What's my life all about?” If you took the time to walk through the exercise we did there, you really went a long way toward getting a handle on the Be component of Be, Do, Have. Well, guess what—If you don't translate your values into action, you miss out. You don't impact the world; you don't make your values live. You also don't get tangible results. It's not just Be… Have. It's Be, Do, Have. True, Napoleon Hill didn't write Act and Grow Rich, he wrote Think and Grow Rich, but if you've read that masterpiece you'll find that the entire work is infused with specific things to do. Action is ultimately what directly leads to every result in your life. It's been said that “if you do the right things the right way, and do them consistently for a long enough time, you will get results.” Be is the foundation of action, Have is a by-product of action; Do is where the rubber meets the road.

  At Freedom Personal Development we often find our coaching clients failing in the area of taking the right actions, in two ways.

  Acting Out of Context

  Our coaching clients never c
ome to us out of laziness. Most of our coaching clients are pretty successful to begin with, usually very goal-oriented and hard-working. And they've literally been working their brains out for years. They act, act, act, and the result is that they've achieved (in many cases achieved well), but they are exhausted. Can you relate?

  This happens because all that action is happening out of context. It's producing results, but the question of “Why am I doing this?” has never been answered. Again, it's such a big question that we try to avoid it altogether. But we can't avoid it entirely, because your brain wants to know why—it needs it. So what happens is that we get fleeting thoughts floating through our minds like:

  “Where is all of this going?”

  “What am I doing with my life?”

  “Is this really what I was meant to do?”

  “What's the point here?”

  If this is happening, even successful results can be somewhat unfulfilling. The other problem with massive action out of context is that it's really exhausting. More energy than we realize goes to those questions, and when they remain unresolved they exert a significant drain.

  No Action at All Due to Paralysis

  The other action related issue we see a lot is the issue of paralysis. When people don't have the answer to the why question, the brain's tendency is to not do anything at all. It goes back to the issue of the comfort zone—where you are hasn't killed you yet, so your brain will default to staying there, unless something moves or inspires it.

  This issue results not so much in exhaustion, but in feeling like you're stuck. You know you should be doing something, but you're just unable to get off the dime and move forward. Have you ever felt this way?

  Killing Two Birds with One Stone

  Fortunately, both the exhaustion of acting out of context and the stuck-ness of being paralyzed can be alleviated by actually developing your own concise answer to the question, “What is the purpose of my life?” and then crystalizing that into your own long-range mental image of how that purpose plays out. That's what we're going to do with the rest of this chapter.

  This is a deceptively simple process—simple as in it's literally a fill-in-the blank exercise followed by one question, deceptive in that coming up with answers that really satisfy you may take a fair amount of time. It may also challenge your thinking a bit, so be prepared to focus here.

  Your Purpose Statement

  There are a lot of ways of asking and answering the question “What's my purpose?”. What our clients and I have found to be the most effective way for an individual to ask and answer it is what follows. To give credit where credit is due, I or we did not invent this question. In the late 1990s my friend Eric Plantenberg and I read a little-known book by Kevin McCarthy called The On-Purpose Business, which we learned later was actually a follow up to his book, The On-Purpose Person. The almost ridiculously simple exercise at the center of both books hit us both right between the eyes, and has revolutionized the thinking of tens of thousands since.

  If you want to figure out what you're here for, here's how to create a purpose statement. Just fill in the blanks of the following statement in the way that:

  a. makes sense to you.

  b. really inspires you.

  I exist to serve by _____ing _____.

  That's it—just fill in the blanks. There are just a few guidelines. The first blank gets filled in with a verb, an action word. The second blank gets filled in with a noun—a person, place, or thing (in this instance the “thing” would probably be an idea or a concept) or possibly an adjective—a descriptive word. Again, to be complete, your answer must

  a. Make sense to you.

  b. Really inspire you.

  Much like the core values exercise, no answer is better or worse than another, as long as they meet the criteria. My only other recommendation on your answers is that they should not depend on anyone else; your answers should be your answers regardless of what anyone else does. It's your own purpose statement and should be insulated. More on this concept in a bit.

