Your Best You

Off Topic
61

[quote]Chushin wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]Chushin wrote:

Can you elaborate on the concrete steps to achieve reprogramming?

I have my own primitive and cumbersome way, and am looking for other methods.

BTW, thanks for reminding me about the importance of this stuff.[/quote]

My pleasure, Chushin!

Well, at its core, since everything we have and are today is the result of our programming, and since our programming is just the thoughts we think about ourselves and our environment every single day (that’s right, that means your past has no power over you that you don’t allow), Then it stands to reason that if we intend to achieve different results from what we have and are today, then we will need to think different thoughts about ourselves and our environment every single day.

I know you know this, but in case I’m not being clear, What I’m saying is our conscious thoughts about ourselves are messages to our subconscious mind. The subconscious mind has no capacity for judgment, right or wrong, good or bad. It’s just like a computer in that manner. What’s important to understand, though, is that the subconscious mind acts upon pictures and emotions, more than it does anything else. It also responds to verbal commands, but only positive ones. It does not understand the negative, only that which exists, so if you say, “I don’t want to be fat, I don’t be fat, I don’t want to be fat,” What are you doing is focusing on FAT, and that’s the result you’re going to end up with, because that’s the only thing that’s the only data it was given.

Data is the key. In this case, data means details, imagined as vividly as possible, using as many of the five sense as is possible. So, Let’s say I have a bodybuilding show three months from now. What I would do is I would take time out of every day to rest with my eyes closed and vividly, emotionally imagine walking onstage at 195lbs and 4% body fat. I Would feel the heat of the stage lights, I would feel the hardwood floor beneath my feet I would look at the crowd and see my section cheering for me here that I would hear the whole crowd yelling for me because I was the stage favorite, I would even feel the tightness of my dick and balls in my homoerotic bodybuilder briefs, and the plastic tag, smeared with Golden Tan, pinned on the side of them, the feel of the metal of the safety pin from the tag against my skin. I would look down and see my abs. with the little bumps in the muscle that are only visible at an extremely low BF, the vein running down my abdomen, striations in my glutes. Are you getting me.

The key is vivid, emotional imagination, and you just can’t get enough of it. The more of it you do the better effect you will get. Meditation or meditation techniques work great as a vehicle for these suggestions, because meditation techniques are often identical to hypnotism. Before my bodybuilding shows, I would use my tanning time as my meditation downtime. First I would pray the rosary, and then after I finished, I would imagine myself getting leaner in leaner and going through the scenarios like I related before. I would imagine the fat melting away from my body, and the skin sucking to the muscle, becoming as thin as onionskin, and veins bulging out from everywhere, and the muscles growing underneath pulsating, every striation and separation visible.

I even had a scenario where I would imagine myself growing bigger and bigger until I was as big as Godzilla, then bigger, and I was absorbing power from people I admired past and present, their knowledge and strength and abilities and attributes, and then sucking in more power, from the sun and planets and the stars in the universe, and all that flowing into me as I grew huger and larger ever leaner like some sort of mutant superhero behemoth Juggernaut God being. It was pretty motivating, to say the least.

Anyway before this gets any longer, I’ll just say that it’s very important to keep your brain focused on what you want all the time, and OFF what you don’t. It’s also very important to take special time out from your day each day. Quiet, alone, and planned. And to use this special time-out to both write down your goals, and to imagine them. [/quote]

Thanks for that, my friend.

[/quote]

Chush, check out “The Secret” by Rhonda Byrnes if you’re interested in this post.

62

[quote]Cortes wrote:
Oh. And if you can’t be bothered to form your goals on paper in as much detail as you have spent forming them in your mind, you probably don’t really want the thing that badly. You must, must write your goals down.
[/quote]

This is interesting. I remember AC saying that he keeps a journal and that it really helps with self awareness and such.

A book he recommends, The Six Pillars of Self Esteem also suggest writing (in the form of completing “sentence stems” as a means to uncovering your subconscious.

