15 ways to focus on your Mindset to motivate.

Throughout we reference Dave Evans book Leadership or Leadershit. This is an edited version and updated content of the eight faces within a leadership functionality we look at Face Three (Read Face one Authentic or Fake? Face Two Selfish or Selfless?). The original edition of the book Leadership or Leadershit stated:

“The mindset of an individual is a choice, similarly to that of behaviour”. 

 Throughout this adaptation of the book chapter, we will add updated neuroscience to this and ensure that we maintain the same focus, or will we have to change it? Also, we will explore a mindset a necessity without motivation. Does mindset motivate? How does a leader manage their mindset, and can they help others mindset? Can a leader motivate, or is that self-owned?

Your current mindset is a choice you made at a very early age and then continued to choose time and time again right up until this moment.  It's something that can be changed and altered by making new choices. To develop who you are as a leader, simply make good choices and when you are not choosing, ensure you ask yourself the right questions.

 The difference we know now from the latest neuroscience is that it’s not just mindset or motivation but also our culture, and environment that impact our choices and therefore, the outcomes. According to some, if you're poor, it’s because you didn’t try hard enough, or you just have inferior genes. Evidence from neuroscience shows that where poverty is concerned, it moulds the brain. People with tremendous mindsets and motivation can’t always find a way out of hardship and debt.

Modern neuroscience (the past 50 years) sees mindset as a choice-driven and aided through a predictable mind process, your previous experiences, albeit it through real or imagined, your social life, your culture, your environment, books you read, movies you watch, the people you associate with, your upbringing are all predictive opportunities that the brain creates (constructed emotion). Most neuroscience studies have focused on research related to cognitive functions, such as attention, memory and decision-making.

 Growth mindsets are the belief that intelligence can be nurtured through learning and effort.  The intrinsic (belonging and natural or innate) and extrinsic (requires some sort of external support) are needed to develop a positive mindset and motivation. There are scientific theories that motivation and mindset are natural, innate and nurtured (intrinsic) things we do -the fixed mindset- and that we can also apply extrinsically (outside), elements and manage our mindsets – growth mindsets. The link is that they are both interrelated, and thus our neural actions impact both and mindset and motivation need each other to be beneficial.

 A growth mindset can be both intrinsic and extrinsic, as both are needed to have a positive attitude and ability to self-manage. Many people who present a growth mindset -lifelong learners, open-mindedness, willing to change, “bouncebackability”, see failure as part of the growing and learning cycle, also do not see their intelligence or personality as fixed traits.

If we apply a fixed mindset (intrinsic only), we can be limited in self-belief, stop ourselves from pushing forward, be less persistent and not be consistent in adversity.

 We ask if you need both the necessity to understand that we have a fixed and growth mindset. As humans, we will not always be on the line of being the ultimate learner, applying, choosing, and continuously making the right choices. We falter, fail, miss, assume, apply bias and present more fixed elements than we like to believe, we are not great at self-awareness or impact on others, leadership is fraught with ego and hierarchy. Self-assess takes the combination of a fixed and growth mindset- ultimately, our mindset is one as is the brain. It requires all variables to function?

 The question is Mindset or Motivation?

Is one better than the other, the necessity of both or just one.? Applying the question to leadership and the ability to lead with or without these skills, qualities or knowledge for self or benefit others. If as a leader, we believe that it is our role to have the right mindset and also the ability to motivate, which is the most important and to the most influential?

Delving into mindset or motivation as IQ or EQ is also evocative within leadership as do we need both to be a great leader?

Is mindset an emotional response?

Neuroscience is rapidly changing; we now know we don’t just have brain areas allocated to one emotion (as previously thought- think the Phrenology heads of the 19th century). The brain doesn’t operate from having specific areas that drive our feelings, or particular spots that “own” emotions, mindset or motivation. We don’t have a left or right brain, our brain functions as a whole, with neurons (all 86 billion of them) having multi-functionality (degeneracy) and can be produced anywhere in the brain. Each thought is being constructed not pulled from a “filing system of memory”.

To broaden our approach to making choices, we have to cultivate a mindset of variation. From philosopher William James recommendation of consciousness connecting to fluidly to mindset, attitude and behaviours and Carol Dweck’s work on Fixed and growth Mindset, or even consider embracing a populations mindset which is that we are all made a variant of the same species (Darwen)

 We can look at motivation and mindset as interrelated. As an individual, you need to have a thought process that is not about emotional responses pushing us back to choice as the action.

  Should a leader motivate others, and if so, how?