  My Purpose Statement Story

  I will confess that when I first did this exercise I was blessed with a bit of a lightning bolt. It's entirely possible that may happen for you; in fact it may have already happened. Eric actually was reading The On-Purpose Business, and while we were out for a run he hit me with the fill-in-the-blank exercise. Cruising along, it only took a few seconds for me. The first answer that came into my mind felt perfect and has stayed with me for more than a decade. For me the answer was

  “I exist to serve by bringing joy.”

  That resonated with me, and the more I thought about it the more it made sense. The noun “joy” was already a core value for me and the definition was very clear in my mind. This is actually why we teach core values before purpose, as one of those is likely to be your noun. The verb “bringing” meant that it was my responsibility to just bring joy to every situation. Other people taking some joy was the desired result, but not necessary for me to be living my purpose. For me these thoughts came very quickly, and I feel lucky that they did. If that's happened for you, great! Take whatever came to you and write it down. Let it marinate for a little while, come back to it, and just let it sink in.

  Your Purpose Statement Story

  If you're like a lot of our clients, you didn't get hit with the lightning bolt as I did—no problem. You'll just need to consider your answers and wrestle with them until you come out with something that works for you. This is another area (much like discovering your core values) where a coach can be incredibly helpful. Our 12-week P.A.C.T (Personal Accountability Training and Coaching) program has the first third of it devoted to just working through the issues we're discussing in this section on “The Basics of You”—yes, that's four weeks. So don't be discouraged if you could use some outside perspective on this. Keep at it until you get the answers you need, and please get some guidance if you could use it.

  As an assist here, take a look at some examples that my clients have arrived at:

  “I exist to serve by creating growth.”

  “I exist to serve by teaching life's lessons.”

  “I exist to serve by being real.”

  “I exist to serve by expanding horizons.”

  All of these are actual purpose statements that my associates or clients have developed with a little help. Notice that they all fit the structure, and I can tell you from being there for the creation of these statements that they truly resonate with the individuals that created them. None is better or worse than another. We each have a unique aspect to our purpose, and your purpose statement should reflect you.

  The only precaution I'll give is that your purpose statement must not be dependent on circumstance. Also, it definitely must not be dependent on the behavior or thinking of anyone else. This is what I mean by “insulated.” I can “bring joy” everywhere all the time, no matter what. My client Ernie Curley can “teach life's lessons” everywhere all the time, no matter what. Eric Plantenberg could “be real” always and everywhere. Yes, the existence of the word “serve” in the statement implies that your purpose is to impact the world somehow, but it's key for your purpose statement that the participation of other people is not required. You must be insulated from that burden.

  I say this because I've seen purpose statements backfire when the approval or participation of others is required. I think of one individual who came up with “I exist to serve by inspiring others”. This sounded really cool and fit the structure, but do you see how this person was set up to fail? The problem with this particular statement is that if somebody happened to not be inspired by my friend, which could happen for an infinite number of reasons beyond her control, then she would be failing to live out her purpose. She would have been giving control of her life's purpose to people she didn't know, and that is dangerous for the spirit. You want to be able to live out your purpose statement in every possible situation, even when you are alone or when other people choose n
ot to participate.

  I strongly encourage you to take whatever time is necessary to craft your purpose statement before moving on. If your why is big enough, the how will take care of itself. Give yourself that foundation for action.

  Your Vision Statement

  We've talked about how your mind thinks in images. The fundamental way that your subconscious creates your results and your life is that it sees images and moves toward them. We discussed this earlier, when you learned about my friend Dave teaching his daughter how to ride her bike without training wheels. Remember? “Don't run into the telephone pole!” versus “Ride straight toward me!” produces a very different result.

  The importance of having a vision for your life is the final piece of the basics of you, and its value cannot be overstated. Without a clear vision for where you want your life to go, it becomes easy to spin your wheels or wander. In Alice in Wonderland, I love this dialogue between the Cheshire Cat and Alice, as she stops to ask him for directions:

  Cat: “Where would you like to go?”

  Alice: “I don't really know…”

  Cat: “In that case, any road will get you there.”

  The Bible puts it a little more directly: “Without vision, the people perish.” Get that fully—the people don't just “suffer” or “become uncomfortable”—they die. Aristotle was among the first to state that human beings are teleological, meaning that we are inherently designed to be working toward something. When we aren't, we start to stagnate and die. Without a clear vision for where we want to go, we literally drain our own life energy and we hasten our death, literally and figuratively.