Does anyone regularly keep a journal?

65

Here’s a link to one of the best books I’ve ever read on visualization/self-hypnosis/auto-suggestion/meditation, using a process I really like called psychosynthesis.

What We May Be, by Piero Ferrucci

It was actually given to me by my Priest (who is also my mentor and one of my closest personal friends, and who is an intellectual Juggernaut). It turned out to be one of the most effective applications I’d ever encountered of the visualization techniques I’d already been practicing. It is a big book and there is NO filler. It gets RIGHT into the exercises and there are TONS of exercises, so you can try lots of different methods out and keep and/or refine the ones you like and disregard the ones you don’t.

This is one of those books that stays on my desk above almost all other books almost all the time. I cannot recommend it highly enough.

67

[quote]Chushin wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:
Here’s a link to one of the best books I’ve ever read on visualization/self-hypnosis/auto-suggestion/meditation, using a process I really like called psychosynthesis.

What We May Be, by Piero Ferrucci

It was actually given to me by my Priest (who is also my mentor and one of my closest personal friends, and who is an intellectual Juggernaut). It turned out to be one of the most effective applications I’d ever encountered of the visualization techniques I’d already been practicing. It is a big book and there is NO filler. It gets RIGHT into the exercises and there are TONS of exercises, so you can try lots of different methods out and keep and/or refine the ones you like and disregard the ones you don’t.

This is one of those books that stays on my desk above almost all other books almost all the time. I cannot recommend it highly enough. [/quote]

Just ordered it.

Thanks.[/quote]

Awesome! We’ll have to talk about it after you’ve gotten into it!

69

[quote]Edgy wrote:
[/quote]

Or one ima, maybe even a genkan for better intimacy.

70

I think my three first sentences in my journal for this year sums up me:

I am a trim athletic woman.
I enjoy what my body can do.
I speak with love and grace.

I begin each entry with those three sentences. Then I get 5 mins to elaborate, berate, meditate. Once that time is done, I move on with my day.

72

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:
Another bit of advice that many of the readers of this site who have managed to transform their bodies or lives will probably already know, intuitively, at least:

All lasting change starts at the finish.

Meaning: You need to know exactly what it is you want, down to the tiniest detail, before you can expect to have it. This is particularly true when attempting to circumvent our lumbering, evolutionarily programmed animal instincts and inclinations. So, for example, if you are obese, but you want to get down to single digit body fat, you MUST program your MIND to believe that you no longer look, feel, walk, move, talk, eat, drink, act, or think like an obese person, but like a healthy, good looking, confident, strong, organized, motivated, lean, driven bad-ass; with single-digit body fat being the necessary and inescapable result of being that person in the first place.

Every single failed endeavor fails due to faulty planning. Every one.

Want to be lean? You need to stop seeing yourself as a fat-ass. Will-power is dictated by self-talk and self-image. Strangely, once you start planning what you will look like, how you will get there, what you will feel like, what benefits you will enjoy from all of the positive changes you’ve made, and deeply, viscerally imagining this often enough that you override your present “fat-ass” programming, something magical occurs. Suddenly, the need for “will-power” all but disappears. As the programming you’ve done before hand takes over, you stop desiring what is detrimental to your goals, and start desiring, spontaneously and unconsciously, that which leads you to become that person.

Want to move up in your company? Same formula.

Want to get rich? Same formula.

Want to learn a new set of skills? Same formula.

So many of our endeavors end up failing not because we were too weak to stick with them, but because we simply did not have a clear, detailed, picture of the final result in our mind. We program ourselves to be exactly what we always have been, and then throw our hands up in the air when we get the same result we’ve always gotten.

So the next time you make a goal for yourself, before you ever start, remember:

All lasting change starts at the finish.

Oh. And if you can’t be bothered to form your goals on paper in as much detail as you have spent forming them in your mind, you probably don’t really want the thing that badly. You must, must write your goals down.