 Motivation makes money, many well-meaning personal development gurus who assume this motivation difficulty has to be made complex to add unseen cosmic value. Profiling to motivate can also lead to ambiguity, complexity and also drive poor behaviours through narrowing and removing individual motivation?! Indeed, not the point. Consider this why would there be any need to personality profile a team of 22 people to work out how to motivate them? Then separate them into four personality types to prove the need for four types of motivation style that would all need to happy simultaneously. As a leader, you have to remember what everyone’s profile is, responded differently to each one, and changed your motivation and mindset in the process. Is your head already spinning? The complex not needed, and neither are personality profiles.

 Profiling is also ambiguous as we don’t as humans have a great skill of self-assessment and therefore (and more than likely more in the workplace) think agendas are in play, corporate politics and people respond to “fit” what you think you should be and not what you are therefore no real outcome is achieved.

 In our opinion, Leadershit is relying on personal profiling to make decisions about your people, your business and worst of all clients. It’s a commercial money-making machine that creates poor mindsets, behaviours, attitudes and responses.  Respondents conform with a need to and fit when required. It doesn’t take into account the moment of completion, the personal situations, the current, previous and future impacts and agendas of why they are being done, the outcome being changing motivations and mindsets in the process.

 Motivating others can be a horrendously difficult task to achieve. The reality is motivation is simple when you understand and learn to connect to others.

 Motivate through relationship, not profiling

A simple way is to use PSMs - Personal Success Motivators. A PSM is a Personal Success Motivator and is one of the most straightforward leadership tools on offer and is not used sufficiently enough by leaders. When you are delegating, supporting team members, helping people defend themselves, or motivating teams to work well together to achieve goals and objectives, they will have superficial things to encourage them.  As a leader, understanding what their primary PSM is and then drilling down to a list of smaller ones, you will have discovered that you can use transparency as a powerful motivational tool. Being a great leader has a few skills.

• Listening

• Great questions

• Timely responses

 A PSM can simply be a list; the main objective here is to get the person’s PSMs identified for their benefit and yours.

 The 4 Best Questions to Identify Personal Success Motivators

• What do you want?

• Why do you want it?

• When do you want it?

• Would you like to work out how to get it?

 A person’s mindset is something that you have to be curious about, explore, investigate and question. Everyone has misled their statements about who they claim to be or what achievements they have attained.  A mindset will present throughout a person’s life story, but it can evolve and become more defined, though it does not remain perfect.

• What is the mindset you are looking for, for yourself?

• Have you ever sat down and defined it in detail?

You can become someone special who doesn't require a fabulous sheet of biodata to impress the world because the world is intuitively impressed by you as a person.

 Remember that it starts with you. Impress yourself before you have any hope of impressing anyone else.

The Mind Connection of mindset

We come back to the fabulousness of neuroscience and its use and boost leadership, personal knowledge, skill, and self-manage our mindset to motivate ourselves first to benefit others.

 Many people have made understanding the mind simpler than ever before.  Deepak Chopra's work and the research of neuroscience over the last ten years have broken many set ways of thinking that we have subscribed to for many years and in turn, it has advanced other breakthroughs we are just discovering take for granted right now.

 We want to look at the importance your mindset has on the day to day of leadership, life and your very existence on this planet are all impacted by your brain's behaviour.  The one clear thing is that we affect ourselves more than anything else by the way we control, choose and decide how we are in any situation.

Neurology and how our brain works

As we described before, we have been educated that “old” understanding of our brains was traditionally left and right, logic and creativity, spots for emotions and feelings.

We know that’s not true, through detailed brain scanning and meta-studies the brain functions as one. Still, we get consultants using old science and attempt to help people be more effective by isolating them and teaching them differently. Logic and Creative have for decades, been trained as an opponent as an idea.  One side of your brain, the left is highly analytical and logical, and the other is creative, the emotional side of a human is seen to exist there. Traditionally they are coached as separate areas.

 There are countless examples of how we can use this information to be better in sales, account management, presenting, storytelling and much more.  Yet the facts are changing.  It was considered one side versus the other in the past, and it is now regarded as different.  The latest research states that the difference is less significant; it is now proven to link the whole brain to an experience. It is taking a logical perspective and connecting it to a creative or even emotional one.

 Think about this for a moment. Think about all the people you have seen become obsessed about causes or challenges in day-to-day life.  The people who give as much time to causes as they do hours and commitment to their job.  Whether that is a children's sports team, a church job, a charity or any other initiative, why do people do this? 

