Personal Ownership – Personal Freedom
This past week’s theme in my CORE Transformation 10 Week program has all been around discussing the NLP Presupposition the Map is not the Territory.
It speaks to the realization that our experience of reality is just that, our own unique experience, which is filtered and distorted by our current thoughts and emotions at the time, and further filtered through our own beliefs about the way things work (which comes from what’s happened in history AND the MEANING we attached to it at that time).
Read that sentence over a few times, as there’s a lot to unpack there. ????
And so, when one realizes this, they can find personal freedom, because what follows is the realization that limitation is not in the world, but it often exists only in their distorted representation of the world.
This brings us to personal ownership.
Personal ownership, for me, is defined by taking accountability and responsibility over all areas of my life.
So many of us have conceded our ability to have choice over to our own limited beliefs about how the world works.
I see this all the time – people stuck in dead end minimum wage jobs, people mindlessly popping one prescription after another, people stuck in states of victimhood about events that happened years ago and people stuck in emotions and behaviours that are self-defeating
Personal Ownership requires us to realize that YOU are the controlling factor in what happens and that no one is going to do it for you.
It IS possible, but it’s going to require work.
On Wealth –
What are your beliefs around money? Do you have an abundance mindset, that there is plenty to go around? Or are you stuck in scarcity? Is money the root of all evil? Or is nothing more than a resource?
Do you have a plan? Have you run the numbers? If you keep progressing at your current rate, will you be where you want to be in 10 years?
I worked with a sales guy once who told me his goal was to hit $100K in 2 years. That’s a very reasonable goal. However, I asked him what the top guys in his company are making? He answered $75-$80K. Something about that threw me off. I then asked him to break down his commission structure for me. We quickly realized that his compensation plan was structured that it was unrealistic to hit $100K consistently – that he would have to literally always be working. It was a bad model for him. He could get all the skills but he was stuck in the wrong environment. His breakthrough happened by switching to another company where the top guys were making closer to $200K. It was much easier for him to hit his goal there.
On Health –
Understand that we can’t give ourselves over to what the so called experts say. Do your own research. Every body (see what I did there) is unique. We have a sick care system, not a health care system. Simply NOT having illness or pains shouldn’t be the goal. Aim for abundance of energy, strength, flexibility, that should be considered what’s normal. Focus on what you want, not what you don’t want.
I worked with someone who relied completely on his doctors and ignored all the signs his own body was giving him. He didn’t want to take ownership of his own health but instead blindly just followed the system. It wasn’t until our sessions that he realized that HE needed to be driving factor of his own recovery and to use his doctors as his support team part of a much bigger picture of health.
On Relationships-
We become trapped when we look at the people in our lives and expect them to change. They won’t. It always takes two to dance, and the only way you can change their patterns is if you first change yours. Ownership is taking responsibility of your own emotions, your own thoughts, and learning how to self-regulate.
And the point isn’t for them to change. The point is for you to integrate and grow. Your life experience is made up of only 10% what happens to you, the other 90% is how you respond to it.
To self-regulate is the ability to keep composure and maturity, especially during times of stress. To find calmness and gratitude on the inside when everything else on the outside perhaps is going sideways.
I worked with someone who was very angry with happened to them. But their anger didn’t change anything. It only produced more cortisol in their system and generalized into other areas of life. When they realized that the person that needed to change was them, they were able to truly move past their history and start building a new future of possibility.
I tell people, that NLP won’t change your life. It will for sure be the vehicle for that change. But it’s still YOU that’s gotta drive that vehicle, and in the direction that you choose.
So choose personal ownership.
Choose personal freedom.
De-clutter and De-stress… your Smart-Phone
This weekend, I embarked on the almost impossible task of cleaning out my office. To say it’s messy would be an understatement. I admit, I haven’t actually seen my desk for about months. There is paper everywhere. I do know where everything is, though. It’s almost a paradox. Organized clutter. Kind of like traffic in the streets of India. But it was time to clean up and so I began. A few hours later, I could see the wooden surface of my desk; papers were now neatly stacked in organized piles, and everything else was filed away. I felt … good.
I mean we’ve all read blog posts and articles of how having an organized office mean having an organized mind and so on. And when we have gone through the effort to clean things up, we do feel at peace. I wholly agree with this. And so as I reflected upon this, the idea suddenly popped into my head, what if I do the same thing but with my phone. What would happen if I empower my smartphone as I empowered my workplace?
I took out my phone and began examining the apps I have. I have everything organized, into different folders. Games in one folder. Health Apps in another. Productivity Apps in yet another. So, already things are pretty neat. But when I asked myself the question, how good do I feel about this from 1-10, I said about a 4. As a Life Coach and NLP guy, I’m always asking myself questions such as this. If I can know how something affects me emotionally, I can make a conscious decision to do something about it. The result being to empower me further. So a 4 was pretty dismal to me.
I then asked myself, well what do I need to make this a 10? What would I need to see? I realized that for me, I had too many apps with notifications, and these notifications were a constant nudge that I’m not doing something. But these weren’t important things. It was apps like SnapChat with their community message. Or games that needed me to check in. Or random news apps telling me I haven’t checked the latest headlines. GroupOn App with deals that I’m potentially missing out on. Etc… I wouldn’t exactly say it’s overwhelming, but I did begin to think what kind of an impact this must have on me at an unconscious level. I mean I must look at my phone over a hundred times a day and each time I get a snapshot of all these things that are needing my attention.
So I began deleting apps. I deleted just over half of the apps I had installed. And it was an interesting exercise. I had had three to do list apps. Another four apps that were essentially calculators. Multiple apps of stores that I hadn’t visited for months and even when I did, the app, served no real purpose. My rule was, if I haven’t used this app in the last month, then I don’t really need it. So I deleted it. My other rule was, even I have used this app, did it actually bring benefit to me? I mean what would happen if I didn’t check into SnapChat or check out the latest deals by GroupOn. Guess what, I ended up deleting both apps and then some.
I asked myself now how do I feel. It was about a 6. So I asked what more do I need to do. I realized that while it was nice to no longer see notifications for things I didn’t really care for, I could do more to evoke a positive emotional response to my phone. I asked what are the apps that bring me benefit and give me a sense of empowerment. I moved those to the first screen. There were only eight of them. I moved the other apps that I often use to the second screen and then the “now and then” apps to the third screen. I then changed the wallpaper to something that brought me a sense of peace and also motivation. See screenshots below.
So now every time I take a look at my phone, how good does it make me feel? Well, I would say a 9.
Give it a try and let me know your experience.
Oh, and in case, you did want something to clear the junk out of your iPhone. Give this a shot:
https://www.imobie.com/phoneclean/
I’ve read good things and have used it myself, but like always, do your own research first 🙂