[/quote]

I think we read a lot of the same types of books…have any suggestions?[/quote]

It depends upon your needs. I’m at Operating Thetan Level 3, performing Solo Audits upon myself in order to rid myself of effects of drugs taken in past lives. You?

(^_~)

Seriously, though, I wouldn’t know where to start without know where you’re at or what you’re looking for. What is your area of interest?
[/quote]

I’m interested in self improvement of all types. I’ll check out the book you mentioned to Cush about visualization for sure. Do you have anything that you’ve read regarding managing people?

I’m a pretty even tempered guy and always fall back on the apology strategy you mentioned, people really get taken back when you change the dynamic of a conversation like that. One of the better books I’ve read on that topic is called Crucial Conversations by Kerry Patterson.

73

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:
I’m interested in self improvement of all types. I’ll check out the book you mentioned to Cush about visualization for sure. Do you have anything that you’ve read regarding managing people?[/quote]

What exactly do you mean “managing people”?

Like specific to business, or in general? Just trying to get an idea, because the book Mastery that I recommended to Cortes has a brilliant chapter about social intelligence and human nature and the like. The same author, Robert Greene, also has a book called The 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction, that I’m assuming deals with human nature. I actually read The Art of Seduction quickly before the semester started and I’m going to reread it as well as read the 48 Laws. He’s a great author and makes everything incredibly interesting.

Depending on what you meant by managing people, they might be of interest to you.

74

[quote]Edgy wrote:
[/quote]

Well, the Love Hotels around here are quite reasonable…

75

[quote]Ginavl425 wrote:
I think my three first sentences in my journal for this year sums up me:

I am a trim athletic woman.
I enjoy what my body can do.
I speak with love and grace.

I begin each entry with those three sentences. Then I get 5 mins to elaborate, berate, meditate. Once that time is done, I move on with my day.[/quote]

You get it.

76

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:
Another bit of advice that many of the readers of this site who have managed to transform their bodies or lives will probably already know, intuitively, at least:

All lasting change starts at the finish.

Meaning: You need to know exactly what it is you want, down to the tiniest detail, before you can expect to have it. This is particularly true when attempting to circumvent our lumbering, evolutionarily programmed animal instincts and inclinations. So, for example, if you are obese, but you want to get down to single digit body fat, you MUST program your MIND to believe that you no longer look, feel, walk, move, talk, eat, drink, act, or think like an obese person, but like a healthy, good looking, confident, strong, organized, motivated, lean, driven bad-ass; with single-digit body fat being the necessary and inescapable result of being that person in the first place.

Every single failed endeavor fails due to faulty planning. Every one.

Want to be lean? You need to stop seeing yourself as a fat-ass. Will-power is dictated by self-talk and self-image. Strangely, once you start planning what you will look like, how you will get there, what you will feel like, what benefits you will enjoy from all of the positive changes you’ve made, and deeply, viscerally imagining this often enough that you override your present “fat-ass” programming, something magical occurs. Suddenly, the need for “will-power” all but disappears. As the programming you’ve done before hand takes over, you stop desiring what is detrimental to your goals, and start desiring, spontaneously and unconsciously, that which leads you to become that person.

Want to move up in your company? Same formula.

Want to get rich? Same formula.

Want to learn a new set of skills? Same formula.

So many of our endeavors end up failing not because we were too weak to stick with them, but because we simply did not have a clear, detailed, picture of the final result in our mind. We program ourselves to be exactly what we always have been, and then throw our hands up in the air when we get the same result we’ve always gotten.

So the next time you make a goal for yourself, before you ever start, remember:

All lasting change starts at the finish.

Oh. And if you can’t be bothered to form your goals on paper in as much detail as you have spent forming them in your mind, you probably don’t really want the thing that badly. You must, must write your goals down.