 The answer is simple, and it is the connecting of the left-brain stimulus to the right brain stimulus. We are putting the feeling or emotion of desire with logic, using the whole brain.  The results are usually astonishing.  Our brain has a definitive effect on us, in all that we do. 

 Every day, all around the world, people get ready for or go through their day with little mental preparation around what they are going to do that day. A lack of how they will get through it, what are the actual thoughts in their heads saying to them. Even worse, avoiding the vital questions that we can ask everyday lead to a fulfilling existence.

 Maximising the brain is a vital part of leadership, it is something that, when it is made a priority, produces staggering results.  If you have ever heard someone say to you or about someone else, the following sentences:

• ‘I wish my life was better.’

• ‘Why can't we just…’

• ‘If only they would…’

• ‘The company always does this.’

• ‘I have never been able to do that.’

• ‘That never happens to me.’

• ‘I’m always the last to know.’

These statements have an element of truth in them t, yet I want to ask you to focus on one small thing. 

• Are they useful to you? 

•  Do thoughts like this contribute anything to your future needs, wants or desires? 

• Does the negative chitter chatter you have about your life, your story, or lack of story, your family, your place of origin, your work career or job, your prospects, your relationships, your relationship or absence of one, your friends, your outlook on your future, your processing of the past and much more - does it help or just get you down?

 Some things affect us in life-changing ways for the good, and the bad, everyday noise people allow to affect them.

• The News

• Tabloids and magazines

• Online media

• Government controlled broadcasters in the west

• ·Political division

• Social unrest

• The weather

• ‘First world problems.’

• A lack of perspective

 All of this affects your brain, and it is being programmed by the very sound, because it is something you are allowing your brain to connect up, unassisted, left with no governance over whether it is good for you or not. Social media contributes to the human mind, such as self-esteem, personal confidence and identity, and our online perception like never before, replacing the importance of two critical things.

 The internal thought-life, outlook, persona, who they are and what they decide to stand for. Our brain is an instrument that is so intelligent and clever; it needs guarding and looking after because it is capable of so much, and our very own self-esteem is decided by what it thinks.

 If you are someone who goes through your day, week, month, year and life taking no care of your thoughts, feelings, personal esteem, confidence, ambition, self-belief and the like. STOP, STOP NOW.

 People say that when you write in capitals, it is like someone shouting. I am!

You are the sum of your thoughts.

 Our thoughts take place now at this moment.  The moment you take control of

• What your brain is predicting for you,

• The moment you take to control your thoughts,

• You decide to determine the way your brain is processing the world around you,

• It is the moment the future you have always dreamed about has a chance of coming into existence.

 Our thoughts determine so much and allow us to be, what we could be in this chapter we are going to look at the brain and how we can impact it every day. We are going to explore the importance of leadership today. 

 Let me be clear, in leadership, if you are not taking care of your mindset management, how on earth can you

a) teach it to someone else

b) expect someone to believe you

c) being anywhere near being your best at any point in your future. 

 Lack of brain preparation is a symptom of Leadersh*!% attraction.

 Let’s apply this straight to the subject of this book, Leadership. 

 Take a moment to pause; what is your Leadership? 

Stop right now and write down the sentence that captures who you are?

• Does it inspire you?

• What type of Leader are you?

• What are you good at? 

• What are your strengths? 

• What is your leadership PSM? 

• How much better do you want to become?

• If you were leaving your company or firm right now, what would people say about you? 

• What would you want to hear them say?

If you have never thought about this before, writing this down alone can be so useful.  And be that person now.

 Often in workshops, we will take a leadership team and ask one person at a time to leave the room.  The person leaving the room has to write their eulogy as if they had just passed on.  The team remaining will do the same thing and write a eulogy as if one went to the funeral or celebration service.

 Both parties would come back to the room, and the person who had left would share theirs before the group goes second.  We then look at the two stories and examples and explore the gap.  There is almost always one, even in a long-time established team. 

 Leadership needs definition, and it requires commitment from you, the person who is leading to determine up-front what you are like, who you are and every day.

 It is something you have to learn over time to prepare.

To understand your leadership sequence. 

Your daily routine. 

It takes practice

It takes courage

It takes commitment. 

 Left undecided, you will have a team disconnected from your business's cause, and you will almost definitely be experiencing deep frustration with the way your people are every day.

 At RLC, we talk about the stage before motivation- mindset and the mind connection before we get to motivation.  Many years ago, I was running a two-day leadership event with a team responsible for a whole company in the field of medicine. Halfway through the first day, the managing director, stopped and said something quite remarkable. 

 He said, “Sometimes I just don’t know the answer or what to do”.

 An awkward silence consumed the room, one mixed of relief because of the MD's openness and honesty and curious energy that was clear around was it okay to feel like this or not. 

 We all know that it is perfectly okay to call out how you may or may not be feeling.  A moment where you can declare how you think, what is going on, and clarify any uncertainty you may or may not have.  Yet in this case, a leader was brave enough just to be candid.  The team he led, appreciated it.  As a facilitator, I acknowledged his statement, and he then shared another direct issue in the world of leadership.  He said –  

“Sometimes I simply share some of my thoughts, working things out, inviting people to experience the moments and decisions I have to face, then in a flash, a week later, the subject was taken as an agreement, and things start happening in the business.”

 One of the truths being displayed here is that sometimes, leaders can be unsure, yet there is an expectation for leaders to be confident, strong, clear, intelligent, and the whole time they are in the spotlight.  This truth leads us to another leadership area that is also an equal size myth, and we are not allowed to be low or demotivated either.  You may even find yourself reading this, thinking, surely not, yet contrast it to people you know, clients you serve and companies you have been part of.

 As a leader, business owner, coach, parent and friend, set of complex roles and responsibilities that I share like many others in my home, in my community, in my business, with our clients.  There are times when you simply don’t feel like it. We all know that it is perfectly okay to call out how you may or may not be feeling. 

 Consider in your life when you confront the pure opposite of the desired motivated state of mind.  The moment when you know you should be motivated, you should be fired up with the energy needed, you should be focused, you know all the answers, you know all the techniques, you know all the answers, the knowledge, you even have a track record of being good at it.  Yet, at that moment, you don’t feel like it. Do you address it? Deal with it? Discuss it?

Managing your mindset

To manage our mindset, there are three areas in particular to look at- mind, body, and spirit.  They are areas of our very human nature that take time to form and are influenced by many events in your life.  We can look at each individual:

 Managing Your Mind for Mindset

The human mind is made up of three areas:

Conscious Mind

Unconscious Mind

A simple way to explain this part of the brain is to consider different states firstly this can be medically induced.  Through the wonders of anaesthetics, we can complete and conduct safely many medical operations, often leading to life-changing or lifesaving events.  The second form can be caused by alcohol or drug abuse, where the aggregate of the amount consumed leaves you in what is known as a paralytic state.  Your body shuts down, and your brain goes into protection mode, your lights go out.

The unconscious constantly communicates with the conscious mind via our subconscious. It provides us with the meaning to all our interactions with the world, filtered through your beliefs and habits. It communicates through feelings, emotions, imagination, sensations, and dreams.

Subconscious Mind

This is the brain part that deals with many vital things that happen by themselves governed by the brain.  It happens without any conscious command, not deliberate thought and will run by itself regardless of whether you interact with it or not.  The subconscious mind is like a television broadcaster, and it has a range of programs that run every day, seven days a week, the programs run whether you choose to watch the channels or not.  Your brain here is the same.  Unless we set the broadcast to media, we want to run, it will run by itself and will create all kinds of beliefs, strategies, identities, abilities all by itself.  The conditions around you become the sum of you, other people’s words or opinions and much more.



Five ways to manage your mind

1.     Be factual. If you can answer the question, is this true? Before you respond. You can actively manage your mindset with facts and not predicted emotional responses.

2.     Use a filter technique (In NLP this is a Meta-Model) Am I distorting this? Am I deleting some information? Am I generalising this?

3.     Distract your thoughts through being specific (4MAT technique), Asking why am I thinking this? What has triggered this? How can I think differently? What if I apply myself to act/think positively?

4.     Use MindChangers® See the action challenge at the end of this post

5.     Use words to reset your language- having the emotional granularity and the ability to describe I details (even your own made-up words to express a feeling) boost your ability to reset. So be as descriptive as possible, use the emotions wheel,(references) to support you to build a new vocabulary.

If we manage our mind choices through thought, through awareness of where the thought, belief, and emotional response are being created, we can then actively nurture and choose the mindset we want.