[/quote]

I think we read a lot of the same types of books…have any suggestions?[/quote]

It depends upon your needs. I’m at Operating Thetan Level 3, performing Solo Audits upon myself in order to rid myself of effects of drugs taken in past lives. You?

(^_~)

Seriously, though, I wouldn’t know where to start without know where you’re at or what you’re looking for. What is your area of interest?
[/quote]

I’m interested in self improvement of all types. I’ll check out the book you mentioned to Cush about visualization for sure. Do you have anything that you’ve read regarding managing people?

I’m a pretty even tempered guy and always fall back on the apology strategy you mentioned, people really get taken back when you change the dynamic of a conversation like that. One of the better books I’ve read on that topic is called Crucial Conversations by Kerry Patterson. [/quote]

Thanks for the suggestion, that book looks great.

For my own suggestion to you, it’s not a book, but a multimedia seminar series (mainly audio).

Brian Tracy’s Effective Manager series is just jam-packed with immediately applicaple, extremely effective ideas, many of which, if I hadn’t heard, I “needed” to hear again. This series has been a massive source of knowledge and improvement to me with my business recently, particularly as I enter a new period of growth (which sounds great, but can actually be the worst thing that happens to a business that is not prepared to handle it). It is expensive, but the titles are broken up to make them affordable separately, and I firmly believe that any one idea from any one of the titles, properly applied, will serve to pay for the investment many times over. I cannot recommend this highly enough. Even someone at the lowest position in his company, with no one to manage, will realize that there is no such thing as having a “boss” (your only boss is yourself, everyone else is just people you interact with and negotiate with, to varying degrees) and can use the ideas in this series to position himself as too valuable to remain where he is. Really good stuff.

http://www.nightingale.com/Auth_About~Author~Brian_Tracy.aspx

77

[quote]rrjc5488 wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:
I’m interested in self improvement of all types. I’ll check out the book you mentioned to Cush about visualization for sure. Do you have anything that you’ve read regarding managing people?[/quote]

What exactly do you mean “managing people”?

Like specific to business, or in general? Just trying to get an idea, because the book Mastery that I recommended to Cortes has a brilliant chapter about social intelligence and human nature and the like. The same author, Robert Greene, also has a book called The 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction, that I’m assuming deals with human nature. I actually read The Art of Seduction quickly before the semester started and I’m going to reread it as well as read the 48 Laws. He’s a great author and makes everything incredibly interesting.

Depending on what you meant by managing people, they might be of interest to you.[/quote]

I’m speaking specific of business, but really, the same skills are useful in many different scenarios, so the books you mentioned may be helpful as well. I’ll check them out, thanks (but not the art of seduction one, haha).

79

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]Cortes wrote:
Another bit of advice that many of the readers of this site who have managed to transform their bodies or lives will probably already know, intuitively, at least:

All lasting change starts at the finish.

Meaning: You need to know exactly what it is you want, down to the tiniest detail, before you can expect to have it. This is particularly true when attempting to circumvent our lumbering, evolutionarily programmed animal instincts and inclinations. So, for example, if you are obese, but you want to get down to single digit body fat, you MUST program your MIND to believe that you no longer look, feel, walk, move, talk, eat, drink, act, or think like an obese person, but like a healthy, good looking, confident, strong, organized, motivated, lean, driven bad-ass; with single-digit body fat being the necessary and inescapable result of being that person in the first place.

Every single failed endeavor fails due to faulty planning. Every one.

Want to be lean? You need to stop seeing yourself as a fat-ass. Will-power is dictated by self-talk and self-image. Strangely, once you start planning what you will look like, how you will get there, what you will feel like, what benefits you will enjoy from all of the positive changes you’ve made, and deeply, viscerally imagining this often enough that you override your present “fat-ass” programming, something magical occurs. Suddenly, the need for “will-power” all but disappears. As the programming you’ve done before hand takes over, you stop desiring what is detrimental to your goals, and start desiring, spontaneously and unconsciously, that which leads you to become that person.