 Managing Your Body for Mindset

When we look at how we physically respond, our awareness of self, our body and our physical responses directly impact our mindset  

 Many years ago, in one role in my career, I truly hated with a passion.  For the spirit of confidentiality, I will not talk about the brand concerned.  Yet the experience was one of the most challenging things I have ever had to do.  In a forty-hour week, I spent up to twenty hours of my own time, getting ready to be in the arena with the people I led, to inspire them into what is possible despite hating the job.  It took so much emotional energy, so much physical power, so much focus.  Despite the travel and the challenges, I learned :

When you are in a low place, stay out of the shop window

Many of us may not have the luxury of being literal with this rule.  If you are in sales leadership, managing a team remotely, in an open office environment, this could be useful.  The principle is simple if you are in a wrong place in your mind, and it is going to take more than a mindset to change to re-energise, step out of the arena you are in.

Five ways to manage your body mindset

1.     Breathe and concentrate on the breath. The brain and body need oxygen to function, sit up, open up our diaphragm—breath through your nose. Breathe in for 4, hold for 7, breathe out for 4. Repeat.

2.     Create a Gravitas stance, centre yourself, earth yourself. This core stance is a power stance and can reset your body mindset quickly. Reset yourself, stand up, firmly plant your feet, pull in your core, straighten your back, roll back your shoulders, feel your body naturally reset and strengthen.

3.     Move instantly. Move around, and best of all, go outside. This reconnection to a different environment will reset your body mindset quickly.

4.     Dance or listen to music- connecting to one of our senses (plus movement) is a boost to the body mindset and allows you to

5.     Have a photograph on your desk or working space that allows you to connect to another (even location) this is shared “body budget” ** and reconnects you to a positive mindset. Sit with it, look at it, allow yourself to be the picture. Reset.

Managing Your Spirit for Mindset

This is not exactly science, as the spirit is your definition or connection to self. For some, this may be religion, a god or deity. For others, this may be mediation, connecting from within. In this instance, we focus on the latter. Our Spirit mindset drives our wellbeing, and we can be very easily distracted from being aware of how damaging it can be if we don’t work on it.

Five ways to manage your spirit mindset

1.     Stillness Practice Allow your thoughts to flow, without connecting or answering them. Stillness is a practice (Check out Dollar Dream Club which is a program to teach the practice)

2.     Find a place or opportunity to go somewhere quiet. Create a moment of peace, is essential, quiet is positive for the spirit as it connects to calm. This may be a bathroom, a cupboard or a private space.

3.     Apply affirmations from the Master Key, repeat this as a mantra to reset your spirit mindset. I am strong, powerful, whole, perfect, loving, harmonious, happy.

4.     Create a mental anchor to a time when you felt at your calmest or use a MindChangers® to reset (see the end of the post)

5.     Write, the catharsis of writing is externalising, bringing something from within out. This is great for spirit reset, and it’s the act of also doing that boost the reset. This isn’t about writing for others. Solely for your purpose of resetting your mindset, it may not even make sense. Journaling has a history of therapeutic self-care. The outcome is to write not for others, the third person, just for you. Use Phone notes, voice message, type, hand scribe whatever works for you.

Motivation after Mastering Mindset

You understand now that we can fully manage our mindset from mind to body and spirit (within). You can progress into developing our skill in motivation, and that starts with self-first too. A great way to do this is to test yourself. This test is a way to learn about yourself through your lens and not of others. Another considerable element of a positive mindset is knowing yourself first.

Moments of Truth Test

 This test helps with setting motivation and focus in the months and years ahead., 

Who wants to be Happier?

Who wants to be Healthier?

Who wants to be Wealthier?

We all have some level of expectation for each of the areas.  Learning to set goals for each of them is a crucial step in the process.  Looking at ways to address them as part of a well thought out goal-setting process that you use each year alongside the drive to be a better version of yourself is a critical phase of motivation.  These questions are a direct reflection of where you are right now, as a moment of self-truth.

For each listed element, you mark a Y for yes and an N for no.

For each item, you marked with Y answer the following questions.

What specifically makes you happy about each area? Why does it make you happy?

HAPPIER

Do you know what makes you happy?

What makes you happy in the following list?

For each essential item, you mark a Y for yes and an N for no.

For each item, you marked with Y answer the following questions.

What specifically makes you happy about each area?

There was a story I heard once about an elderly lady who was running a shop in one of the NYC Boroughs, and her grandchild would come and help every Sunday.  In the cold months, she would complain about the cold, the lack of heating.  The old lady would council the grandchild with the following message: “There are hundreds of people in the cemetery who would love to feel the cold, it is a privilege of being alive”. The principle here is what makes you happy at a base level. Is being alive better than daily criticising your weight or your look?

HEALTHIER:

Are you happy with your all-round health right now?