Want to move up in your company? Same formula.

Want to get rich? Same formula.

Want to learn a new set of skills? Same formula.

So many of our endeavors end up failing not because we were too weak to stick with them, but because we simply did not have a clear, detailed, picture of the final result in our mind. We program ourselves to be exactly what we always have been, and then throw our hands up in the air when we get the same result we’ve always gotten.

So the next time you make a goal for yourself, before you ever start, remember:

All lasting change starts at the finish.

Oh. And if you can’t be bothered to form your goals on paper in as much detail as you have spent forming them in your mind, you probably don’t really want the thing that badly. You must, must write your goals down.

[/quote]

I think we read a lot of the same types of books…have any suggestions?[/quote]

It depends upon your needs. I’m at Operating Thetan Level 3, performing Solo Audits upon myself in order to rid myself of effects of drugs taken in past lives. You?

(^_~)

Seriously, though, I wouldn’t know where to start without know where you’re at or what you’re looking for. What is your area of interest?
[/quote]

I’m interested in self improvement of all types. I’ll check out the book you mentioned to Cush about visualization for sure. Do you have anything that you’ve read regarding managing people?

I’m a pretty even tempered guy and always fall back on the apology strategy you mentioned, people really get taken back when you change the dynamic of a conversation like that. One of the better books I’ve read on that topic is called Crucial Conversations by Kerry Patterson. [/quote]

Thanks for the suggestion, that book looks great.

For my own suggestion to you, it’s not a book, but a multimedia seminar series (mainly audio).

Brian Tracy’s Effective Manager series is just jam-packed with immediately applicaple, extremely effective ideas, many of which, if I hadn’t heard, I “needed” to hear again. This series has been a massive source of knowledge and improvement to me with my business recently, particularly as I enter a new period of growth (which sounds great, but can actually be the worst thing that happens to a business that is not prepared to handle it). It is expensive, but the titles are broken up to make them affordable separately, and I firmly believe that any one idea from any one of the titles, properly applied, will serve to pay for the investment many times over. I cannot recommend this highly enough. Even someone at the lowest position in his company, with no one to manage, will realize that there is no such thing as having a “boss” (your only boss is yourself, everyone else is just people you interact with and negotiate with, to varying degrees) and can use the ideas in this series to position himself as too valuable to remain where he is. Really good stuff.

http://www.nightingale.com/Auth_About~Author~Brian_Tracy.aspx
[/quote]

It looks interesting and I could probably use something a bit more constructive for my car rides…but I’m a bit confused. I don’t see his Effective Manager series on the link? Or are the totality of the products from the link commonly referred to as his Effective Manager series?

Edit - found it on his website…wow that is expensive. I’m going to check out some of his other work first, it looks like his work runs the gamut on self improvement. I’ve watched some of his youtube videos in the past, I don’t think I’ve ever read anything he’s done.

80

[quote]Chushin wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:

[quote]rrjc5488 wrote:

[quote]LankyMofo wrote:
I’m interested in self improvement of all types. I’ll check out the book you mentioned to Cush about visualization for sure. Do you have anything that you’ve read regarding managing people?[/quote]

What exactly do you mean “managing people”?

Like specific to business, or in general? Just trying to get an idea, because the book Mastery that I recommended to Cortes has a brilliant chapter about social intelligence and human nature and the like. The same author, Robert Greene, also has a book called The 48 Laws of Power and The Art of Seduction, that I’m assuming deals with human nature. I actually read The Art of Seduction quickly before the semester started and I’m going to reread it as well as read the 48 Laws. He’s a great author and makes everything incredibly interesting.

Depending on what you meant by managing people, they might be of interest to you.[/quote]

I’m speaking specific of business, but really, the same skills are useful in many different scenarios, so the books you mentioned may be helpful as well. I’ll check them out, thanks (but not the art of seduction one, haha).
[/quote]
Already got that one down, eh?[/quote]

How do you think I landed my wife?