Here we are going to look at the reality of your health.

 What is being happy with your health mean? 

Describe what makes you content with your health right now?

 For each essential item, you mark a Y for yes and a N for no.

For each item, you marked with Y answer the following questions.

What specifically makes you happy about each area?

Do you have any problems in the following areas?

 WEALTHIER:

The condition of your finances today. The question we want you to think about here is again at a base level, what is it that will make you satisfied.  Think about the people around the world, less fortunate than you.  If you live in America, Britain or Europe, you exist in the top 5% of earning in the world.  Satisfaction starts at a base level.

 Wealth List

TOP WEALTH TIP Take 10% of any money that comes into your life, the first 10% of every penny earned and pay it into an account that you can never withdraw from.  It is a self-tax.  Imagine if you do this for ten years, twenty years and beyond. 

What could the effect be?  There is only one rule, and you pay in, you never take out.

This Moments of Truth exercise is all about stopping right now, taking a look at the picture of your world and deciding

First, what do you need to have in your life to make you happy and content, in a way you can manage your Mindset.  

That each night you can check-in with yourself before you go to sleep and know where you are on your life's journey. 

Secondly, it allows you to be clear about where you want to go in the future, and it stops you from being disappointed if you are not on track.

Analysis of MOT’s

Moments of Truth (MOT’s are personal, so no right or wrong, incorrect or correct it is relevant to your situation. You decide the outcome by examining your answers.

The best way to do the test is to complete it, quickly and without too much reflection, that first response is usually the most relevant. Then pause and come back to the answers after 24 hours.

Now from each question- ask do I need to take action now?

Can you write a specific goal/action for it?

Each night ask yourself – did I focus on happiness today (happy, health, wealth?)

Summary

Mindset and Motivation are a necessity as a leader. Managing your mindset comes first to us; Mindset creates Motivation.  If we use modern neuroscience, our brains and minds are the leaders of our predicted thoughts and emotions. Therefore, without managing our mindset, we wouldn’t be motivated to do anything anyway.

As a leader, your priority is to manage your mindset first, your ability to represent what you do, using honesty and openness, to identify when you do and don't know. All Mindset work starts with self and allows us to develop and enhance our self-awareness, connect, and communicate better. Real leadership is managing your mindset to create motivation for you and others.

Want o make an impact on managing your mindset- take this 30-day challenge

ACTION CHALLENGE

My real purpose is to support you be the outstanding leader you were born to be, answer this: If you are currently looking for a healthier mindset to take you further in your career/business/life, would you be prepared to do a task for the next 30 days? (Just choose two).

The chances are that you have to this point, never heard of MindChangers®, and even if you are aware of the techniques, never done them day by day for a minimum period. Because I know this challenge will bring positive change to you, I guarantee success if you guarantee commitment and application.

 Choose your MindChangers® and do for the next 30 days.

Tools and techniques to manage your mindset MindChangers®

 MindChangers does precisely what its name says, changes your mind. These have been created by, enhanced and updated and can be found in most of our programs. We coach these in detail in our FireStarter Business NLP Practitioner course, and our Dollar Dream Club program also shares how to manifest over 26 weeks. The importance is that we must focus on Mindset to become the best version of a leader we can be.

 MindChangers came from us working with many leaders who did have the skill or understanding to manage and build their mindset. Yet it goes further back than that An American called Earl Nightingale was born in 1921, a radio speaker and one of the world's early developers of the 'science' of personal development. He was also the author of The Strangest Secret, one of the best personal development books of all time. His inspiration came from Think and Grow Rich by Napoleon Hill, born in 1883. Hill's book is ranked amongst the top self-help books of all time, published in 1937, and is still a best-seller today. Yet the challenge with the wealth of all this good material was the lack of how to.  These books that seemed to offer lots of exciting inspiration and the chance for you to unlock life's success secrets were devoid of the tools in how exactly to achieve it. Since the early 1990s, 'The Law of Attraction' that was so prominent in these early books were made into The Secret - a video researched and created by self-help movie by TV producer Rhonda Byrne. This was another excellent offering explaining how what we think can manifest in reality - but once more, I was disappointed by not enough 'how to'.

 MindChangers is based on several authors' tools over fifty years that are all about the how-to and include the very best techniques that are easy to perform by anyone, anywhere at any time. The other thing worth noting is that they work! I know, as they've worked for me many times over.

 We will share the following MindChangers®, and you can listen to them on the audio.

• The Cards

• The Star

• The Squeegee

• The Image Diary

Before you dive into MindChangers® a little note on goal writing, MindChangers® is something that will change your beliefs, paradigms, and barriers to success - in short - what your mind needs to change in its thinking to attain desired results and longed-for outcomes. The reason most goals fail to succeed is that all are created as thinking in the future

When you tell your subconscious mind about something in the future, it will work purely in the future, and of course, the future never arrives in this context.

When you work in the present or the past telling your subconscious mind that the goal has already been achieved - it has to allow you to make this a reality if only to make sense of the command.

 You can struggle writing goals that motivate you and balance your Mindset too. Here are a few tips to get you started:

 Ask yourself:

·      What things do I often daydream about and strongly desire?

·      What goals would I choose if I knew I could not fail to achieve them?

·      What goals have I given up on because I believe they are impossible?

·      Complete the MOT test

·      Write your goals in the present or past (as if they have been completed)

MindChangers®

The Cards (Audio Listen)

1.     First, have a set of index cards, preferably in different colours.

2.     You can colour code your goals so that blue cards indicating business, yellow cards suggest personal and so on.

3.     On the card, write a present positive or past positive statement.

4.     Max of 15 cards on career or business

5.     Max of 15 personal goals

6.     Shuffle the cards and read all 30 once a day.

Writing your goals is essential to the success of this MindChangers®. Examples of writing Goals

 Why there is a negative statement tucked in at the end of the advanced MindChangers®, the fact is that we, as humans, are used to allowing negative chatter to ruin our goals. You think: "I need to cut the grass today". It replies: "It's been a bit damp this week, best leave it for next week."

So, if you add a minor negative at the start, the subconscious feasts itself on the negative, while allowing the statement that you ARE in Australia to filter through unchallenged. Just don't make the negative too bad. Recently I read someone's card MindChangers® about a holiday: "We loved skiing in Switzerland at this extraordinary resort. It was brilliant. Shame about the accident on the slope".

If you don’t want the analogue version of cards, you create a PowerPoint/ Video version with music. You can have many more than 30 screens because you can set them to flash rapidly. Adding music is a massive boost to the MindChangers®

The Star

Simple idea here

1.     Have a goal be very specific and clear about what it is (remember the goal writing)

2.     Add a sticky star in about six locations that you regularly see like the bathroom mirror, rear-view mirror in the car, fridge, briefcase or handbag, mobile phone etc.

3.     Now link this star with a strong visual picture of your goal.

Then leave your subconscious to do the rest.

Overtime consciously or subconsciously you 'see' the star you will get a strong mental link or reminder of your goal.

The idea is to open the brain's attention system called the Reticular Activation System (RAS). It's that part of the brain that makes you pay attention to something. Buy a new white VW car, and you'll start seeing the same model and colour car - everywhere!

The Squeegee (Audio Listen)

This MindChangers® I created myself. I was in a car wash and imagined how it would be if the windscreen of your mind were like a car windscreen.

·      I then imagined all the dirt on the windscreen being the negatives I wanted to remove from my thinking.

·      Stuff going on, which was a barrier to my success.

·      I then imagined getting a squeegee and started cleaning this unrequired material from the glass's surface or my mind's platform.

·      Just do it for a week and see the difference it makes.

The Image Diary (Audio Listen)

If you are visual, this is a fabulous one.

Buy yourself a quality scrapbook and add magazine and brochure pictures of people, places, things you want in your life - in glorious colour.

Then start leafing through the pages once a week.

Some people cut out pictures and put them up on their fridge - same principle.

But when you do this with high intent and buy a quality book to stick the images into, you are telling your subconscious this is important to you at the same time.

Enhancing the techniques.

All MindChangers® techniques are excellent and produce amazing results, if you want to enhance your results or have previous experience in Mind, state management and control, have done NLP etc. then use these enhancements.

Power Burst Visualisation (Go to Dollar Dream Club)

·      SEE IT IN YOUR HEAD

·      START TO BELIEVE IN IT

·      GET TO KNOW IT AS REAL

·      MANIFEST IT EFFORTLESSLY

There are two states of your mind to consider for a moment with this MindChangers®.

1 - The Normal Waking State we all take for granted

2 - The Impressionable State we forget we have and can activate at any time

The more often we can activate and experience state 2, the more subconscious power we unleash to apply to creating desired outcomes by manifesting them.

Imagine that you are sitting in a plane and listening to a powerful piece of music that delivers satisfying energy that stimulates and allows your mind to be immersed - bathed if you like - in a harmonious bath.

Now imagine yourself as a ball of energy seamless and with no creative limitations.  Notice that it will create waves or currents that emotionally impact you as you add images of the future you want to be in the here and now.

One of the most potent transformations this process can produce, if you allow it to do so, is to move you from merely wanting to believe in it, to a place of knowing that this is happening right now.  It’s the stuff of dreams when in the dream we believe one hundred percent that what you are experiencing is real and not imagined. The part that shatters a positive and desired dream is putting the technology into reverse on waking and knowing it was only a dream - something you set aside as fantasy.

The world around us leaves so many clues. Yet, we get caught up in life, the challenges of day-to-day struggle, and we forget to develop inner subconsciousness stimulation that allows us to choose the story of the rest of your lives—allowing us to make it happen as opposed to life happening us.

This MindChangers® technique is designed to take you from where you are right now into a more resourceful state and place that will develop your ability to know rather than just believe.

Instant Activation

First, choose a piece of energising and deeply emotional music.

 The music you need is something that expresses energy, force and power, yet harmony simultaneously finds the track, link it and use it.

 Note: if you’ve achieved something similar think about that experience, time, era and any relevant music. If this is a new goal never experienced consider the music, it has to connect to you, “move you” create that impressionable state.

The music choice enables a more profound expression of thinking using neural pathways, which harnesses mental energy that runs directly from conscious to the subconscious with ease. Over many years, many people have taken significant steps towards major dreams and ambitions, taking the time and investing thousands of dollars to pursue what is humanly possible.  But there is a more straightforward yet highly radical way that transforms thought to thing quickly. Significantly the more often you activate it.

• Choose a powerful and dynamic piece of music.

• Make sure it’s rich in ambience and has personal connectivity to you for whatever positive reason.

• Second, be sure of choosing what you have always dreamed of doing in your life, relationships, goals, ambitions, and future states of being.

• Consider using a pair of headphones that were noise reducing and will lock you in.

• As the music plays, let yourself drift into a daydreaming state and see the future as if you are in the present, in the sense of knowing.

The key to this technique is to use the music, locked in your ears, conducting a deep visualisation, seeing yourself in the picture, succeeding with whatever your goal or dream is, over and over again. Continue this technique repeatedly, take time to ‘anchor’ the moment and experience with a physical gesture. This will help you get into the state more quickly next time you ‘fire off’ this gesture.  (Like clicking your fingers for example).

After the music is complete, open your eyes and move towards the things you have seen in practical terms. If your goal is to write a novel, start writing Chapter 1. Do this daily for the next 30 days, every day in succession and realise what changes you can manifest that you have, up until now, found it challenging to create a reality.

Applying MindChangers®

Placemat / Desktop/ Mouse Mat

Choose a couple of these and just do them for 30 days. You don't have to buy into it or believe it will work - just do it! It is like going to the gym and doing exercises. You don't have to believe they will work - just go and see the difference 30 days later. This is a mental gym, and there's no joining fee or monthly subscription.

References and Notes

https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5836039/

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S1878929316302183

Barrett, L. F. (2015, September 1). Psychology is not in crisis. The New York Times. Retrieved from https://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/01/opinion/psychology-is-not-in-crisis.html

**Body Budget https://how-emotions-are-made.com/notes/Glossary#:~:text=view%20of%20emotion.-,Body%20budget,predict%20your%20future%20energy%20needs.Lisa Feldman Barratt

Darwin, C. (2013). On the origin of species. Retrieved from the Project Gutenberg website: http://www.gutenberg.org/files/1228/1228-h/1228-h.htm (Original work published 1859)

Gallistel, C. R. (2012). On the evils of group averaging: commentary on Nevin’s “Resistance to extinction and behavioural momentum.” Behavioural Processes, 90, 98–99.

James, W. (2007). The principles of psychology. New York: Dover. (Original work published 1890)

James, W. (2017).  Psychology: Briefer Course. Retrieved from the Project Gutenberg website: http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/55262 (Original work published 1892)

Mayr, E. (2004). What makes biology unique? Considerations on the autonomy of a scientific discipline: New York, NY: Cambridge University Press.

https://humansystems.co/emotionwheels/

Danziger, K. (1997). Naming the mind: How psychology found its language. London, England: SAGE.

Lewontin, R. (2000). The triple helix: Gene, organism and environment. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press

Capture the complexity of causation: Every action and every mental event emerges from a rich milieu consisting of a large number of weak, interacting influences.

Gravitas by Caroline Goyder